Global Mapper v21.0 is Now Available!
Blue Marble Geographics is pleased to announce the availability of the official Global Mapper v21.0 release for download at
http://www.bluemarblegeo.com/products/global-mapper-download.php.
New in v21.0
Significant New Features
- The Global Mapper MangoMap Extension. This new data sharing tool allows users to publish maps to MangoMap online map site directly from Global Mapper. The MangoMap Extension allows users to quickly and easily share online maps in a new and powerful way.
- Global Mapper Mobile 2.0. The Mobile 2.0 release for iOS and Android features many free updates and a new Pro version available for purchase. Features include streaming online data, expanded projection support (for packages exported from Global Mapper 21), many UI enhancements,
- Improved feature label creation and management including assigning labels to their own layer and individual label editing and moving.
- Improved layer management with target layer selection now available in all vector feature creation dialog boxes
- New tool for identifying local peaks and depressions in a terrain layer
- New tool for recording a fly- and walk-mode path in the 3D Viewer as a line feature, which can be used to create a fly-through recording
- Improved layer template creation for form-based data collection. This is especially useful when collecting data in the field on Global Mapper Mobile/li>
- Keyframe animation allowing the display of a sequence of layers to visualize change over time
- New option to calculate Strahler's stream order as part of watershed analysis
- New function to add a specified slope to vector features
- New option to create a textured 3D model from terrain and draped imagery
- New option to allow the export of Global Mapper Mobile package files (for use in Global Mapper Mobile) in the current display projection (requires Global Mapper Mobile 2.0)
LiDAR Module Features
- Automatic identification, reclassification and extraction of utility poles from a point cloud layer
- New masking option in the Pixels-to-Points tool to eliminate uniform background colors from images. This is especially useful when attempting to process oblique images that contain sky.
- Reorganized Pixels-to-Points dialog box with larger Image Preview window.
- Improved orthoimage and point cloud quality when created from a mesh (3D Model) during the Pixels-to-Points operation using the 'High' quality setting.
- New option in the Pixels-to-Points tool for orthorectifying each camera image.
- New function for displaying the approximate ground coverage polygons for selected images in the Pixels-to-Points tool.
- Support for deriving image locations (EXIF information) from external text files such as those reported from RTK or PPK
- New Pixels-to-Points option for harmonizing colors in input images that have inconsistent contrast to produce better reconstruction results
- New tool for panning the Image Preview in the Pixels-to-Points dialog box by dragging with the middle mouse button
- New Pixels-to-Points tool for identifying images that may contain ground control points based on their location
- Speed improvements when gridding LiDAR with large gaps and when selecting large numbers of LiDAR points with the Digitizer Tool
New in v20.1
Significant New Features
- New option to allow zooming in the Path Profile view
- Support for setting the projection to use at startup
- Option to display legend within the Path Profile view when multiple terrain layer lines are rendered
- New Digitizer tool for closing gaps between adjacent area or line features
- Dramatically faster viewshed calculations on computers with multiple cores
- Significant speed improvements loading and working with workspaces, GMP files, and any vector data with attributes
- Support for downloading vector features from Esri RESTful data sources
- New format support including OpenFlight, HEC-RAS raster and vector formats, and more
LiDAR Module Features
- LiDAR toolbar option to query points by distance from points of a specified classification or from vector line features
- Tool for selecting LiDAR points above or below a line drawn in the Path Profile view
- New option to apply thinning to selected points, to thin by retaining every Nth point, and to control whether to mark thinned points as deleted or move them to a new layer
- EDIT_LIDAR and DEFINE_LIDAR_FILTER script commands that allow editing of points based on their proximity to other LiDAR points and/or line features
- New option to quickly select points by classification in selected LiDAR layers
New in v20
Significant New Features
- A new tool for creating a 3D point cloud from a mesh or 3D model
- A new free flight mode for navigating in 3D
- Eyedropper tool for selecting a color directly from a raster image in the map view
- Dramatic speed improvements for the load time of many vector formats such as shapefiles
- Expanded support for Windows Tablet and touch screen computers
- New Map Layout options including legend filtering and creating a map book from selected features
- Improvements to Vector display in 3D including smoothness of movement on large datasets
- Streamlined licensing process
LiDAR Module Features
- New tool for creating a 3D model surface from selected LiDAR points
- Support for spatially thinning Lidar point clouds
- New tool for gridding LiDAR Data by Classification
- New option to create higher quality orthoimage during the Pixels to Points process by creating the image from the 3D mesh rather than the point cloud
- New option to extract buildings from LiDAR as 3D models rather than 3D vector areas
New in v19.1
Significant New Features
- New option to perform multivariate queries of vector data attributes using a wide variety of expressions and functions
- Consolidated attribute management with the Attribute Join and Calculate tools incorporated in the Attribute Editor window
- Expanded drag-and-drop window docking, now supporting the Graph window, Map Layout Editor, and secondary 2D Views
- Enhanced 3D Viewer, allowing the user more precise control over the process of zooming and panning
- Support for reading and writing LAZ (LasZip) files with the LAS 1.4 fields
- Support for batch converting between 3D model formats (i.e. Blender, Collada DAE, OBJ, Sketchup, etc.)
