[udig-devel] udig0.9.1 feedback

[Rueben Schulz <r_j_schulz@xxxxxxxx>]

Hello,

I spent some time playing with udig 0.9 tonight (on linux). It is
looking very good. I have a few minor issues to report below.

Ok scratch that, you guys are too fast! I am now playing with 0.9.1.

Referencing
-----------

When a layer does not have CRS information (no *.prj shapefile file) the
properties view sets the CRS to whatever the render's CRS is. I guess
this is what the data's CRS is assumed to be when it is rendered, but I
would prefer if the properties view just called the CRS "unknown". For
example I have a dataset with a UTM projection (but no *.prj file) that
the properties view confusingly says is a NAD83 geographic crs.

On a related note, you could assign a WGS84 CRS to DataStores that have
no crs info, but have their bounding box within +-180/+-90. In the
properties view you can call it "assumed" WGS84. This would allow these
layers to be re-projected and the assignment would be correct most of
the time.

For another test, I set the *.prj file to simple sphere for a world map.
I then set the maps CRS to an orthographic projection (underlying
geographic crs was a sphere). I did not expect this to work, since half
the map cannot be projected. However, the map CRS was set to
orthographic and the world map layer remained unprojected. An error
message was printed to the command line, but it might be nice to give
the user some feedback about the failure (not too much thought). (By the
way, this test worked fine for a polygon of BC that fit within the
projections valid area).


Toolbars
---------

I find the layout of the map toolbars unorganized. Can you place the
zoom and pan tools together and the editing tools together (edit
features is apart from commit and rollback changes).

Also, some buttons do not have tooltips or their tooltips are wrong.

Information tool
----------------

When using the information tool, I was getting this error (and not
attribute information).

18-Mar-2005 9:54:33 PM org.geotools.data.shapefile.shp.PolygonHandler
read
WARNING: only one hole in this polygon record

On another layer, I am not getting any errors or information. I think
this worked on windows (udig 0.9) yesterday when I tried it on the same
dataset.

DataStores
----------

I tried adding some data from SDE (working with udig 0.9 on windows). I
could not get it to do anything. Do I need anything special to be
installed?

Style
-----

I got the labeling to work on some streams and world countries: very
cool. 

The drop down box to chose the field to use for labelling was way too
narrow for me to read the names though (I could only see the first
letter). FYI my monitor resolution is 800*600.
 
I found the four buttons at the top of the style view (line/disable,
point/disable, polygon/disable, text/disable) to be confusing. If they
only switch between the different style views (ie line style vs label
stuff), can you replace them with a single drop-down list? Also, how do
you turn off the labels.

Looks like David reported most of this as UDIG-350.

Other
-----

The remove button in the catalog view does not seem to work.

Rueben