History of Changes

Map Merging Utility for OziExplorer - History of Changes

Version 1.28

Changes

Fixed major issue with mapmerge using excess memory when opening maps.

Version 1.26/1.27

Changes

To create Magellan RMP maps you are no longer forced to use the latitude/longitude map projection, any projection can be used.
Fixed issue with reading converted kap images.
1.27 - fixed issue with loading old format .map files.

Version 1.22/1.23/1.24/1.25

Changes

Now creates OZF4 image format.
Added 3 color reduction method options (Octree, Median Cut, Neural Net).
Version 1.23 - Added ability to write BigTiff (.tif) format for image files larger than 4GBytes (for licensed version).
Version 1.24 - Fixed "Integer Overflow" error on license screen.
Version 1.25 - Fixed problem reading .ozf4 map images.

Version 1.21

Changes

Added support to the purchased version to create Magellans RMP Image Maps for their Magellan GPS receivers which support them.

Version 1.20

Changes

Map Merge can be licensed (purchased) to enable the merged maps to be saved in formats TIF, JP2, PNG, JPG, ECW (limited size) as well as OziExplorer's oxfx3 format.

Version 1.17/1.18

Changes

Fixed issue where some maps were left out of the merge (blank spaces left in the created map).
Some tweaking done to color reduction algorithum.

Version 1.16

Changes

Mapmerge can now creates large format ozfx3 image files, the new large format ozfx3 images can be greater than 10GBytes in size.
Improved map management to reduce memory requirements.
Low memory use techniques implemented for png and jpg images.
Made Vista and Windows 7 aware. Unfortunately this means the configuration for Vista and Windows 7 installations will be lost as the configuration files are stored in a different location.

Version 1.15

Changes

Added support for New Zealand TM 2000 grid.
Some minor fixes.

Version 1.14

Changes

Fixed issue with maps calibrated in certain grids and using a datum other than wgs84 - the map display in mapmerge and the maps created had the map image displaced from its correct location.

Version 1.13

Changes

Fixed issue with selected map area which is not drawn from the top left.
Fixed some issues with missing maps (white areas) when merging many maps.

Version 1.12

Changes

Many internal changes - please report any type of maps which do not merge, send maps to test with if possible.
Faster again than version 1.11 when merging a large number of maps.
Added support for reading ozf2 and ozfx3 maps. It is not necessarily a good idea to merge maps to ozfx3 and then merge the merged ozfx3 maps again, each time you merge maps quality may be lost.
The 2GB limit on the temporary files has been fixed (there is now essentially no limit for these files). However the size of the completed ozfx3 file must be below 4GB.
The previous version did not create the image thumbnails correctly for a couple of image types. If you have any map thumbnails which are just black or corrupted you will need to delete the thumbnails folder (in the System Files folder), the deleted thumbnails will be recreated.

Version 1.11

Changes

Faster than version 1.10 - the speed increase may be only 25% for a single image re-projection to a factor of 3+ for for merging many maps.
Corrected the calculation of the Mercator pixel scale (thanks to JG for the description of the issue on the user group).
Have rewritten the image reading drivers for ecw and sid images.
Some changes to the bilinear filter.
Fixed some problems.

Version 1.10

Changes

Much faster than version 1.05 - the speed increase may be a factor of 3 for a single image re-projection to a factor of 50 for for merging many maps.
Added bilinear filtering to the re-projection process so the final image will have a smoother look. Bilinear filtering will have no affect if you are doing significant scale reduction on an image, the effective range is 50 to 100% resizing.
Added sharpening to reduce the blurring effect of the bilinear filtering.
Improved color lookup algorithm (colors in final image may match source images better).
Other minor changes.

Version 1.05

Changes

The ozfx3 files created by this version will now work faster - this will be particularly noticeable on slow PDA's or slow memory cards.
Added the ability to specify the % resize of the final map. If you want the final image to be lower resolution than the originals this does a smart bilinear resize of the merged image which of course looks much better.
Added a new column in the maps list for status, this shows if the map image could not be found or is not supported.
Added an "Action List" to show what maps have been opened and closed and how many maps are currently open. This is displayed during the merging process.
Many internal changes have been made.

Version 1.04

Fixes

Fixed a problem where the map would jump to a new location when selecting maps with the mouse.

Changes

Another method of finding map the map within in the neat lines (corner markers) is being tried.

Version 1.03

Fixes

Many minor issues.

Changes

When looking for the map within the neat lines (corner markers) the map had to be within the border (not on the line), this worked ok for joined maps which had some overlap but did not work correctly for maps with no overlap, a row of pixels could be missed. The algorithm has been changed to find parts of the map within or on the border.
Selected maps in the Map List will now always show on top of the unselected maps.
Added a new button called Refresh, this will repaint the map viewing window. Useful when changes have been made to the maps selected in the maps list, the map viewing window will be repainted and the selected maps will be drawn on top of the unselected maps.
Added a new Create Map option From Drawn Region (Selected Maps only). During the map creating only selected maps will be used.
Removed the Zoom Out button from the toolbar, it was unnecessary as Zoom Out can be done by right clicking the mouse.
Added a new button called Show Selected Map Extents, it shows the extent of only the maps you have selected in the Map List.
Added a new button called Invert, it inverts the selections in the Map List.
Adding a new folder to the Folder List, or deleting a folder from the list will no longer force the other selected folders in the list (if any) to be scanned as well.
After creating a map a dialog will be shown giving the start, end and elapsed times.

Version 1.02

Notes

Map Merge will scan all map files in the selected folders. In many cases these map files contain errors such as bad calibrations, incorrect corner markers and a variety of other problems. An attempt is made to eliminate the map files which could cause problems but this is not always possible. If you receive errors when scanning map folders then check the map files in the folder, 1 or more will not be valid.

Fixes

Certain Grids such as Irish Grid and perhaps Swedish, France II and France IV grids would not work at all, this has been fixed.
Sid images were being displaced in the destination map vertically by many pixels (a random number), now fixed.
Many minor issues.

Changes

A new Checkbox called "Auto Scan Folders" has been added to the configure tab. If checked the maps in the selected folders will be scanned as the folders are added, or folders in the folder list are ticked or un-ticked. If "Auto Scan Folders" is un-ticked the new "Scan Folders" button needs to be manually pressed to do the scanning.
The different mouse modes (controlled by the buttons on the toolbar) can now do multiple tasks - example the map select mode can also drag the map, the draw region mode can now zoom in and out by clicking the mouse buttons.
Maps which could not be processed in the initial scan phase are now shown in a dialog at the end of the scanning. The reason why they could not be processed is not shown (not yet anyway).

Version 1.01

Notes

To process SID images a new version of the OziMrSID dll must be downloaded from the Optional_extras web page.
For Destination Maps using the Latitude/Longitude map projection the map scale (meters/pixel) is only approximate as the map scale varies depending on the latitude.
If the png dll is found then the image thumbnails will be created in the png format instead of the bmp format and will therefore be smaller.

Fixes

Fixed map calibration issues for destination maps created using grids
For the Latitude/Longitude projection the map scale (meters/pixel) is now calculated using the center of the Destination Map.
Map Zooming should now work better.
other minor issues

Changes

The datum of the Destination Map can now be specified.
The mouse pointer now changes depending on which toolbar button is selected.

Beta Version 1.00 Released July 2004