Mapping software for Mac besides Google earth?? ArcGis is XP based, what else?

[Tandin Wangmo]

What do you all use?

[Eric Gilbey]

Being on a Mac, what software are you currently using? One program that works well on both Mac and PC is Vectorworks Landmark, and I have recently been using Vectorworks Landmark for GIS mapping that I will then use as I continue on in the rest of my design phases, still in Landmark. I am able to import Shapefiles that carry the data I need to do my analysis and studies. I can also import world reference image files to “sit” behind the information brought in from the Shapefiles. Since I have full control of the lines and data brought in from the Shapefiles, I can modify fills (color, hatches, etc), and opacities and even take information like building heights imbedded in the data fields of the shapefiles for building and extrude them or create massing models to represent them in 2D/3D environment. If you need to save back to a DWG format, you can do that, too.

[tatu oussama]

well for me i like to use the vista system but i se that all chouse the XP why i don’t knwo !!!!! in my country i chouse the only good programme the AUTOUCAD

[Tandin Wangmo]

Thanks Eric Gilbey!

[nca]

Eric-

This is pretty cool. I just downloaded VW Land trial version, so I’ll have to check this out.

The only thing missing would be the ability to run different analyses on the shape data in Landmark. If VW even had the basic ‘surface analysis’ or some of the ‘spatial analyst’ tools that come packaged in Arcmap you’d have yourself one comprehensive piece of software.

I really appreciate how VW is supportive of the landscape profession as I feel autodesk has more or less abandoned LA with revit and BIM focus. I really do look forward to working with this program and hope VW continues to invest in out profession and carve a nice niche out for the company.

Thanks,

-n

[Tandin Wangmo]

Nick, can you please put up the link to this trial version download? Somehow i cannot find it. Thanks.

[nca]

http://www.nemetschek.net/eval/eval_form.php

Fill out the form and wait for the dload. For some reason the download took forever for me, wish there were a faster way.

[Eric Gilbey]

Nick, it is amazing what you can do with the shapefiles once they are in Vw. In working with a county’s planning department, we were able to take their buildings “footprint” shapefile into Landmark, then with the help of a vectorscript, it took the data imbedded in each building outline and extruded it to the height specified by each polygon. So with the many buildings they had in that shapefile (shape and height determined by Lidar), every building was extruded by its own height. With a site model in place, you could then send them to the surface and see the “community” take shape in both 2D and 3D. I haven’t tried it yet, but the process could likely take those same shapes and convert them into massing models that become the height specified from its data and then once done, you could edit the roof lines to look like what the actual buildings do, instead of an extruded shape. Also…the contours brought in from shapefiles can be converted to 3D lines with the assigned elevation (again built into the shapefile data) and once done, you can select the 3D lines and create a Site Model (Digital Terrain Model). With that site model in place, you can then do a slope analysis, too.

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