Global Mapper Changelog

What's new in Global Mapper 22.0

Sep 16, 2020
  • Significant New Features:
  • New Eye Dome Lighting settings in the 3D viewer help improve visual display of vector and lidar data
  • A new tool for simplifying loaded meshes or TINs
  • A new Spatial Operations tool to find the intersection of two vector layers
  • A new Analysis menu option to find the overlap (both percentage and graphical) between two or more Lidar, raster/image, and/or terrain layers
  • An update to the Raster Reclassify tool that allows it to work with continuous data (terrain/slope, single bands of imagery).
  • A new sweep selection tool for working with vector data in the 3D viewer
  • Dramatically faster rendering of tiled online sources, especially in 3D.
  • Support for creating point, line, or area features from a list of coordinates in an MS Excel (.xls/.xlsx) file.
  • A new Digitizer menu providing convenient access to all Digitizer functions.
  • A tabular preview showing the first ten lines of an imported ASCII or Excel file.
  • Significant New LiDAR Module features:
  • A new Terrain Paint tool for manipulating elevation values in a free-form way using an interface similar to MS Paint, Photoshop, etc. [Item #GM-1126]
  • A new algorithm that improves building classification results on all types of point clouds. [Item #GM-9434]
  • Improved building extraction with better 3D shape simplification, including generating building footprints. [Item #GM-2889]
  • A new option to generate a process summary report when using Pixels to Points [Item #GM-7612]
  • An update to the underlying libraries used in the Pixels to Points process resulting in improved output with certain image data sets. [Item #GM-10386]
  • Two new lidar draw modes: [Item #GM-10148]
  • 'Color by Source Layer' (allowing easy display of lidar point clouds using a different color for each layer)
  • ‘Color by Scan Angle’.Supports for sorting exported LAS/LAZ files by one or more fields (.X, Y, Z, class, GPS time, etc.).
  • Dramatically faster rendering of lidar path profiles with a large number of points.
  • New Supported Formats:
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Added support for exporting Lidar data to the Leica PTS format. [Item #GM-10284]
  • Added ability to import and export Mapbox Vector Tile data sets. [Item #GM-3900]
  • Added support for the XTide .dat file format [Item #GM-9424]
  • LiDAR Changes
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] The export to Lidar LAS/LAZ files now supports sorting the data by one or more fields (i.e. X, Y, Z, class, GPS time, etc.). A new Sorting tab on the Export dialog and a new SORT_FIELD parameter for the EXPORT_VECTOR command. [Item #GM-10697]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Added new Lidar draw mode 'Color by Scan Angle' to color Lidar point clouds by scan angle. [Item #GM-10834]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Added a new option to allow selecting Lidar points at least some distance from other Lidar or line features to the existing 'Select Lidar by Distance' feature. [Item #GM-10994]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed issue with updating the return number/count of Lidar points when deleting other Lidar points in the pulse. [Item #GM-10838]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed an issue with bin-gridded Lidar data being a fraction of a pixel off from its correct location in the grid. [Item #GM-10917]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Poles that are extracted now have a height attribute [Item #GM-10820]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Pole extraction will now use the workspace projection correctly. [Item #GM-10653]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Pole extraction now handles poles that have a negative elevation [Item #GM-10708]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed an issue where the method that retrieved the nearby points could return no points. This affected pole classification and an other lidar operations that used this method [Item #GM-10868]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Lidar cropping based on selected features now uses the feature bounds instead of a rectangle [Item #GM-10997]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Corrected Lidar spatial thinning when keeping or removing every Nth point. It was off by 1. [Item #GM-10838]
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed issue with image masks not working correctly on the Pixels to Points dialog if the images have been resized prior to loading in the P2P dialog. [Item #GM-11071]
  • 3D Viewer Changes:
  • Repair the rendering of 3D vector area features in some contexts. [Item #GM-11267]
  • Repair the rendering of 3D vector line (twisting) features in some contexts. [Item #GM-11083]
  • Fix a variety of issues in 3D vector feature editing. [Item #GM-11108]
  • 3D Sweep Selection [Item #GM-4088]
  • New Eye Dome Lighting settings in the 3D viewer help improve visual display of vector and lidar data [Item #GM-9276]
  • 3D lines now have constant width. [Item #GM-6847]
  • Fixed 3D display and gridding of vector layers that have unit names representing something other than meters or feet (like '500 cm'). [Item #GM-10826]
  • Path Profile/Line of Sight Function Changes:
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Dramatically sped up the render of Lidar path profiles with large numbers of points. [Item #GM-10825]
  • Made path profile save to CSV use Position Display Format setting for Latitude/Longitude values. [Item #GM-11011]
  • Fixed issue with perpendicular path profile not aligning with main path if Bearing Sense was not Grid North. [Item #GM-10809]
  • Analysis Function Changes:
  • Add new option to find the overlap (both percentage and graphical) between two or more Lidar, raster/image, and/or terrain layers. The new option is under the Analysis menu. [Item #GM-10367]
  • Fixed issues calculating area volumes. [Item #GM-10614]
  • Added features to the Raster Reclassify tool to work with continuous data (terrain / slope). Other new features include creating a spread of output values, Improved diagnostic messages, creation of ranges with equal but opposite ends, and allow multiple transparent colors. [Item #GM-10734]
  • Added a new option to simplify when generating a 3D model (mesh) from a loaded terrain surface. [Item #GM-7358]
  • Added more output options to Raster Reclassification. It includes palette image, elevation (8-bit integer), elevation (16 bit integer), and an option to set unspecified input values to the transparent color.Raster Reclassification now allows non palette based layers such as elevation and image data. [Item #GM-10842/GM-10816/GM-10843]
  • Fixed incorrect units on min/max points while generating contours. [Item #GM-10684]
  • Reworked View Shed algorithm to use Measure->Bearing Options to calculate angles. [Item #GM-8409]
  • Allow view sheds with over 512 million samples. Users are now prompted to allow the specified size or to automatically increase the Sample Spacing to get the sample count to a reasonable level. [Item #GM-10921]
  • Digitizer Tool Changes:
  • Added a new option to simplify the geometry of 3D models (meshes). The new option is in the Digitizer Tool's right-click Move/Reshape menu. [Item #GM-7358]
  • Added new option to allow snapping to Lidar point returns when digitizing. The option is under the right-click Options menu of the Digitizer Tool. [Item #GM-5859]
  • Fixed the simplification of area features to remove the correct number of vertices. From v21.0 until v21.1.1, area simplification was often keeping many vertices that should have been removed. [Item #GM-10852]
  • Fixed issues creating perpendicular lines when the selected line layer projection is different than the view projection. [Item #GM-10908]
  • Fixed issue with ELEVATION attributes of point features changing when moving the features. [Item #GM-11231]
  • Made 'Insert Vertices and Split at Intersections' keep per-vertex elevations and times. [Item #GM-11041]
  • Add ELEVATION attribute to newly created point features created by snapping to 3D features (Lidar, terrain, 3D models, etc.) in the Digitizer Tool. [Item #GM-10992]
  • Allow user to select "Above Sea Level" option when performing multiple volume calculations over a range of base heights. [Item #GM-10575]
  • Fixed issue creating a buffer on one side of a line [Item #GM-10888]
  • Updated Create Regular Grid operation to obey the Distance Calculation Type setting from the Configuration dialog. This means that if you are using Great Circle or Rhumb Line distance calculation, the grid cell edges will match the specified distance using the Measure Tool rather than being calculated in the current display projection. [Item #GM-5818]
  • Scripting Changes:
  • Added ability to export TINs, Points, and Contours to Land/XML via a script. [Item #GM-7759]
  • Added support for TAKE_OFF_ALT parameter for GENERATE_POINT_CLOUD script command. [Item #GM-11030]
  • Added parameter to CALC_VOLUME script command to allow user to indicate whether the base height is at sea level or relative to the ground. [Item #GM-10913]
  • Added built-in script variables for script file name with and without the extension [Item #GM-11106]
  • Made VOID_ELEV parameter be obeyed for BIL elevation export using EXPORT_ELEVATION script command. [Item #GM-11133]
  • Updated saved workspace files to remember a user-specified no-data value used when gridding text files on import. The new NO_DATA_VAL parameter for the IMPORT_ASCII command provides this support. [Item #GM-11139]
  • Fixed bug causing the CALC_VOLUME_BETWEEN_SURFACES script command to require an AREA_FILENAME parameter to be provided rather than just calculating the volume inside the overlap of the surface layers. [Item #gm-11180]
  • Online Source Changes:
  • Dramatically sped up the rendering of tiled online sources, especially in 3D. [Item #GM-10503]
  • Added ability to add or replace layers in an existing MangoMap. [Item #GM-10933]
  • Updated the Layer->Find Extrema (Min/Max) Elevation Points option to work with online terrain sources. There is also a new option to create point features at the located min/max points. [Item #GM-11056]