- New option to capture the linear path of a profile line or perpendicular profiles as 3D vector line features
LiDAR Module Features
- New function in the Pixels-to-PointsT tool for creating a 3D mesh (3D model) with photo textures in OBJ or GMP format
- New option to import Ground Control Points from a file or a loaded point layer in the Pixels-to-Points tool
- New option when exporting a point cloud to GMP to export to sort the data by the 2D position. This improves the processing speed when re-imported
New in v19
Significant New Features
- New Attribute Editor, replacing the old vector search function. In addition to querying, this tool now allows for spreadsheet-style editing of feature attributes in a dockable window
- Improved hillshade rendering with an interactive tool for dynamically positioning the light source using real time click and drag control
- Drag and drop docking for 3D, Path Profile and Attribute Editor windows
- Many new online data sources for the U.S. and Canada including many individual states and provinces
- New option to limit the extent of terrain data displayed in the 3D Viewer based on the geographic extent of the 2D map
- Several new built-in raster calculation functions including Normalized Difference Snow Index (NDSI) and Advanced Vegetation Index (AVI)
Scripting Changes
- Script commands that take a source FILENAME now support multiple FILENAME parameters for the command to match multiple filename masks
- Improved handling of local files when loading a moved workspace. Local files at or under the workspace folder will be preferred to explicit file paths in the original workspace folder
- Redesigned Scripting Reference Guide offering easy access to script parameters
New in v18.2
Significant New Features
- Support for Amazon Web Services (AWS) Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3) Open Cloud Datasets which allows sources to be imported from S3 buckets and data formats can now be exported to writeable S3 buckets
- New toolbar in the Control Center for easy access to common functions (i.e. Options, Metadata, Close Layer, Select All Features, Zoom To, and Toggle Show/Hide)
- Dockable Overview Map window in the main view that displays the full bounds of loaded data, with rectangles representing the current bounds of all 2D view windows - this is useful for working in a small area in one window while retaining the full map view in another
- Support for read/write to new beta version of Global Mapper Mobile for Android
- New ability to digitize Points, Lines, and Area features, by snapping to other data in the 3D Viewer
- New built-in sources for the 1-arc-second (30m) resolution SRTM and ESA CCI Land Cover data for the entire world
- 3D fly-through playback loop option
- Fly-through view position and heading now displayed in 2D View during playback and preview
- Support for Geographic Calculator 2017
- Improved lighting model for display of vector features and models in the 3D Viewer
LiDAR Module Features
- New ability to apply 3D breaklines and flatten 3D areas when gridding LiDAR data using a Bin Grid method - this allows for the creation of Hydro-flattened terrain surfaces from LiDAR and other point clouds
- Saved workspaces now include shared LiDAR draw mode setting if LiDAR data is loaded and the LiDAR module active
- New LIDAR_COMPARE script command for performing LiDAR to control point compare and adjust in a script
- New LiDAR draw modes for coloring by the withheld, overlap, and model key point flags
- New ability to filter LiDAR points (either selected or when performing operations like gridding) by the withheld, overlap, and key point status flags
- New option in LiDAR import dialog to control whether or not withheld points are marked as deleted
New in v18.1
Significant New Features
- New option to freeze the 3D View when zooming and panning the 2D map
- Significantly improved usability/speed of model and raster display in 3D View
- Faster loading and display of vector layers
- Support for many new formats, including LandXML(export), RMaps/MBTiles (import), BPF Lidar (import), Autodesk FBX (import/export), and GSF (import)
- New online data sources including General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO)
- New option to apply a bank angle value and variable velocity to each flight segment with creating a 3D fly-through
- Support for calculating cut-and-fill volume results for multiple line features at once
- Map draw can now be paused when mouse wheel is scrolled
- New option to derive range ring radius from an attribute
- New tool for calculating color statistics in a raster layer within an defined area
Scripting Changes
- New command for for measuring the volume between two surfaces CALC_VOLUME_BETWEEN_SURFACES
