With the latest edition OCAD is moving its cartographic software a step further. The newest item of the OCAD product family is called «OCAD 11 Enterprise». In addition to the current known OCAD Professional environment it introduces «client-server architecture». Multiple users are able to work simultaneously on a map project regardless of their place of work.
OCAD was originally developed as stand-alone single user software. All map information – either map geometry or symbol definitions – has been stored in a single file on the computer. As perfect this solution fits for single author maps it is limited for larger map projects, a solution for collaboration among cartographers is need. In order to simplify larger map projects customers wished to introduce such a collaborative approach directly into OCAD.
The «client-server architecture» of OCAD 11 Enterprise is based on the PostgreSQL server system, which can be installed on local or hosted servers. The OCAD software has been visually extended by adding a new «client toolbar». The interaction with the server is handled transparently to provide the most convenient user experience. With the «client-server architecture» all project information is now stored in the database system. The minor change for current OCAD users is that they first have to download the map objects from the server before editing. For editing the map object must be checked out. This exclusively locks the object to the member of the map project to prevent unintended simultaneous editing of the same geometry.
The user management and their abilities have been the biggest challenge during the development of OCAD 11 Enterprise Edition. Questions like, who may change map scale, symbols or its colors, had been raised. After two years of intensive development we feel ready to present you our «client-server architecture» for OCAD. In conjunction with this solution we enhance OCAD to fulfill another customer wish: assign different sets of symbols to one single basemap geometry. This means, with OCAD 11 Enterprise you are able to update for example either a hiking or a bike map by editing the map geometry only once.
The «client-server architecture» project is a huge milestone for OCAD. It now enhances the stand-alone software to store and manage projects in the cloud, from where several cartographers can participate on map projects.
About OCAD Inc.
OCAD Inc. sells its cartographic software OCAD in various editions worldwide, adapting customer requests. OCAD is the result of 25 years of software engineering and features specialized cartographic drawing and editing tools, including an ingenious map symbol editor, Bézier curve, line tracing, etc. It also automatically draws junctions correctly and derives contour lines and hill shading from Digital Elevation Models. OCAD is more than just a map-drawing software, however. It is in fact a powerful package which covers the entire workflow of map production – from the capture of geodata (a mobile application) to the import and export thereof and eventual publication of paper or web-based maps. www.ocad.com
OCAD at International Cartographic Conference in Dresden, 27-29 August 2013
OCAD Inc. is present with a booth at the International Cartographic Conference in Dresden. A team of OCAD Inc. will answer your questions about OCAD 11 and demonstrate you the new OCAD 11 Enterprise edition. www.icc2013.org