  • Projection/Datum Changes:
  • Fixed issue with NTv2 datum transformations not being used immediately upon load. [Item #GM-10630]
  • Added built-in IG05/12 and IG05/12 Intermediate datums and corrected the transform for the New Israeli Datum (NID). [Item #GM-10386]
  • Added new Italian versions of ETRS89 and ETRF2000 datums that use NTv2 datum shift files. The base ETRS89 and ETRF2000 datums no longer use those NTv2 shift files as they only covered Italy and caused a slight discontinuity at the edge of the file. [Item #GM-10526]
  • Added built-in PROJCS names for EPSG codes 2945-2951 (MTM Canada NAD83 CSRS zones). [Item #GM-10774]
  • Improved the behavior of the GeoCalc mode projection selection dialog when loading layers so that transforms are automatically selected or prompted for when pressing OK rather than requiring the user to explicitly double-click on the transform list. [Item #GM-10808]
  • When in geocalc mode and files are using a projection that isn't supported by geocalc a warning will appear and let you pick a new projection instead of hard crashing [Item #GM-10571]
  • Updated MGI Austria datum shift with new file from Austrian government that fixes an issue in some locations. [Item #GM-6711]
  • Fixed issues with display lat/lon grid lines for world-covering data cutting off around 67 degrees (N and S) for Mercator. [Item #GM-10801]
  • Updated coordinate system definition files to include some missing EPSG codes. [Item #GM-11021]
  • Fixed central meridian for Albers Conus EPSG codes (5069 and 5070) [Item #GM-11024]
  • Format Specific Changes:
  • Added support for exporting terrain data to Land/XML as a TIN. [Item #GM-9472]
  • Sped up tiled exports to ECW/JP2 files when multiple cores are available. [Item #GM-5063]
  • Updated DXF and DWG exports to handle 3D models (meshes). Each triangle in the mesh is exported as a 3D area feature. [Item #GM-11345]
  • Added the ability to customize the No Data value exported in Arc ASCII Grid files through the user interface. [Item #GM-10846]
  • Updated projection information stored in GeoTIFF and LAS/LAZ files to include the detailed TOWGS84 datum transformation so that custom datums with unknown EPSG codes can be read back in correctly from exported files. [Item #GM-10849]
  • Fixed issues in v21.1.0 rendering JPG-in-TIFF files. [Item #GM-10884]
  • Fixed the methodology used to identify a SQLite/Spatialite database file. [Item #GM-7745]
  • Updated exports to multi-band image formats (i.e. GeoTIFF, BIL, Erdas Imagine) to allow the inclusion of vector data and map layout items (i.e. scale bar). [Item #GM-8177]
  • Fixed issue loading Japanese GML DEM files on systems where the locale was also set to Japanese. [Item #GM-9977]
  • Ensure that exported KMZ files containing a 3D model can be read by Google Earth. [Item #GM-10926]
  • Fixed slow load of vector files containing area features with large numbers of holes/islands in v21.1.0 release. [Item #GM-11131]
  • Fixed issues loading ECW files with non-English characters in the filename or path. [Item #GM-11182]
  • Added support for batch converting to the Garmin JNX format. [Item #GM-11334]
  • Updated GeoTIFF 16-bit imagery exports to store signed 16-bit samples if any of the input layers have signed values. [Item #GM-10976]
  • Added support for loading LandXML Parcels with 3D coordinate lists. Also added support for using Property values from LandXML as attribute values. [Item #GM-11054]
  • Added option to use the Ordinance Survey Master Map (OSMM) styling when loading an OSMM file. [Item #GM-9055]
  • Add an option to the KML/KMZ export to control the creation of folders for each geometry type. [Item #GM-10579]
  • Significantly improved time needed to export data to CADRG format. [Item #GM-5415]
  • Improved performance of exporting data to Digital Terrain Elevation Data (DTED) file format. [Item #GM-7830]
  • S-52 zoom levels now are used when changing the detail slider on s-57 files. Features that disappear when zooming in will now more closely match the s-52 style [Item #GM-10788]
  • Improved the loading of MSI-Planet files. The clutter files now load as a palette-based image layer if a 'menu' file is provided. A prompt to confirm the UTM zone hemisphere is also no longer required if the 'projection' file specifies enough information to determine the hemisphere automatically. [Item #GM-10822]
  • Added support for MapInfo datum codes for GDA2020, S-JTSK, and other datums. [Item #GM-10973]
  • Dramatically sped up the load of S-63 chart files initially encrypted for a different machine. [Item #GMSDK-240]
  • Re-enabled support for loading NetCDF files larger than 2GB (broken since v20.0). [Item #GM-10803]
  • Fixed problem with incorrect elevation units when importing Global Mapper workspace file containing TIF files. [Item #GM-10634]
  • Fixed error loading some LAS files over 2GB in size. [Item #GM-11337]
  • Fixed problems loading some JP2 terrain data, including crashes on load and missing data in parts of the display with elevations below -9999. [Item #GM-11157]
  • Fixed problem exporting feature points to shape files when using the "Generate 3D Features Using Loaded Elevation Data" option and the points did not have an ELEVATION attribute. [Item #GM-10564]
  • Improved exporting and importing 3D content (mesh data) to and from PDF files. [Item #GM-9727]
  • Include color from GM point symbols when exporting to DWG and DXF.Read point color when importing DWG and DXF. [Item #GM-5606]
  • Fixed issue where the wrong code page being written to an exported SOSI file. [Item #GM-11200]
  • Fixed an issue where the projection was not being identified correctly in an exported SOSI file. [Item #GM-11201]
  • Improved resolution when exporting large map layout from the Map Layout Editor to PDF [Item #GM-10629]
  • Made ELEV_UNITS get passed down properly when adding terrain layers to map catalogs via script. Also ensure that loading map catalogs doesn't end up prompting for elevation units. [Item #GM-10792]
  • Made export to CSV from Attribute Editor handle the case where the first column is empty or hidden. [Item #GM-10815]
  • Include map layout elements when exporting to PDF from the main view.Make inclusion of layout elements optional. [Item #GM-10840]
  • Fixed the inadvertent duplication of coordinate values when exporting a lat/lon dataset to CSV with the "Export Separate Lat/Lon Coordinates for Each Point" option selected. [Item #GM-10475]
  • Removed extraneous vertices from FBX terrain export. [Item #GM-10903]
  • Make sure REST and GeoJSON overlays have the codepage set to UTF-8. [Item #GM-10916]
  • Remove invalid characters from DXF layer names during export. [Item #GM-10924]
  • Automatically detect false easting/northing values specified in the wrong units for some MrSID files and load them with the correct interpretation. [Item #GM-6031]
  • Improved display of filled areas in SOLID entities when loading DXF and DWG files. [Item #GM-5955]
  • Fixed problem where linked image files were not being saved in an exported KMZ file. [Item #GM-11009]
  • Move option indicating whether to load all PDF map frames to the PDF Import Options screen. [Item #GM-11017]
  • Fixed DXF exporter so that it respects the label option when exporting point features. [Item #GM-10981]
  • Resolved issue with missing attributes when importing OSM data. [Item #GM-11064]
  • Fixed issues displaying some BMP files in v21.1. [Item #GM-11184]
  • Rendering/Style Changes:
  • Fixed issue with custom shape point symbols scaled to be less than 0.5 pixels in radius drawing as 2 pixels width. Also fixed the pixel location of vector data on display and export. It could be up to one pixel right and or down of where it should have been. [Item #GM-7490]
  • Check online layers when rendering a texture map. [Item #GM-10860]
  • Performance:
  • Sped up tiled exports when cropping or tiling to selected area features. Now multiple cores will be used if available. [Item #GM-5063]
  • Improved performance when specifying very small custom grid line spacing. [Item #GM-5788]
  • User Interface:
  • Added a new top-level Digitizer menu providing access to all Digitizer functions. [Item #GM-11198]
  • ASCII and Excel file import dialogs now have a preview for the top 10 lines [Item #GM-457]
  • Added Apply button to the Layer Shift dialog when its opened from the Control Center [Item #GM-11126]
  • Added preview of transparent colors in the Raster Options/Display dialog for all raster formats, not just palette based ones. [Item #GM-10675]
  • Added new feature to keep Histogram Graph windows open after the metadata dialog has closed. [Item #GM-10883]
  • Added options on metadata histogram tab to control display of histogram bin labels and the option to color the histogram bins based on the currently selected shader. [Item #GM-10878]
  • Added option for more detailed batch/re-projection processing information during run. [Item #GM-10720]
  • Added configuration option for setting water level increment in 2D view. [Item #GM-9475]
  • Modified Layer Name input box to only outline the control with a red box if it is blank rather than a blinking color. [Item #GM-10895]
  • Allow deleting single color from a list of a layer's transparent colors. [Item #GM-10891]
  • Made the band selection dialog for multi-band exports resizable. [Item #GM-10731]
  • Misc. Changes:
  • An update to the Raster Reclassify tool that allows it to with continuous data (terrain/slope, single bands of imagery).
  • Enforce multi-part polygon grouping in Attribute Editor. [Item #GM-8068]
  • Fixed issues in batch convert from v21.1.0 release, including cropping to selected areas and using other source files as filler. [Item #GM-11023]
  • User settings import now will remember toolbar locations. They will be used when imported as long as the version and monitor resolution match. [Item #GM-10615]
  • Fixed bug where vertical transformation box doesn't appear in geocalc mode [Item #GM-10560]
  • Fixed bug where 3D settings didn't match expected values if there were no GM registry keys yet [Item #GM-10279]
  • Global Mapper correctly reads the custom AoU file in geocalc mode [Item #GM-10127]
  • Display attribute values in the appropriate code page on the Search Vector Data dialog. [Item #GM-10789]