LiDAR Module Features
- New LiDAR QC tool for comparing point cloud elevations with known elevations at control points and for adjusting the point cloud elevations to match
- New option to visualize and filter LiDAR point clouds by density
- New tool for adding colors to a point cloud from a gridded layer (eg, NDVI, land cover)
New in v18
- Significant New Features
- Redesigned user interface with new button graphics and fresh new logo
- Dramatically improved 3D Viewer with high performance, asynchronous, multi-threaded, 3D rendering boosting display speeds and data resolution
- Full range rendering of LiDAR and raster/ terrain data with “infinite view” display and dynamic detail as the 3D View is zoomed and panned
- Display of multiple surfaces in the 3D View and “mole’s-eye” view for a subterranean perspective
- Improved 3D vector selection capability and measuring tools
- Twelve new 3D point styles including utility pole and push pin as well as improved 3D point style assignment and management
- Significantly improved display and export of large raster and terrain files
- Updated toolbars providing convenient access to advanced Digitizing and Analysis functions
- Toolbar customization allowing buttons to be assigned to or removed from each toolbar, which can now be docked on the side or bottom of the map view
- Selectable themes providing a variety of window colors and styles
- Redesigned dockable Overlay Control Center with layer tree view and streamlined access to layer options and metadata
- Updated Configuration dialog box with intuitively organized settings and preferences layout
- Support for importing and exporting OGC GeoPackage format files
- Support for importing PDF files as vector layers (lines, points, and areas) rather than as a raster image
- New Floating Single User License option allowing a single user to easily move a license between desktop and laptop computer
- LiDAR Changes
- Enhanced 3D View supports display of an entire point cloud regardless of size
- Improved building extraction with 3D vector features created for floor, wall, and roof areas
New in v17.2
- Significant New Features
- An update to the Map Layout functionality for designing a PDF Map Book that applies the same layout to multiple pages
- Support for saving multiple map layouts in a workspace
- Support for macros in the text element so that the element text can include the projection, scale, date, and time and improved flexibility of grid overlay
- A new feature in the 3D View to render a path profile as a cut-away of the terrain
- Support for pan sharpening color imagery using higher resolution panchromatic (grayscale) imagery
- A new option when creating Global Mapper Package (GMP) files to save imagery layers in JPEG 2000 format, significantly reducing the file size
- Downloading or streaming imagery through a WMS now includes the option to define the extent of the data to a selected area or polygon
- FLOW_ANGLE attribute added to flow direction points created during Watershed Analysis
- When importing a PDF, the DPI at which to display the file can now be selected
- Improved import speed of text-based file formats
- A new tool for performing an inverse crop in a raster layer, allowing a hole to be easily created in the imagery
- An update to the Quick Point Creator to allow faster point creation by skipping the Feature Edit dialog
- Dramatically faster export of multiple tiles to raster (image) formats
- Support for loading ENVI .ima multi-band imagery layers
- Scripting Changes
- Support for creating a distance/bearing/COGO line using the IMPORT_ASCII command
- LiDAR Module Features
- Reduced memory requirements and increased draw speeds for Lidar point clouds loaded from text-based formats (.ply, .xyzi, etc.) as well as MrSID Lidar formats
New in v17.1
- Significant New Features
- New tool for creating multiple perpendicular profiles along a defined path and for easily cycling through these profile views perpendicular to the original path.
- Display of the Path Profile in the multi-view layout allowing the simultaneous display of 2D, 3D and Profile views in the same interface.
- Filtering function to determine which layers are displayed in each 2D map view in the multi-view interface. For instance, one view might be used to display aerial imagery for a project location while the adjacent map shows a gridded terrain layer for the same area.
- Option to save the multi-view layout in the workspace. Each time the workspace is loaded, the preconfigured multi-view display will be recreated
- New attribute management function for creating Feature Templates. Templates offer a predefined list of attributes for a layer with pick lists for faster and more accurate attribute entry when collecting data in the field.
