US MAp software for .net

[Alcides]

Hi all,

Does anyone can indicate a software that shows US map and allows
states and region selection.
We need to associated sales managers with states. That part is easy,
however for some states we need to associate more than one manager. So
we need to do, for example, manager1 have Southern California, and
manager2 have Northern CA. We will need to associate using state and
zip codes in this case. I think we can select by state and county,
however we need to know the zip codes.
Anyone knows or have been using any software that allows that?
Thanks in advance.

Alcides Schulz
http://alsql.blogspot.com

 

[Cowboy \(Gregory A. Beamer\)]

Out of the box? No. But there are plenty of GIS systems you can program
against. As you are doing fairly simple stuff, you might try the SharpMap
project (http://www.codeplex.com/SharpMap). You will have to create your own
overlays for the states, but it should get you started. There are other open
source implementations out there, but not sure if they are .NET.

For what you are doing, Google Maps may be a free/inexpensive option, as
well. But, you will still have to write the overlays to separate the states,
etc.

A cheaper option, for commercial software, is a component that can map using
TIGR data (from the census beaureau). They will still generally run a few
hundred to a few thousand, so this might not be an option for you.

--
Gregory A. Beamer
MVP, MCP: +I, SE, SD, DBA

*************************************************
| Think outside the box!
|
*************************************************

 

[Liz]

MapInfo.com, ESRI.com are two pretty sophisticated vendors of mapping and
geospatial products; you'll get whatever job you need done with their
offerings but it'll cost you some time and money ... MS MapPoint *may* be
enough for your needs if you can figure out the APIs, which are documented,
but not well ...

I'm sure there are others; this is not really difficult stuff but it always
seems to take more time than it really ought to ...

L

 

[Family Tree Mike]

Hi all,

Does anyone can indicate a software that shows US map and allows
states and region selection.
We need to associated sales managers with states. That part is easy,
however for some states we need to associate more than one manager. So
we need to do, for example, manager1 have Southern California, and
manager2 have Northern CA. We will need to associate using state and
zip codes in this case. I think we can select by state and county,
however we need to know the zip codes.
Anyone knows or have been using any software that allows that?
Thanks in advance.

Alcides Schulz
http://alsql.blogspot.com

If you have the money, go with ESRI which Liz mentioned. MapInfo has a
following, but I haven't used it in years.

If you have virtually no budget, go for Google Earth. Driving it from KML
(a variation of XML) is relatively easy. The API lets you do a lot of
manipulations from outside of GE. States and regions in KML form is probably
out there.

 

[clintonG]

I know about ESRI and MapInfo and you don't need either. This entire project
can be done using Microsoft Virtual Earth using tiles to color code and
assign regions to multiple managers. We can bind data to tiles and pins and
what have you much less expensive than what has been available from the
desktop and server products from ESRI and MapInfo who have been around a
long time but are not really players anymore once the web enabled platforms
have been released.

In fact an entire line of business that ESRI has enabled to its customers
has now been made obsolete. Sorry I can't recall the name of the ESRI
product that was used for so long and is no longer going to be useful. Its
not ArcServer but something else I just can't remember at the moment.

Anyhow, this can be and probably is a Virtual Earth project. The zip code
data is free from all kinds of sources.

 

[Family Tree Mike]

I know about ESRI and MapInfo and you don't need either. This entire project
can be done using Microsoft Virtual Earth using tiles to color code and
assign regions to multiple managers. We can bind data to tiles and pins and
what have you much less expensive than what has been available from the
desktop and server products from ESRI and MapInfo who have been around a
long time but are not really players anymore once the web enabled platforms
have been released.

In fact an entire line of business that ESRI has enabled to its customers
has now been made obsolete. Sorry I can't recall the name of the ESRI
product that was used for so long and is no longer going to be useful. Its
not ArcServer but something else I just can't remember at the moment.

Anyhow, this can be and probably is a Virtual Earth project. The zip code
data is free from all kinds of sources.

The obsolete item from ESRI is ArcIMS.

Where ESRI has the edge (and MapInfo) over the tools from MS Virtual Earth
and Google Earth, is where you want to compute detailed GIS functionality.
GE and VE don't (to my knowledge) provide APIs for computing the flow path of
water using terrain and soiltypes. They don't include tools for computing
proximity analysis for census data from a point clicked on the map.

Don't get me wrong. GE and VE can be used for some large percentage of
applications. They are totally wrong for truely intense GIS applications.

 

[clintonG]

The obsolete item from ESRI is ArcIMS.

Where ESRI has the edge (and MapInfo) over the tools from MS Virtual Earth
and Google Earth, is where you want to compute detailed GIS functionality.
GE and VE don't (to my knowledge) provide APIs for computing the flow path
of
water using terrain and soiltypes. They don't include tools for computing
proximity analysis for census data from a point clicked on the map.

Don't get me wrong. GE and VE can be used for some large percentage of
applications. They are totally wrong for truely intense GIS applications.

Its been a long time since I dug through all the old school records my mom
kept for us kids but last time I looked at my old report cards they all said
I passed reading class. Granted there is a difference between GIS
capabilities and mapping but where does Alcides state the goal is
computationally intensive analysis of terrain and soils? Where did you read
that?

This project as Alcides explained in this news article can be done using
Virtual Earth (VE) which is many thousands of dollars less expensive and
many weeks and months of time not spent learning to use GIS applications
when mapping is all that is necessary.

So I did get you wrong because your advocating over-kill which is the wrong
solution.

 

[Family Tree Mike]

So I did get you wrong because your advocating over-kill which is the wrong
solution.

No, you may not have seen my other post where I completely agreed with you.

I was just pointing out that I disagree that VE has made the other products
from ESRI and true GIS vendors obsolete. This was the line I was reacting to
"In fact an entire line of business that ESRI has enabled to its customers
has now been made obsolete. "