New in Global Mapper 20.0.0 b091818 (Sep 21, 2018)

  • 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

New in Global Mapper 19.1 b021218 (Feb 13, 2018)

  • 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

New in Global Mapper 19.0 b092017 (Sep 25, 2017)

  • 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 Global Mapper 18.2 b052417 (May 25, 2017)

  • 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 Global Mapper 18.1 b022117 (Feb 22, 2017)

  • 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 Global Mapper 18.0.0 b092616 (Sep 28, 2016)

  • 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 Global Mapper 17.2 b051716 (May 18, 2016)

  • 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 Global Mapper 17.1 b020216 (Feb 4, 2016)

  • Significant New Features:
  • Support for displaying perpendicular profiles to an original defined path and easily stepping through the series of paths perpendicular to the original path. Users can right-click with the Path Profile Tool active to switch to perpendicular profile mode and set the length of the perpendicular profiles.
  • New Custom Feature Extraction Tool for extracting 3D area and line features by graphically selecting the associated location for each feature on the perpendicular profile display. This provides a very easy way to digitize highly accurate 3D features from Lidar or terrain data, such as road edge and curb lines, powerlines, and buildings.
  • Added support for adding the path profile display to the multi-view layout. Users can now choose to add a new view of type Profile and the Path Profile Tool will use that for displaying the active path profile. Users can also add any path profile dialog to the multi-view interface via a new button or pop a multi-view profile view to its own dialog through a right-click option.
  • Added support for loading and saving the multi-view layout. By default the multi-view layout is now saved to and restored from workspace (GMW) files.
  • Added support for filtering which layers are displayed in each 2D map view in the multi-view interface. Users can right-click on a 2D map view on the View Manager dialog and choose to select which layers are displayed in each view.
  • Added support for Geographic Calculator 2016.
  • Added support for Feature Templates. This allows creation of predefined pick lists for faster attribute entry for field data collection.
  • Add support for custom paper sizes in Map Layout Editor.
  • Implemented Grid Frame (Graticule, etc.) on Map View Element. This allows placement of grid line tick marks and labels to be placed outside the neat line of the Map View Element.
  • Can now export attribute search results to a CSV file
  • Improved display for hi-resolution monitors
  • New Supported Formats
  • Added support for loading text files with multiple coordinate pairs on a single line of the file, such as TINs in simple text and 2-point paths on a single line.
  • Added support for loading ASTER GED data (GDEM, emissivity, temperature, etc.) from HDF5 files.
  • Added support for GlobeLand30 land cover data via a built-in palette (with classification names) and roughness tables for calculating roughness based on land cover.
  • Map Layout Editor Changes:
  • Fixed the ruler bar so that the numbers go the full length of the bar, and made the ruler bar line up better with the page.
  • When a new item is added to the layout, it is now in "selected" mode.
  • Used a better initial size when inserting a new text or image element.
  • Added ability to select item even when it is on top of the currently selected item.
  • Can now use Delete key to delete selected features.
  • Fixed scaling used when printing map so that the point symbols are the right size.
  • Modified logic so that translucent area styles will be printed.
  • Removed the conflict between background color and frame style in legacy elements (elevation legend, map legend, scale bar) to allow for transparent background.
  • Added temporary pan functionality by having user click and drag the middle mouse button (or by clicking and dragging while pushing down on the mouse wheel).
  • Fixed problems when changing the group element buffer size.
  • Fixed bug in Map Layout Editor when attempting to display quiver plot data.
  • Added "ungroup" option for grouped map elements.
  • Added ability to export a map layout to a Geospatial PDF.
  • Allowed map view element to be drawn using fixed scale or fixed bounds.
  • Added support for custom paper sizes in Map Layout Editor.
  • Added option to combine all data and layout elements into a single PDF layer when exporting from the Map Layout Editor.
  • Added format tool to make selected elements the same size as another element.
  • Allow user to choose units used to display rulers, margins, element size and position, etc.
  • Fixed hang when displaying Map Layout Editor when the main Global Mapper view includes a text element.
  • Added Undo/Redo functionality to Map Layout Editor.
  • Added option to maintain aspect ratio to the Position and Size tab on the Element Properties dialog.
  • Implemented Grid Frame (Graticule, etc.) on Map View Element. This allows placement of grid line tick marks and labels to be placed outside the neat line of the Map View Element.
  • Implemented enhancements to Scale Bar element that allow user to control spacing and placement of labels.
  • Added ability to fine-tune element position using arrow keys.
  • Cleared item selection (instead of closing the editor) when user presses the Esc key.
  • Fixed crash when enabling margins for the workspace layout with a size of 0 for any margin.
  • Adjusted location when pasting so that all pasted elements will be visible.
  • Made sure that the grid marks on the map view element frame get written to the output PDF file during export.
  • "Print" the map layout to an image file instead of the printer.
  • Lidar Changes (Includes Lidar Module v17.1 Features):
  • New Custom Feature Extraction Tool for extracting 3D area and line features by graphically selecting the associated location for each feature on the perpendicular profile display. This provides a very easy way to digitize highly accurate 3D features from Lidar or terrain data, such as road edge and curb lines, powerlines, and buildings.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Added button to Lidar toolbar to allow quickly marking points as a ground point (class 2).
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Added support for editing which classification groups a Lidar class belongs to. Right-click on a class on the Lidar filter configuration dialog and choose to Set Class Group(s) to choose if a class is a surface point (i.e. ground, water, road), vegetation, structure, etc. This makes it easier to use a classification system that differs from the standard ASPRS classifications.
  • Made Lidar point clouds render before line features by default so that line features are more visible on top of dense Lidar point clouds even when zoomed out.
  • Improved load of Lidar point clouds from generic ASCII text files. Additional column layouts are recognized, including XYZI, XYZRGB, and XYZIRGB. In addition, if the file has named columns, any column layout works as long as it has recognized column names, like RED, GREEN, BLUE, INTENSITY, NIR, etc.
  • When selecting with a left click in the Feature Info and Digitizer Tools, make normal line and point features be of higher precedence than Lidar point cloud points, making it easy to select normal features that are drawn with Lidar data.
  • Made Lidar Model Key Points be treated as surface/ground points so they can be used for calculating height-above-ground.
  • Reduced load time for Lidar point clouds, GMP files in particular.
  • Added display of 24-bit RGB color as RGB attribute in Feature Info dialog for Lidar points in clouds with 16-bit per band colors to make it easier to filter based on color.
  • When loading LAS/LAZ files that have points outside the bounding box specified in the header, give the user the option to keep or toss these points for all files in the current load operation rather than prompting for each one.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed issue with the height above ground for some non-ground points being marked as 0 rather than the actual height above ground.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed issue with per-vertex elevation values for extracted building and tree features being interpreted as feet rather than meters when the Elevation Display/Export Units setting set to Statute.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed color “fuzziness” selector on Lidar filter dialog. The selected value was previously ignored and a value of 16 always used..
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed issue with elevation modifications from Alter Elevation Values tab of Options dialog for Lidar point cloud layers (i.e. scale, offset, etc.) not saving to workspace files.
  • Multi-View Changes:
  • Added support for adding the path profile display to the multi-view layout. Users can now choose to add a new view of type Profile and the Path Profile Tool will use that for displaying the active path profile. Users can also add any path profile dialog to the multi-view interface via a new button or pop a multi-view profile view to its own dialog through a right-click option.
  • Added support for loading and saving the multi-view layout. By default the multi-view layout is now saved to and restored from workspace (GMW) files. There is an option on the Map View Manager dialog to disable the save and restore of the multi-view layout. There are also Load and Save buttons on the Map View Manager dialog.
  • Added support for filtering which layers are displayed in each 2D map view in the multi-view interface. Users can right-click on a 2D map view on the View Manager dialog and choose to select which layers are displayed in each view.
  • Added support for splitting containers of multiple map views. This allows adding a new map view that crosses multiple existing maps, like have 2 side-by-side maps, then adding a new view (like a path profile) above or below those and spanning both maps. Previously users could only insert a new view by splitting an existing single map view.
  • Added multi-view button on the 3D view toolbar to allow easily embedding the 3D view window in the main map view interface or popping it out to a floating dialog.
  • Added Close All Views button to Map View Manager dialog allowing users to quickly reset the multiple view interface to the default of a single 2D map view.
  • 3D Viewer Changes:
  • Selections for Lidar points are now rendered as cubes rather than squares.
  • When adding models in the Configure Features dialog, the units chosen by the user are now used to scale the models in the 3D viewer. Any units/scaling information in the model itself is ignored.Fixed 3D display of Lidar point clouds when loaded with raster layers or from a map catalog when no gridded terrain data is loaded. The flat raster surface now draws at the height of the lowest Lidar point rather than at a height of 0.
  • Made Flythrough Path Edit dialog resizable.
  • Fixed display of model points added by creating a new feature type with a 3D model on the Edit Feature dialog.