- Map Layout improvements including grid display, custom map scale options, and export to geospatial pdf
- Export function for saving Search results in CSV format.
- Improved display for high-resolution monitors
- Support for Geographic Calculator 2016 with using GeoCalc mode for projection management
- Support for batch converting data to ADRG and ASRP format files
- New LiDAR Module Features
- New Custom Feature Extraction Tool including ability to manually select a series of points as part of a custom area or line feature for extracting it to a custom geometry. Feature vertices are placed while cycling through the profile views resulting in precise 3D line or area features such as road edge and curb lines, powerlines, and buildings
- New Toolbar button for quickly and easily assigning the Ground classification to selected points
- Added support for editing which classification groups a Lidar class belongs to
New in v17
- Significant New Features
- Dramatic Speed Improvements – depending on data and machine anywhere from 5 to times faster for all types of data processing and rendering
- New Cartographic Map Publishing tool including:
- A paper scale interface that actually lets you see the layout in the paper proportions
- Easier addition of overlays for graphics, text, legend, scale bar, north arrows etc, and positioning these elements through click and drag
- Template creation and template library
- New flexible view interface with dock-able windows and multiple map views for better data visualization and manipulation
- Several new built-in online sources, including US National Map sources (w/ 1 foot color imagery source), World Navigation Charts (1:1M Scale ONC Charts), and Australian water sources
- New support for CPT palette files, both for layer color palettes and for initializing elevation shaders and updated support for PLY, PNG (added EXIF tag support), Sketchup, CPT and USGS Earth Explorer formats
- Updated logging information now available for scripting, along with many other scripting enhancements
- Speed improvements and threading updates for many large format raster and vector data types
- Updates to GPS Tracking, to support Glonass and Baidu NMEA positions, as well as new tracking functions to follow the live position more closely and orient the map to the GPS Heading
- Added new GPS toolbar buttons to control whether or not the main display centers on the GPS vessel location and automatically rotates to keep the GPS heading towards the top of the display
- Attribute Calculation now stores the previous formula for new attributes, if one exists, so that a user can have see what changes a previous formula made to an attribute .Added a new right-click option on the Feature Vertex dialog so you can easily duplicate vertices for an area feature. This allows you to use the “Pen Up” draw mode option to turn off the drawing of some segments of the area border
- LiDAR
- Automatic classification and extraction for power lines and noise points
- Dramatic speed enhancements for LiDAR and other Point Cloud data for drawing, gridding and load
- Updated building and vegetation classification
- Fast spatial thinning and threading for very large datasets
- Calculation of basic rooftop statistics from point clouds
- 3D updates
- Dramatic 3D display speed optimizations
- Support for using custom 3D models symbol styles for any point feature in the 3D window for example graphically pleasing tree models for extracted trees
- Export of 3D data formats, including PLY, OBJ, and Collada (DAE), and STL
New in v16.2
- Significant New Features
- Added a new 3D navigational aid, the pivot axis, which shows the scene rotation pivot location. This may be toggled on or off using the 3D right-click context menu or by using the Ctrl+Shift+P hotkey
- When recording a fly-through video file, the video file will automatically be associated with the fly-through feature so users can easily play it back from the Feature Info or Digitizer Tool
- Dramatically sped up the export of high bit-depth/multi-band exports, especially from map catalogs with large numbers of maps
- Added support for Unity RAW/JPG, ADRG, GGM Gravity Grids and Esri zLas Lidar
- Improved support for NetCDF and SketchUp SKP including the newer SketchUp SKP files and the ability to load in the 64 bit version
- Added write support for 3D formats Collada, Obj, Sdl, and Ply
- Added option to Invert Selection to the Digitizer Tool right-click Advanced Selection submenu
- New script command: GENERATE_VIEWSHED to perform a view shed analysis using loaded elevation grid data with a user-specified transmitter location, height, and radius. All areas within the selected radius that have a clear line of sight to the transmitter are colored with a user-specified color
- Added built-in online sources for the Atlas of the Cryosphere, providing polar data like snow and ice cover for various years. These sources are under the new ENVIRONMENT built-in group on the online source dialog
- Added option to reverse the order of selected maps on the Control Center right-click menu
New in v16.1
- Significant New Features
