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Track: Defense and Intelligence
Chris Steere
Lockheed Martin Corporation
1301 Virginia Drive Building 97 Suite 305
Fort Washington, PA 19034-3226
Telephone: 215-283-6969
Fax: 215-283-6970
E-mail: steere@fwo.mds.lmco.com
Integrating ArcInfo and ERDAS Imagine To Perform Terrain Analysis
The purpose of this paper is to give an overview of the methods used to integrate ArcInfo and ERDAS Imagine to satisfy the requirements of the Digital Topographic Support System/Quick Response Multicolor Printer (DTSS/QRMP). The DTSS/QRMP is a battlefield system whose purpose is to enable the U.S. Army's Terrain Teams to perform terrain analysis and produce topographic products in a more timely and automated manner than is currently possible. Based on an analysis of the two commercial products' strengths, ERDAS Imagine was utilized for the production of hard-copy products and much of the graphical user interface (GUI) and ArcInfo was used for the vector analysis. Due to this assignment of tasks, a means of communication between the two pieces of software was required. Custom code was written that passes messages from the analysis code, written in ARC Macro Language (AML), to the GUI, which was written in ERDAS Macro Language (EML) and Imagine's C Toolkit package. Another problem encountered was the
differences between the methods used by each product to define vector symbols. Custom code was written to convert ArcInfo lookup tables into ERDAS vector symbology files. In conclusion, the DTSS/QRMP is proof that it is possible to design and produce a system that integrates the analysis tools of ArcInfo and ERDAS Imagine in a manner that enhances the strengths of both products.
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