  • Fixed crash generating fly-through path data when the fly-through line does not have known lat/lon coordinates.
  • Fixed handling of 3D point features that have height values that are interpreted as “Above elevation” in the Feature Types/Labels/Elevations tab of the Vector Options dialog..
  • Fixed scaling of 3D point models that have height of 0, and use a symbol scale that is a fixed distance in ground units.
  • Path profiles are now automatically added to the 3D view, and tracking of the profile in a path profile view is now reflected in the 3D view, similar to how its done in a 2D view.
  • Fixed issue with 3D view dialog not remembering its size and position.
  • Path Profile/Line of Sight Function Changes:
  • Added support for extracting/digitizing 3D area and line features along linear paths using the path profile tool while displaying perpendicular profiles along the source path. This powerful new feature includes the following capabilities:
  • Support for displaying perpendicular profiles to an original defined path and easily stepping through the series of paths perpendicular to the original path. Users can right-click with the Path Profile Tool active to switch to perpendicular profile mode and set the length of the perpendicular profiles.
  • Support for extracting 3D area and line features by graphically selecting the associated location for each feature on the perpendicular profile display. This provides a very easy way to digitize highly accurate 3D features from Lidar or terrain data, such as road edge and curb lines, powerlines, and buildings.
  • Added support for adding the path profile display to the multi-view layout. Users can now choose to add a new view of type Profile and the Path Profile Tool will use that for displaying the active path profile. Users can also add any path profile dialog to the multi-view interface via a new button or pop a multi-view profile view to its own dialog through a right-click option.
  • Improved responsiveness of path profile dialog when dragging a path.
  • Fixed error in v17.0.0-v17.0.1 when a path profile is being displayed and user unloads all data or change the view projection.
  • Analysis Function Changes:
  • Updated reported results for volume between surfaces to include information about the layers being compared, the time the analysis was performed, and the area features the volume was calculated within (if applicable).
  • Updated reported cut-and-fill volume results so that the net volume (cut minus fill) is now reported as a NET_VOLUME value and the TOTAL_VOLUME is the sum of the cut and fill volumes.
  • Added support for TRANSMITTER_HEIGHT_MS and RECEIVER_HEIGHT_MS as recognized attributes when creating view sheds from selected point features. They contain the transmitter and receiver heights relative to sea level (as compared to relative to ground for the non-MS versions). They respectively are the same as the OFFSETA_MS and OFFSETB_MS attributes.
  • Added option to copy the results of measurement (including volume) of one or more features to the clipboard as text, either from the Analysis menu or Digitizer Tool right-click menu
  • Added new functions to the raster calculator: the trigonometric functions sin, cos, tan (sine, cosine and tangent, angle specified in radians), asin, acos, atan (arcsine, arccosine and arctangent, result specified in degrees), sin_deg, cos_deg, tan_deg (sine, cosine and tangent, angle specified in degrees), and sqrt (square root).
  • Updated Layer Statistics dialog to include ‘Check All’ button for quickly selecting all attributes as well as be resizable.
  • Digitizer Tool Changes:
  • Improved display of selected area features using a solid fill style. Now rather than being completely transparent with a cross-hatch, they will be filled with a partially transparent background the same color as the fill style of the area. The same applies for the Feature Info Tool. Those selected areas will be filled with a partially transparent background as well.
  • Updated calculation of chainage (connecting selected points to nearest selected line) to include the name and layer of the connected point and line in the attribute list for the chainage line. Also renamed the right-click menu entry for this option to add CHAINAGE at the start to make it easier to find.
  • Added option when copying attributes from point features to area features they are included in to create cloned copies of the area features for each point if there are multiple points within an area.
  • Fixed placement of point features created at centroid of selected area features. Some centroids were not exactly where they needed to be.
  • Fixed issue with selection of vertices only in selected areas by holding down S when dragging a selection box. This operation was correctly updating the selection, but was not automatically redrawing so users couldnt see the results until user forced a redraw.
  • Scripting Changes:
  • Added support for exporting ADRG or ASRP format files using the EXPORT_RASTER script command.
  • Added EXPORT_PDF3D command to export to 3D PDF file from a script.
  • Added PDF_USE_ADOBE_EXT parameter to EXPORT_PDF and EXPORT_PDF3D commands to specify Adobe ISO 32000 Extensions for georeference.
  • Added support for changing area and distance measurement units using the SET_OPT script command via new AREA_UNITS and DISTANCE_UNITS parameters.
  • Added support for changing whether base, large, or a mix of measure units are used for measure attributes using the new MEASURE_UNIT_TYPE parameter for the SET_OPT script command.
  • Added support for all measure options from the SET_OPT script command when using the ADD_MEASURE_ATTRS script command.
  • Added support for specifying the COVERAGE_SMOOTHING_FACTOR when using the GENERATE_LAYER_BOUNDS command to create polygonal coverages rather than prompting the user for the smoothing to use.
  • Added new parameter, USE_EXACT_BOUNDS, to be used when defining the bounds in a script command so that the command uses the specified bounds instead of the intersection between the specified bounds and the full data bounds.
  • Added progress reporting when exporting multiple tiles from a single EXPORT_ELEVATION/EXPORT_RASTER/EXPORT_VECTOR script command.
  • Added option to DEFINE_SHADER script command to control whether or not the shader is saved between runs to the custom_shaders.txt file. Enabled by default, add SAVE_SHADER=NO to cause defined shader to NOT be saved between runs.
  • Allow loading workspace (.gmw) or script (.gms) files using the IMPORT script command. Just provide a workspace or script in the FILENAME parameter and it will now act like EMBED_SCRIPT was used.
  • Fixed bug with specified SAMPLING_METHOD not being obeyed when exporting from the EXPORT_RASTER or EXPORT_ELEVATION script command.
  • Fixed bug causing extra pixel to be added to right and bottom of EXPORT_RASTER results in some cases.
  • Fixed crash using LAYER_LOOP_START…LAYER_LOOP_END with a script command that unloads some layers that were loaded when the loop started, like SPLIT_LAYER.
  • Online Source Changes:
  • Added support for loading data from additional WCS online sources and improved error reporting when we try to load too much data.
  • No longer export an HTML file for OSM/TMS tiled export of GMG tiles as web browsers cant display those.
  • Added support for adding online source definitions directly from MapInfo tile server XML files.
  • Fixed issue with slow display of some tiled online sources.]
  • Fixed issue with exporting high resolution terrain to OSM web tiles for display as a streaming source. Now the full elevation units will be maintained for all zoom levels that can handle that much detail and not just the most detailed layer. The default elevation units selection is now also much better based on the loaded data.
  • Fixed issue with initial display of elevation legend range when loading streaming online sources.
  • Projection/Datum Changes:
  • Changed priority to prefer projections from .aux.xml and .prj files when loading raster/image files that have known position information but not known projections (i.e. ECW).
  • Added support for ground-to-grid scale factor in load-time coordinate transformations via a .gm_xform file in the same folder as the projected vector file being loaded.
  • Fixed reprojected display of some images when converting between orthogonal projections (i.e. Mercator and Geographic). At some zoom levels the display would look striped.
  • Fixed issues using a custom datum based on a control point file when transforming coordinates outside the control point convex hull.
  • Fixed displayed lat/lon locations on the status bar when the option is checked to always display using WGS84.
  • Format Specific Changes:
  • Added support for batch converting data to ADRG and ASRP format files.
  • Allow high bit depth JPEG2000 files to be exported from the 64-bit version of Global Mapper.
  • Significantly sped up display of NITF images with embedded JPEG2000 data, especially when zoomed out.
  • Added code page (language) support to GMP files. Any exported GMP files retain the code page of the layers being exported. If the GMP files includes multiple layers with varying code pages in a single GMP layer, all text is converted to UTF-8 so all text can be properly maintained.
  • Added option to generate PRJ (projection) files when exporting BIL/BIP/BSQ files.
  • Updated import of 3D model formats to show the import options dialog at least once for each group of 3D models loaded. The Use for All button on that dialog now applies just to the current load operation, so the options dialog is no longer gone forever.
  • No longer show prompt to confirm load of file when a layer based on the same filename is already loaded for file types that provide a list of layers to the user to select from, like HDF5 or NetCDF format files.
  • Improved export to multi-band image files with 32-bit float samples to support filling gaps by interpolating nearby values.
  • Updated the load of NITF images with RPC geolocation information. Now if both RPC and corner positions are known, the user is prompted for which to use as RPC is not always the desired choice. If RPC is used, the coordinate conversions are now done at the elevation for each location rather than a height of 0. If terrain data is loaded that is used to get the elevation, otherwise the mid-point elevation for the entire file scene is used from the header.
  • Updated Control Center right-click option to add selected layers to a new map catalog to allow adding to an existing map catalog file rather than always creating a new one.
  • Added option to Advanced section of General tab of Configuration dialog to allow the use of an alternate PDF rendering engine when loading PDF files. This option can be useful if the default rendering engine is not providing the desired results.
  • Made 3D text imported from DGN files keep the elevation.
  • Updated GeoJSON export to keep per-vertex elevations.
  • Updated addition of style attributes when exporting to Shapefile to update existing 10-character Shapefile style attributes rather than creating duplicates for style attributes over 10-characters if style attributes had previously been added.
  • Updated MapInfo import to use font information for text point features so imported data looks more like it did when saved from MapInfo.