- New option to rotate the map view, both manually and automatically
- Added ability to select and measure features in the 3D viewer
- Enhanced Attribute Calculation function with the ability to calculate new attribute values using spreadsheet-like formulas
- New UAV or Aerial tracking playback option to display a video file synced to any line feature with per-vertex times, fly-through lines or point features with recognized timestamp attributes
- Numerous improvements to LiDAR Module analysis features such as automated building and vegetation classification, feature extraction, and building height calculations for more streamlined processing and improved output
- Support for several new file formats, including load directly from .7z archives, and support for Landmark Graphics Vector, ZFS Lidar, ArcGIS Layer Pack (.lpk), Rockworks XML Grid, and Carlson Grid/Geoid files
- Sped up online sources by downloading data in the background making the display of this data several times faster in many cases
- Added several new online sources including FEMA Hazard Maps, Mexican INEGI layers, and CORINE 2006 land coverage
- Improved Watershed Calculation option to create a flow direction point layer with a selected symbol
- Added support for finding the location associated with a MapCode
- Scripting Changes
- Added support for exporting only specific layers from an EXPORT script command
- Added support for exporting everything outside of selected polygons rather than inside
- Added support for cropping a script EXPORT* command to an area feature selected in the Digitizer Tool
- Updated EDIT_VECTOR command to allow filtering what is operated on to a bounding box
- Added support for setting a large number of advanced options with the SET_OPT command using new MISC_OPT and MISC_OPT_VALUE parameters
- Added support for more built-in variable names to allow easily logging the time required for scripts to run
- Added facility for calculating new attribute values using formulas using the new CALC_ATTR_FORMULA script command
- Added support for new script variables using formulas in the DEFINE_VAR script command
New in v16.0
- Significant New Features
- Dramatically faster processing speeds by leveraging multiple cores, significantly reducing the processing time required for operations like contour generation, view-shed calculations, gridding, and re-projecting layers that cover a large area of the world.
- Many significant updates and new tools for working with 3D data
- Support for several 3D formats, for a complete list click here
- The ability to link the 2D and 3D viewer so panning, zooming, and adding vector features will automatically replicate in both windows
- New toolbar and support for setting up and recording HD 3D fly-through video
- Support for a Skybox in 3D, rendering a sky simulation
- Improved support for draping vector data in 3D
- Support for tracking GPS in 3D
- Support for 3D textures and meshes into GMP files
- New graphing and charting tools, useful for vector and raster analysis
- Added operations for bar graph, histogram, line chart, or pie chart from any attribute field in loaded vector layers
- Histograms for gridded terrain layers
- Save graphs to a BMP file and place it on the map as a fixed screen position layer
- Graph definitions are saved in the workspace file for easy saving and sharing
- Added option to export selected layers from Control Center
- Updated ASTER GDEM v2 worldwide terrain data set for higher resolution and much faster server
- Merged all functionality from the Global Energy Mapper Module into the base product of Global Mapper v16 and higher
- New toolbar to access Blue Marble’s Geographic Calculator coordinate transformation library for users with an active license
- Button options include enable/disable GeoCalc projections, editing settings, and a button to launch the Geographic Calculator
- Added support for conditional expressions in the Raster Calculator
- Several updates to the Digitizer tools
- Many new scripting commands for automating LiDAR functionality and other tasks
- LiDAR Features
- Powerful new LiDAR features have been added to the LiDAR Module, for a complete list click here
- Dramatically faster processing of point cloud searches
- Quickly display and process LiDAR point clouds with over 10’s of millions of points
- Added new built-in point type for Railroad ASPRS class 10 (LiDAR, Railroad)
- Added support for coloring points by the point index
- Updated display of min/max Scan Angle on the Statistics dialog for LiDAR point clouds to show the min/max values in degrees rather than the raw scaled values
- Updated creation of point clouds from elevation grid cell centers to create the points in the full native units of the layer and not a more precise unit like centimeters
New in Previous Releases
- New feature creation automation
- Numerous new online datasources and OpenStreetMap vector data via WMS
- More buffer creation flexibility
- New hyperlink connectivity with features
- Powerful new scripting including - Conditional processing within a script (IF/THEN/ELSE)
- Random point generation within specified area. Very useful for sampling/analysis.
- Support for multiple light sources when rendering hill shading
- New Search option to only limit search to features selected with the Digitizer
- Support for 3D models from Collada DAE files
- GEM connection to Geographic Calculator 2014
- Added option to keep the original file offset/scale or for specifying a new one when exporting to LiDAR LAS/LAZ files
- New ability to crop to a selected area when specifying the bounds to import from a LiDAR point cloud
- Added ability to export point cloud to Esri File Geodatabases (GDB) as normal 3D point features
- Added support for loading data from and exporting data to MS SQL Server Spatial databases.
- Updated the Raster Calculator to support calculations from elevation grid layers.
- Dramatically sped up raster/elevation exports cropped to complex area features. For very complex areas (i.e. hundreds or thousands of vertices) the exports may be 10x as fast or even better!
- Added built-in links to several online sources, including all NASA GIBS (Global Imagery Browse) sources, Landsat8 imagery and Lidar data (new Lidar group in dialog) from the USGS EarthExplorer web site, and GlobCover ESA2009 Land Cover data.
- Added option to 3D Path Profile to display the path from each terrain layer separately. This allows easily comparing the surface of multiple loaded terrain layers along a path.
- Also added support for specifying to sample elevations from gridded terrain surfaces along a corridor in the path profile to easily get the minimum, maximum, or average elevation surrounding the path.
- Added Attribute Setup tab to Shapefile export to allow customizing exported attribute types and lengths.
- New Summit Evolution Extension
- Added support for feature extension plugins to Global Mapper. These allow 3rd-parties and customers to create add-ins to Global Mapper to extend functionality through their own toolbars and/or menu items. The feature extensions will have access to all data loaded in the Global Mapper application instance through same API used by the Global Mapper SDK. There is an item under the Help menu for managing the installation and registration of feature extension plugins and add-in modules. For more information contact sales.
- New LiDAR module with advanced LiDAR analysis functionality. The licensing is handled under a new Help menu option for working with module and feature extension licenses. Visit our purchasing page for more info.
- Added Raster Calculator under Analysis menu for performing mathematical operations on multi-band imagery to extract different types of information. Users can use pre-defined formulas, like NDVI and NDWI, or create your own free-hand formulas using common mathematical operations, like addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and powers, as well as simple operators like absolute value, minimum value, and maximum value of 2 values.
- Added support for passing variables on the command line to a script. Users can provide the variable after the script (.gms) filename itself on the command line in the form '-var_name var_value'. For example,
'global_mapper.exe "c:\my_path\my_script.gms" -my_var my_var_value'
- Added support for importing and exporting 3D PDF files. Underlying data format in PDF 3D Annotations may be U3D or PRC. However PRC is not supported at this time.
- Added support for loading E57 Lidar files.
- Added support for CMIP5 HDF5 data sets with sea surface temperatures.
- Added support for loading text files with the coordinates stored as ECEF (Earth-Centered Earth-Fixed) coordinates. The Coordinate Format drop-down on the ASCII Text Import dialog has an option to specify that the coordinates are ECEF.
- Added support for GCP (control-point) files with the pixel coordinates specified as a percentage value rather than an absolute pixel coordinate. Userful when users have text placement files with just the corner coordinates users can easily add 0% or 100% for the X and Y pixel coordinates of each corner to get a good placement.
- Improved Volume Measurement Tools such as one too measure the volume difference within multiple area features.
- Added new right-click option to the ‘Search Vector Data’ dialog to allow calculating and displaying the statistics for a numeric column in a result set including minimum, maximum, average, and standard deviation.
- Many scripting updates and additions, including support for calculating attributes, splitting layers, and interactively prompting users for files and folders.
- Many LiDAR enhancements, including search by elevations, rendering of points based on return value, point loading slider bar, reporting tools for point cloud density, improved import/export options including point cloud to DXF/DWG.
- Additional LiDAR processing improvements such as;
- Dramatic increase in LiDAR processing and display speed, and the ability to view and process point files in the hundreds of millions range. This is beneficial for previewing the data before processing and includes rendering intensity values in a variety of ways such as; limiting import by return type, statistics display and feature attribute editing
- Global Mapper Package (GMP) files are now able to store Lidar point clouds in a special compressed manner much smaller (4-10 times usually) than uncompressed LAS data in line with the best compression on the market today
- Ability to render the intensity values as grayscale images, coloring by LiDAR classification, and coloring by point elevation or RGB color if present
- Ability to limit import of LiDAR files by return type (like first, last, first of many, last of many return, etc.)