  • Added support for additional projections when exporting to GeoTIFF. Now projections that cant be directly encoded will store their WKT projection string in the PCS citation key. For example this now allows storing Mollewide projections.
  • Added support for reading and writing DPI values for PNG files. Now a PNG file with a DPI set will display that in the metadata. Exports to PNG via a script also now support the DPI parameter.
  • Added ability for user to specify that a base be added to the generated STL mesh when exporting DEM. A new script option, “ADD_BASE” is also provided for the export script command.
  • Fixed crash displaying some TIFF files in v17.0.0-v17.0.1.
  • Fixed issue with transparency not working for TIFF files in v17.0.0 at some zoom levels.
  • Fixed load of KMZ raster files in v17.0.0-v17.0.1.
  • Fixed export of Lidar point clouds to point Shapefiles. Attributes were not coming through.
  • Fixed error drawing ECW, JPEG2000, Erdas IMG, and MrSID layers with contrast adjustment (i.e. high bit depth layers) in v17.0.0-v17.0.1.
  • Fixed error exporting Float/Grid file in v17.0.0-v17.0.1.
  • Fixed display of palette-based TIFF files with an alpha channel for transparency in v17.0.0-v17.0.1.
  • Fixed zoomed in display and export of TIFF files with a resampling method other than nearest neighbor in v17.0.0-v17.0.1.
  • Fixed problem with very slow export from map catalogs in v17.0.0-v17.0.1.
  • Fixed problem with lockup exporting to ECW in v17.0.0-v17.0.1.
  • Fixed error loading some TIFF files with overview layers.
  • Fixed issue with leading or trailing double quotes being removed from GNIS file fields when the pairing quote was not at the opposite end.Item #16667
  • Fixed issue with exporting projection information to PDF in ISO 32000 format when in GeoCalc mode and data crosses antimerdian.
  • Fixed problem with maximum elevation value being set to just about zero for GeoTIFF elevation exports with all negative values.
  • Fixed crash exporting to any multi-band image format with 32-bit float samples for each band.
  • Fixed issue where area borders would have incorrect elevation in exports to U3D or 3D PDF. [Item# 16793]
  • Fixed issue with the ELEVATION value for some line/area features coming in incorrectly as 0 when loading DWG/DXF files.
  • Fixed error loading Ozi .map files for raster data.
  • Fixed crash exporting from MrSID/JPEG2000 files in some cases.
  • Fixed bug with all Shapefile attributes exporting as type String by default if Users go to the Attribute Setup tab of Shapefile export dialog in v17.0.1-v17.0.2.
  • Fixed zoomed out display of TIFF files with overview layers when an image uses control points to set the location.
  • Fixed problem with Elevation Units selection for JPEG2000 elevation grid export being ignored and meters always being written out.
  • Fixed problem with blank output exporting online sources to ECW or JPEG2000 files.
  • Fixed error loading some Vertical Mapper GRC (clutter) files.
  • Fixed slow performance creating elevation grid from 3D vector data when specifying that the heights are relative to ground and the ground heights come from terrain data in a map catalog with a large number of layers.
  • Fixed a problem with SketchUp imports, where the model geolocation information was not being determined correctly.
  • Fixed error doing reprojected multi-band exports from some formats (i.e. TIFF).
  • Fixed issues loading text with embedded quotes from MapInfo MIF/MID files.
  • Fixed errors loading TIFF files with 12-bits per band.
  • GPS Tracking Changes:
  • Added support for getting GPS heading from $GPHDG messages (only $GPHDT was supported before).
  • Updated GPS tracking when a heading (direction vessel is pointed) is available but not course/track (i.e. direction vessel is travelling). In this case the heading will now be used for the course/track so that we can still display the vessel rotated in the correct direction.
  • Updated GPS Information dialog to display both the GPS heading and course/track if both are available. If they are both available and different, the value will show the course and then the heading in parentheses.
  • Fixed crash trying to use the GPS->Send Raster Maps to Connected Garmin Device menu command.
  • Fixed display of available COM ports on GPS setup dialog. We were showing COM3 for any port with a friendly name rather than the actual COM port number.
  • Fixed GPS location display in the current projection on GPS status dialog when the current projection is not based on WGS84.
  • Fixed insertion of pad sites in the Digitizer Tool using the current GPS location when the current projection is not based on WGS84.
  • Rendering/Style Changes:
  • Made application display properly on high-DPI displays. For now the application just scales up. Eventually we will provide the option of displaying at the full device resolution.
  • Updated default font character set to be based on the system locale (code page) set for non-Unicode applications. If set to Polish (for example), the default character set will be Eastern European. Users can change the setting from Default to a specific character set if users don’t want it based on the current system locale.
  • Added built-in Band Setup presets for Worldview 2/3 DigitalGlobe images for easy selection of Natural Color and Color Infrared (CIR) bands from those 8-band products.
  • Made point/text features with rotated text keep the text rotated the same angle relative to the map features when map view rotation is also used.Item #16987
  • Fixed issue with changes to the Band Setup not being correctly reflected in images using shared automatic contrast adjustment settings.
  • Fixed issue with right-click options on elevation legend and scale bar to hide the items or change their styles not updating them until user zooms or pans the map.
  • Fixed error rendering lines with some styles when they are small enough to be a single pixel on the screen.
  • Fixed slope display and hill shading for layers using a distorted projection (i.e. Geographic, Mercator, etc.) covering a large area and using native elevation units other than meters. The calculated slope and applied shadow would be off by the elevation unit conversion factor to meters.
  • Fixed issue with display of area features using some complex border styles (i.e. offset line styles).
  • Allow map layout elements (scale bar, legend, grid lines) to be included when exporting selected layers from the Control Center to a raster image format (i.e. JPG, GeoTIFF, etc.). Before the export of selected layers would only include the layer even if user selected to include map layout items on the export options dialog.
  • Improved image rectification and vector layer transformations based on control points in many cases where the results were not ideal.
  • Made files loaded by dragging and dropping from Windows Explorer be added to the recently opened files list and used to update the Recently Used File Types filter.
  • Added option to Restore Original Elevation Range on the Alter Elevations tab of the Configuration dialog to allow easily showing all elevation values in a layer.
  • Added option to save selected result items to a CSV / Excel file on the Search dialog.
  • When generating polygonal coverage areas from vector/Lidar layers from the Control Center only show a single dialog prompting the user for the smoothing factor to use rather than a separate dialog for each layer.
  • Assign feature description from recognized attributes (i.e. LAYER, DESC, etc.) when loading vector formats.
  • Updated export option to keep an input pixel if any part of the pixel is inside the export crop area to also work for non-polygonal crops. This means that if the option is checked in the Advanced section of the General tab of the Configuration dialog, any source pixels that at least partially overlap an output pixel bounds will be used and not just those that include the output pixel center.
  • When cropping to area features for export or loading Lidar LAS/LAZ files and area features are selected both in the Feature Info Tool and Digitizer Tool, prefer the Digitizer Tool selection over the Feature Info selection. Previously the reverse order of preference was used, making it impossible to crop to a selected polygon while loading a Lidar file referenced in attributes of an area selected with the Feature Info Tool.
  • Fixed issue with image rectification with 2 points using the automatic mode if the points result in negative X or Y scales. The rectifier was switching to Helmert in some situations that didnt provide good results.
  • Fixed crash with large amounts of data loaded (several hundred layers) with some operations, like view shed.
  • Fixed bug exporting to raster format (i.e. JPG, GeoTIFF, etc.) when all that is loaded is vector data in the User Created Features layer. No data was exported in that case.
  • Fixed a bug in the Feature Types/Labels/Elevations tab on the Vector Options dialog: the height attribute value and height above/below elevation setting value were not handled correctly, so that the settings did not affect Global Mapper operations, particularly 3D display.
  • Fixed a bug where the Export model as Y-up setting in the 3D File Export Options tab was ignored.
  • Fixed join of attributes to a vector layer from a text file encoded using UTF-8 when non-ASCII characters are present.
  • WHAT'S NEW IN Global Mapper Lidar Module v17.0:
  • Dramatically sped up nearly all Lidar operations, including load, display, gridding, and automatic classification.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Added support for automatically classifying powerline points from a Lidar point cloud. The new powerline classification options are available on the non-ground Lidar classification dialog and via the LIDAR_CLASSIFY script command.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Added support for automatically extracting powerline line features from a Lidar point cloud with Lidar points classified as a powerline type. The new powerline extraction options are available on the Lidar extraction dialog and via the LIDAR_EXTRACT script command.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Added support for automatically identifying high and low noise points from a Lidar point cloud. There is a new button on the Lidar toolbar providing this option as well as support in the LIDAR_CLASSIFY script command.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Added support for editing which classification groups a Lidar class belongs to. Right-click on a class on the Lidar filter configuration dialog and choose to ‘Set Class Group(s)’ to choose if a class is a surface point (i.e. ground, water, road), vegetation, structure, etc. This makes it easier to use a classification system that differs from the standard ASPRS classifications.
  • Made Lidar Model Key Points be treated as surface/ground points so they can be used for calculating height-above-ground.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed issue with the height above ground for some non-ground points being marked as 0 rather than the actual height above ground.
  • [LIDAR MODULE ONLY] Fixed issue with per-vertex elevation values for extracted building and tree features being interpreted as feet rather than meters when the Elevation Display/Export Units setting set to Statute.

New in Global Mapper 17.0 b092215 (Sep 23, 2015)

  • 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 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
  • 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
  • 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 Global Mapper 16.2.0 b051815 (May 20, 2015)

  • 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 Global Mapper 16.1.0 b020415 (Feb 5, 2015)

  • 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 Global Mapper 16.0.0 b091714 (Sep 19, 2014)

  • 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 Global Mapper 15.2.5 (Jun 27, 2014)

  • Significant New Features:
  • 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

New in Global Mapper 15.1 (Jun 27, 2014)

  • Significant New 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

New in Global Mapper 15.0 (Jun 27, 2014)

  • Significant New Features:
  • 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'
  • New feature to color loaded elevation data (including LiDAR) with the shader using the elevation range on-screen rather than all loaded. This makes it easy to see terrain differences even in flat areas while zoomed in.
  • New Supported Formats:
  • 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. Useful 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.

New in Global Mapper 14.2 (Jun 27, 2014)

  • Significant New Features:
  • Many scripting updates and additions, including support for calculating attributes, splitting layers, and interactively prompting users for files and folders.
  • 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. This allows you to easily see the minimum, maximum, average, and standard deviation of the numeric values for all of the selected attribute for the result set.
  • Added support for exporting new MrSID format files if you have a GeoExpress license and cartridges on your machine from LizardTech.
  • Updated option to Measure Volume Between Surfaces to support measuring the volume difference within multiple selected area features and generating a report of the volume difference within each area and the total difference.
  • Added option when measuring the volume of one or more area features (either with the Digitizer Tool or drawn with the Measure Tool) to measure the cut and fill volume of the area relative to how the edges of the area feature cut the terrain surface. This provides a very easy mechanism to measure the volume or one or more piles of material simply by drawing/selecting an area around them.
  • Added Filter/Noise/Median resampling method for removing noise from image and terrain layers. Different sizes are available so you can control how large of an area is examined for doing the filter.
  • Added new EXTEND function allowing extending one or more line features to a previously selected line feature. To use this, first select the line feature to extend to, then right-click and choose the Move/Reshape submenu command to select the "extend to" feature. Then select the line feature(s) to extend to that line, then right-click and select the Move/Reshape menu command to extend the selected lines.
  • LiDAR Improvements:
  • Allow searching on elevation values for LiDAR points (missing in v14.1.0).
  • Added option to color LiDAR point clouds by the return number to easily visualize where you have multiple returns (often vegetation).
  • Added quality slider to the LiDAR display options tab of the Options dialog for point cloud layers allowing control of display quality (i.e. what fraction of points are drawn) vs. display speed.
  • Added option when loading LiDAR files to specify how often to sample points when using preview mode.
  • Added option when loading LiDAR files to automatically mark any points outside some number of standard deviations from the mean as deleted. This allows easily getting rid of outlier/noise points.
  • Added option to LiDAR load options dialog to load the elevation values as depth, resulting in negative elevations.
  • Improved load as ASCII (like .xyzi) files to allow selecting the LiDAR classification to assign to the points.
  • Updated creation of points from the grid cell centers of a loaded terrain layer to create a point cloud rather than a series of full point features, resulting in vastly less memory usage and much greater performance.
  • Added report of point density (samples per square meter) to the metadata report for LiDAR point cloud layers.
  • Sped up the initial display of the search dialog when searching on LiDAR point cloud data.
  • Updated batch conversion of LiDAR LAS/LAZ files to GMP (Global Mapper Package) files to allow storing as point clouds or grids since GMP files can store the data either way.
  • Added support for exporting point clouds to DXF and DWG format files.
  • Added support for exporting LAZ files from a script by using a .laz filename.
  • Added LIDAR OFFSET and LIDAR SCALE to reported metadata for LiDAR point clouds so that you can see the original precision stored in the LAS/LAZ file.
  • Fixed issue in v14.1.0 loading some LAS files with lat/lon XY coordinates.
  • Fixed issue in v14.1 with incorrectly positioned points in some ASCII files loaded as point clouds.
  • Allowed LiDAR point cloud export to MapInfo MIF/MID and TAB/MAP files and also allowed batch converting LiDAR point clouds to Shapefiles.
  • Made colorizing LiDAR point clouds using the EXPORT_VECTOR script command work properly with online imagery sources.
  • Fixed issue in v14.1 with exports to new LAS/LAZ files dropping the GPS time from input files if exporting to LAS v1.2 or earlier.
  • Fixed export from v14.1 of some types of LiDAR files (XYZ text for instance) to new XYZ files.
  • Fixed error loading LAS files over 2GB in size.

New in Global Mapper 14.1 (Jun 27, 2014)

  • A number of 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
  • A new OTF reader available for an additional license fee. OTF is a special multi-function format used in war simulation that contains a variety of attribute and surface feature information useful for military work.

New in Global Mapper 14.0.1 (Oct 1, 2012)