- Added display of a large number of statistics for LiDAR data
- Updated editing of LiDAR point features to have special edit dialogues for the attributes that apply to LiDAR point data
- Global Mapper Package (GMP) files now being able to store Lidar point clouds in a special compressed manner much smaller (4-10 times usually) than uncompressed LAS data
- New USB Dongle licensing available
- Added new Analysis menu (formerly the Terrain Analysis Menu) option to compute the areas covered when you raise the water level of selected areas or a fixed elevation by some height. This is useful for modeling the rise of a flood plain by some height or by modeling sea level rise
- Added option to Analysis menu to allow calculation of Voronoi/Theissen polygons for loaded point features
- New File Formats: GeoMedia MDB, DWG 2013, MapBox MBTiles and RMaps SQlite files for use on mobile devices like Andriod and much more
- Many new Digitizer tool improvements and bug fixes including a new option to Advanced Feature Creation submenu to create a coverage area (concave hull) for loaded or selected point features. This allows you to easily get the coverage for an irregularly shaped grouping of points, like in a Lidar data set
- Updated DigitalGlobe premium imagery with access to new DigitalGlobe servers with faster access to more up-to-date and higher resolution imagery in most locations
- Added support for specifying custom paper sizes for geospatial PDF export.
- Added MapQuest OpenAerial Worldwide Imagery as built-in source
- Load many geospatial PDF files at higher resolution
- Added built-in access to Geologic Map datasets for most of the world using the Download Online Imagery/Data menu
- Many enhancements to the Digitizer tool
- New format support for LogASCII, Norwegian SOSI export, PCI Geomatix PIX, NDVI in HDF5 format, EasyGPS .loc, and several others
- Added new network licensing option with borrow feature and concurrent seat access.
- New Geospatial PDF functionality like import/export to 64-bit versions, ability to select which layer to load and ability to load multi-page PDfs with geo-positioning.
- Significantly sped up depression filling step when generating watersheds/drainage areas.
- Added built-in access to land cover datasets and generation of grids from layers.
- Many new enhancements to the Digitizer tool.
- Added support for LAS 1.4 and LASzip (compressed Lidar) files.
- Added support for JeoJSON and Digital Bathymetric Database Variable Resolution (DBDB-V).
- Created native 64-bit version of Global Mapper, allowing users of 64-bit versions Windows to work with much larger data sets.
- Support for importing/exporting GeoPDF® files!
- Support for exporting loaded vector data to DWG files.
- Added built-in access to global street-level maps from OpenStreetMap.org, NAIP color imagery for the US, worldwide ASTER GDEM terrain data, 10m (1/3rd arc second) US NED terrain data, MapMart On Demand, and US Parcel Data via the File->Download Online Imagery/Data menu command.
- Added support for numerous new formats, including ESRI Personal Geodatabase (MDB), BigTIFF, MrSID MG4 LIDAR, Vertical Mapper (MapInfo) Grid/Clutter, SOSI, QCT, QED, HTF, SPS, BAG, ARCS, and many others.
- The 3D Viewer now supports displaying 3D vector features in space above or below the terrain surface. You can also extrude 3D area features to create building-like displays.
- Added map layout support for easily adding margins, text, map legend, and north arrows to your map and setting up the display and location of the distance scale and elevation legend.
- Added support for automatically delineating stream networks and watershed areas using loaded terrain/DEM data using the File->Generate Watershed menu command.
- Built-in DigitalGlobe imagery access was significantly improved with much more worldwide data available.
- Added support for exporting multi-band GeoTIFF, BIL, and JPEG2000 files with 8, 16, or 32-bits per band.
- Updated the Control Center to support assigning groups to selected layers via the right-click menu. Those groups can then be collapsed in the Control Center to allow easily selecting, closing, or hiding/showing that group.
- Added 'Area Styles', 'Line Styles', and 'Point Styles' tabs to Options dialog for vector layers allowing users to setup the styling of features in a layer. Now users can use the default type-based styling, apply a single style to all features in a layer, setup an attribute-based styling system that styles the features based on the value of an attribute value or the display label, or randomly assign colors to the features in a layer.
- Added support for loading ESRI File Geodatabase (GDB) data sets.