  • Significant New Features:
  • Added support for spatial databases (see list below) for both import and export.
  • ESRI ArcSDE (requires ESRI license on machine and 32-bit only)
  • ESRI File Geodatabase (includes raster and grid and all versions of file geodatabses, requires ESRI license on machine and 32-bit only)
  • ESRI Personal Geodatabase (requires ESRI license on machine and 32-bit only)
  • MySQL Spatial
  • Oracle Spatial
  • PostGIS/PostgreSQL
  • SpatiaLite/SQLite
  • Added new Terrain Analysis menu and moved functionality like contour generation, combine terrains, and watershed there from the File menu.
  • Added option to calculate the volume between 2 terrain surfaces on the new Terrain Analysis menu.
  • Added option to find ridge lines on loaded terrain data on the new Terrain Analysis menu.
  • Added new Favorites toolbar that provides easy access to frequently used Digitizer/Edit Tool options. The new toolbar automatically tracks which features you commonly uses and makes some of those available. You can also customize it and choose which options to always make available. The currently selected favorite can be run by pressing a button or using the Ctrl+Enter shortcut key. You can also setup custom keyboard shortcuts for any favorite item.
  • Reorganized Digitizer Tool right-click menu, greatly reducing the size of the popup menu and making it much easier to find items.
  • Updated the Quick Start buttons displayed at startup, removing the Find Data Online option and replacing the Manage Loaded Data (Control Center) button with one to Open Sample Data that is included with the installer. The new button also still opens the Control Center.
  • Added support for adding WFS (Web Feature Services) online data sources for dynamically loading online vector data sources.
  • Added support for adding WMTS (tiled WMS) online data sources.
  • Improved display of online sources at some display scales and also use less imagery for some DigitalGlobe exports.
  • Added button on DigitalGlobe client ID specification dialog to allow easily estimating how much premium DigitalGlobe imagery that you would need to purchase for a particular export size and resolution. Also show coverage for each DigitalGlobe source as you highlight it in the source list.
  • Update search dialog to allow selecting a specific set of layers to search in.
  • Global Energy Mapper Only Features:
  • Added option to Digitizer Tool to create a flattened site plan that smoothly transitions a set of areas into the surrounding terrain with an allowed slope and optional benches/terraces. This tool can also calculate the optimal flatten height such that the cut and fill volumes are approximately equal (i.e. no haul in or out of dirt required).
  • Added option to rotate a shape feature to calculate an optimal rotation angle for selected area/closed line features such that the combined cut-and-fill volume for the features is minimized at a calculated break-even height. This is a powerful feature for finding the optimal orientation and cut height for a pad site to minimize the total amount of dirt that needs moved.
  • Added a new group of online data sources (with limited usage for free) from Spatial Energy (www.spatialenergy.com ). This includes Bing Maps data, among several other sources.
  • New Supported Formats:
  • Added support for exporting loaded data to CADRG/CIB format data sets.
  • Added support for exporting loaded data to ASRP format data sets.
  • Added support for importing and exporting Garmin JNX format data sets. This allows much larger data sets (like imagery) to be exported to compatible Garmin devices which already have a Garmin BirdsEye subscription than the officially supported KMZ format. This option is part of the existing GPS menu item to send raster maps to a Garmin device and also as part of the list of raster formats from the File->Export->Raster menu command.
  • Added support for exporting loaded terrain data to binary STL format data sets.
  • Added support for generating OziExplorer .map positioning files for most raster exports and when batch converting to most formats (new in v14.0.1 release).
  • Added support for loading OpenAir Airspace text files.
  • Added support for exporting loaded line data to ZMap+ IsoMap Line Text files.
  • Added support for loading NMF (ArcGIS Explorer map) format files.
  • Added support for loading Cosmo-SkyMed SCS Radar Data in HDF5 Format.
  • Added support for additional bands of VIIRS data in HDF5 Format.
  • Added support for loading Cogent3D .imagery, .line, .point, and .poly files.
  • Added support for loading generic text files with MGRS coordinates.
  • Added support for exporting loaded contour line data to the AnuDEM contour .gen format.
  • Added new export options for RAW and ERS (ERMapper) Grid formats. These were previously possible using the BIL export, now there are just explicit options to get the proper extension and options by default.
  • Added support for text format files, like Arc ASCII Grid Files, larger than 4GB in size.
  • Added support for LogASCII v2.0 Files (only v3.0 were supported before). Change in v14.0.1.
  • Added support for elevation GeoTIFF files with 64-bit double-precision samples.
  • Digitizer Tool Changes:
  • Added new Favorites toolbar that provides easy access to frequently used Digitizer/Edit Tool options. The new toolbar automatically tracks which features you commonly uses and makes some of those available. You can also customize it and choose which options to always make available. The currently selected favorite can be run by pressing a button or using the Ctrl+Enter shortcut key. You can also setup custom keyboard shortcuts for any favorite item.
  • Reorganized Digitizer Tool right-click menu, greatly reducing the size of the popup menu and making it much easier to find items.
  • Updated the toolbar buttons for creating new features to be active even if the Digitizer/Edit Tool is not active. If you select one of those options the tool will automatically activate.
  • When using the File->Unload All menu command, reset the tool to the Zoom Tool if the Digitizer Tool is active so that the projection can also be reset and avoid confusion when the next file is loaded.
  • Added option when rotating and scaling features to use the mouse to interactively rotate the features rather than specifying a specific rotation angle.
  • Added option to create a series of new line spaced along selected line/area features that are perpendicular to the selected feature.
  • Added option to assign attributes to selected point features from loaded line features.
  • Updated the option to assign address attributes to selected point features to also add an ADDR_SIDE attribute with which side of the line the point is on.
  • Updated options to assign attributes between features to choose which attribute(s) to copy.
  • Updated Undo option (Ctrl+Z) to allow un-doing the last deletion of one or more features (new in v14.0.1).
  • Added option when selecting all areas that connect to a selected area to select only those immediately connected or those that can be reached with any connect path.
  • Updated option to crop a selected area to a selected line to allow cropping multiple selected areas to the line.
  • Added option for creating more than 1 point offset from an existing point (new in v14.0.1).
  • Added support for adding elevation statistics to selected point features (in addition to lines and areas which are already supported) using the Digitizer Tool. This includes adding SLOPE and SLOPE_DIR attributes, as well as ELEVATION, from the loaded terrain.
  • Updated calculation of elevation statistics for area features to calculate the 3D surface area and store it as a SURFACE_AREA_3D attribute for each area.
  • Fixed issue in v13.2 with slow performance (i.e. apparent lockup) trying to snap in the vicinity of area and line features with an extremely high (i.e. tens of thousands or more) number of vertices.
  • Updated joining of lines with per-vertex timestamps (like tracklogs) to keep the per-vertex timestamps.
  • Added new View menu command to zoom to the features selected with the Digitizer Tool.
  • When creating range rings around multiple selected point features and choosing the option to combine the results, immediately combine the results rather than waiting until a subsequent operation with the combine checkbox not checked.
  • Updated options to select areas in other areas or to apply attributes to areas from other areas to allow just doing those that partially overlap and whose centroid is within a selected area.
  • Updated the feature measure dialog to highlight the feature selected in the dialog on the map.
  • Add a TIMESTAMP (as well as ELEVATION and DEPTH if applicable) attributes by default to points created with the Quick Point Creator feature from the position of a connected GPS device.
  • Fixed change in orientation of line and area features when editing the segment lengths when the bearings are being reported relative to magnetic north.
  • Scripting Changes:
  • Added support for numeric and character looping in scripts using new VAR_LOOP_START and VAR_LOOP_END commands. This allows you to step through some range of numbers or characters in a script, including simple loop counters or numbers like coordinates.
  • Added support for looping over loaded layers in scripts using new LAYER_LOOP_START and LAYER_LOOP_END commands. This allows you to step through any loaded layers to perform operations based on some current layer.
  • Added new CALC_ATTR script command to allow calculating new or updating existing attribute values in a script, including numeric calculations between an attribute an another attribute or a fixed value and appending or prepending text to existing attributes.
  • Added new EDIT_MAP_CATALOG script command to allow creating new map catalogs and adding and removing maps from existing map catalogs from inside a script.
  • Added new SET_LAYER_OPTIONS script command to allow setting the display options of a loaded layer without having to unload the layer and re-import it.
  • Added new COPY_LAYER_FILES script command to allow copying the base files for one or more loaded layers to a new location on disk (new in v14.0.1 release).
  • Allow use of the SHAPE_TYPE parameter to filter which types of objects (i.e. areas, lines, and/or points) are considered for the EXPORT_VECTOR and EDIT_VECTOR commands.
  • Added support for TRANSFORM_FILENAME parameter for IMPORT command in script to provide a coordinate-to-coordinate (rather than pixel-to-coordinate like the GCP_FILENAME parameter) when loading a layer.
  • Added support for generating OziExplorer .map files for EXPORT_RASTER command. Use GEN_OZI_MAP_FILE=YES to enable this behavior (new in v14.0.1).
  • Added support for specifying the SPATIAL_RES parameter for export commands as percent values rather than raw numbers, to easily allow adjusting native resolutions.
  • Fixed issue with folders being created for each possible output when gridding even if no files end up being created there.
  • Added option to mark duplicate features with a DUPLICATE=Y attribute by adding MARK_DUPLICATES=YES to the EDIT_VECTOR command rather than just marking them as deleted. You can specify IGNORE_ATTRS=YES to only match on geometry and not also attributes, but now specify DUPLICATE_ATTR parameters to indicate some attributes that do need to be identical.
  • Allowed use of POLYGON_CROP_FOLDER_ATTR without also using POLYGON_CROP_NAME_ATTR to insert a folder into an output filename path.
  • Updated SET_LOG_FILE command to add a version string and timestamp to the log file.
  • Added new GRID_TYPE_PIXEL_SIZE_MAX parameter for EXPORT_RASTER and EXPORT_ELEVATION script commands to allow specifying that gridding should be done to a maximum pixel size, but then the actual pixel size shrank to get same-sized tiles that exactly cover the specified export bounds rather than making the last row and column of tiles possible go past the edge.