- Added support for generating density grids from point features in a loaded layer. This density grid can be based on either just a count of the point features or any numeric attribute value associated with the points.
- Added support for joining a file with attributes to the attribute table of an existing loaded spatial layer against a common attribute.
- Added support for resampling raster and elevation layers using bicubic interpolation or a box average of size 3x3, 4x4, 5x5, or 7x7 in addition to the previously available options of nearest neighbor and bilinear interpolation. The "anti-alias" option on the Raster Options dialog has been replaced with one for selecting the sampling method to use.
- Added support to combine area features, find the intersection of area features, and crop line and areas features to a crop area on export to some vector formats.
- Added real-time display of current cursor information (location, distance, elevation) to 3D Path Profile dialog. In addition, you can now also click to define a sub-path on the 3D Path Profile dialog and get information about that sub-path displayed.
- Added support for scaling point symbols, adding custom point symbols from PNG, GIF, JPG, and (new vector) .gmsym files, and easily creating symbols of custom sizes and colors for common shapes, like dots, squares, etc.
- Added toolbar for Digitizer/Edit Tool to make it easier to perform many commonly used operations.
- Added ability to create new line features by tracing them without clicking at each vertex with the Digitizer/Edit Tool.
- Added ability to rotate and scale features using the Digitizer/Edit Tool.
- Added more control over placement of labels for point features. Now when choosing the font to use for point features, you can also choose where to place the label for the point relative to the point location. An automatic setting will try different locations to try and make the label fit.
- Added support for selecting/changing the layer that features are in when editing existing features and creating new ones with the Digitizer Tool.
- Added KML/KMZ Super Overlay Support! This allows working with huge data sets in Google Earth. The option to automatically grid the data on the KML/KMZ export dialog enables this behavior.
- Added support for creating new feature coordinates based on distance/bearing and/or COGO values from a start location using the Digitizer Tool.
- Added option on the Gridding tab for exports to grid to the currently selected area features. This will create a separate export file for each selected area feature. Naming can be done using the display labels or an attribute of the selected area feature(s).
- Added options when editing multiple features to rename attributes and also to copy the values of one attribute to a different attribute.
- Added new Coordinate Convertor option under the Tools menu to allow easily converting a coordinate between any two supported projections/datums/units.
- Added ability to Search Vector Data dialog to limit your search to the existing search results. This effectively allows you to query on multiple attributes/values.
- Added a large collection of new available line styles to use when rendering line features or area feature borders.
- Added option to crop a loaded raster layer to the currently selected area feature to the Cropping tab of the Raster Options dialog accessible from the Overlay Control Center.
- Added support for exporting loaded vector data to the MapInfo TAB/MAP format.
- Added ability to easily create strike-and-dip (geology) points by right-clicking in the Digitizer Tool. You can now place your strike-and-dip points and specify the dip value, azimuth angle, and symbol to use and get the appropriate symbology displayed on the map.
- Added support for adding custom area fill styles from image files.
- Added support for rotating point symbols by a user-specified angle.
- Added option to the Digitizer Tool to calculate the minimum, maximum, and average elevation values within selected area features.
- Added new EDIT_VECTOR script command (replacing the ASSIGN_TYPES command) to allow adding/updating feature attributes values and display labels, reclassifying features, rotating/scaling/offsetting feature coordinates, or marking features as deleted by searching loaded features for matches against their attributes/label values and/or types.
- Added new GPS menu option to send any loaded data map directly to a compatible Garmin GPS device, such as a Colorado or Oregon handheld, for display as a raster map on the unit. This allows display of anything, including imagery, on compatible Garmin GPS devices!
- Added support for creating buffer areas some fixed distance around selected area and line features. This option is available from the Advanced Feature Creation submenu of the right-click menu in the Digitizer Tool.
- Lidar Module Only:
- Added additional selection option on path profile dialog with Lidar points shown to select by drawing a polygon.
- Added support for loading Leica PTS point cloud files.
- Added option when batch converting to Lidar LAS/LAZ files to apply color from loaded imagery.
Many other enhancements and bug fixes were made as well. See the What's New page at http://www.bluemarblegeo.com/products/global-mapper-new-features.php for a complete list of changes.
As always, upgrades and new licenses can be purchased from the Purchase page at http://www.bluemarblegeo.com/products/global-mapper-purchase.php.