  • Added support for providing a coordinate offset and scale (COORD_OFFSET and COORD_SCALE parameters) when exporting Lidar LAS files with the EXPORT_VECTOR command.
  • Fixed issue with the EXPORT_RASTER command when running a script from a command prompt whereby if you only had vector data loaded it wouldn’t be found.
  • Fixed COMBINE_TERRAIN script command to by one pixel larger in size to better maintain the sample spacing.
  • Fixed JOIN_LAYER command to work with formats other than Shapefiles.
  • Added option (TIFF_NO_GTIFF_HEADER) to disable writing out a GeoTIFF header when exporting a TIFF file.
  • Add option to prepend a blank line to the start of empty files being appended to with the GENERATE_PATH_PROFILE script command by adding an ADD_BLANK_LINE=YES parameter.
  • Updated DIR_LOOP_START to allow specifying .. (two dots) as the FILENAME_MASK parameter for just looping over directories without needing to specify a file inside the folders.
  • Online Source Changes:
  • Added support for adding WFS (Web Feature Services) online data sources for dynamically loading online vector data sources.
  • Added support for adding WMTS (tiled WMS) online data sources.
  • Improved display of online sources at some display scales and also use less imagery for some DigitalGlobe exports.
  • Added button on DigitalGlobe client ID specification dialog to allow easily estimating how much premium DigitalGlobe imagery that you would need to purchase for a particular export size and resolution. Also show coverage for each DigitalGlobe source as you highlight it in the source list.
  • Added new SRTM terrain source hosted on globalmapper.com that is more reliable and much faster than the previous source hosted on a NASA/JPL server. The old source is still available with the text ‘Backup Source’ at the beginning of the source name just in case the new source is ever not available for any reason.
  • Added support for merging WMS sources comprised of multiple layers into a single download if the WMS server supports it. This is useful for vector data available as different layers.
  • Added drop-down lists to explicitly select the projection and file format to use when creating new WMS/WMTS sources so that you don’t have to provide it as part of the service name anymore if you want something other than the default.
  • Added support for adding custom tile-based sources that use quadtree naming (like Bing Maps). You just specify a custom URL string and use %quad for the quadtree name placeholder rather than %x, %y, and %z.
  • Added option for custom WMS sources to draw using a single download per screen draw rather than using tiles. This is useful for sources that add watermarks to each download from the WMS server. This option is available by right-clicking on a WMS source in the source list.
  • Updated TMS web export to generate a tileset XML file rather than an HTML file.
  • Added option to skip existing tiles for WorldWind Export, allowing you to split a large export among multiple running instances of Global Mapper.
  • Fixed default display projection when loading the entire world of DigitalGlobe imagery. It was coming in for viewing as a UTM projection centered on the prime meridian if nothing else was loaded, which was not good for viewing much of the world.
  • Made the WMS/WCS source selection dialog resizable.
  • Moved the File menu option to load an ECW file from the Web to the online imagery download dialog as a new button.
  • Added support for WMS sources that go from 0-360 rather than -180 to +180.
  • Projection/Datum Changes:
  • Added Norwegian Transverse Mercator (NTM) zoned projection as a built-in projection.
  • Added ED50 (Malta) and Sphere Radius 6378137 m as built in datums.
  • Renamed Quebec MTM projection to MTM (Eastern Canada) to reflect that the projection is used for more than just Quebec.
  • Updated Hotine Oblique Mercator/RSO projections that use Azimuth Point parameter to save to PRJ files as ‘Longitude_of_Center’ rather than ‘Central_Meridian’ so that Esri products will recognize it.
  • Use TOWGS84 parameters in a WKT PRJ file to select an appropriate datum specialization for datums like ED50 that have lots of transformation parameters available.
  • Updated New Israeli Datum transformation parameters based on official values from Israeli authorities.
  • Added support for using a default.prj file in the App Data folder (see Help->About dialog to set) in addition to the .exe file path.
  • Updating pasting of features to show a dialog allowing you to control what layer the features on the clipboard are pasted to. You can now either paste to the original layer (if still loaded), always create a new layer, paste to the User Created Features layer, or select a loaded layer to paste to. There is also an option on the Edit menu to control whether or not the paste options dialog is displayed or if the last selected option is used.
  • Reorganized the File menu to reduce its size, including moving the export commands to a popup menu and grouping some other related functionality together, in addition to moving spatial analysis functions like contour generation and combining terrain to their own menu.
  • Added option for displaying the bearing of line and area segments on the map on the Vector Display tab of the Configuration dialog.
  • Added option to calculate the areas that drain to and from selected line features when performing a watershed analysis.
  • Added option to watershed calculation to discard any stream stub segments (i.e. short segments at start of flow path) below a certain length threshold.
  • Updated watershed calculation to make the streams 3D lines and ensure that the stream elevation always flow 100% downhill, even through depressions.
  • Updated watershed calculation to save an input flow attribute (IN_FLOW) for each stream and also renamed the MAX_FLOW attribute to OUT_FLOW.
  • Updated map catalog dialog to have a checkbox next to each map so you can disable maps without removing them from the map catalog (added 14.0.1 release).
  • Added new custom Half Pie and Half Pie (Empty) point symbols that allow for custom sizes and colors for the same shape of symbol.
  • Allow overwriting loaded Shapefiles with large DBF files. Previously you would get an error if trying to overwrite them if they were currently loaded due to the DBF file being held open.
  • Added option to specify a bounding box to load when loading Lidar point cloud data. Useful for limiting your load to just a small region for very large Lidar files.
  • Added option to GPS menu to draw a ring around the vessel location of a user-specified radius.
  • Updated build of map legend based on an attribute of vector features to also check the default attribute list for the feature type, allowing you to assign alternate names for a feature type (like different language for built-in types).
  • Added new right-click option to the 3D path profile dialog to create a 3D line feature from the active sub-path.
  • Made the Path Details dialog displayed from a 3D path profile dialog modeless so you can interact with the path with the details shown and also show details of multiple paths if you have multiple profile dialogs open.
  • Include RETURN_NUM as attribute for Lidar point cloud points (v14.0.1 change).
  • Made Help menu command to Release/Remove licenses work for node-locked licenses, providing a mechanism to move licenses more easily.
  • Updated exports to KML/KMZ when using a Mars or Moon datum to stick with that datum to facilitate using the data in Google Mars or Google Moon.
  • Updated image rectification dialog to make the mouse wheel work for zooming when in the reference image view if the mouse is in there rather than just always zooming the zoom map view.
  • Added Heading (always instead of just when time available) and Total Length columns to Feature Vertices dialog showing the length along to the line to each vertex.
  • Updated font selection dialogs for things like the distance scale and elevation legend to allow selecting any color and not just one of a few common colors.
  • Added option when saving search results to the clipboard as text to save them to a file if they are too large to all fit on the clipboard.
  • Added new volume measure units (acre-feet, acre-inches, barrels, and barrels of oil).
  • Made geocoding addresses from a file use Country and Postcode fields. The address search will also be tried without the postal code if the results are poor as for some reason the search will sometimes work better without the postal code than with it.
  • Added option when batch geocoding addresses to copy any addresses that no match at all could be found for to the clipboard.
  • Added option to hide layers that are inside the selected area features to the right-click menu in the Control Center (previously just an option to hide layers outside selected layers existed).
  • Updated Control Center to move the selection to the layer below (or above if none below) the item(s) being deleted rather than moving it to the first layer in the list.
  • Fixed rare incorrect coloring of some PDF files in the 64-bit version.
  • Made holding down the Ctrl key when resizing the main map window maintain the same resolution rather than keeping the same bounds and changing resolution.
  • Greatly improved performance when exporting from online sources that occasionally return invalid image files.
  • Added option to clone existing attribute styles on the Styles tabs of the Options dialog by right-clicking on an item and selecting the appropriate command that pops up. This allows easily using an existing style for a new attribute value.
  • Fixed some issues with SOSI export and added OBJTYPE to every feature exported to SOSI file.
  • Updated ZMap Grid ASCII Export to use 5 columns of elevation rather than 3.
  • Restored dynamic behavior of water level slider on 3D view options dialog.
  • Fixed issue in v13.2 release with prompt for type of unknown files no longer being shown when using the File->Open Data File menu command.
  • Fixed issue with map layout items disappearing when you cancel a KML/KMZ export.
  • Fixed issue with small custom shape symbols being larger than specified when viewed in Google Earth after exporting to KML/KMZ.
  • Improved recovery from errors due to setting 3D view texture and/or terrain size larger than your video card can handle.
  • Added support for creating equal-value areas from map catalogs.
  • Fixed problems drawing some symbols from IoGas .gas files.
  • Corrected slope attribute value display to show degrees rather than radians for equal value area creation on a slope grid.
  • Added support for GDAL “no data value” tag (42113) when reading and writing elevation GeoTIFF files.
  • Added option to generic ASCII text import to create areas from closed line features if no CLOSED attribute is specified for the feature.
  • Fixed error loading high bit depth NITF files with embedded JPEG2000 images in v13.2.
  • Sped up rendering of ECW, MrSID, and JPEG2000 images when zoomed out a bit on them. They are no longer automatically interpolated to improve appearance as it’s not needed for multi-level formats like those.
  • Updated row and column grid naming to allow starting on strings of more than one letters (like BY).
  • Fixed issue with Control Center being impossible to find if you somehow drag it off the screen since the position is now remembered.
  • Limit field length and allowed characters in exported DBF files (such as with Shapefile export) to 254 characters as ESRI products can’t handle the full supported 255 character length and also can’t handle any special characters in DBF field names.
  • Fixed issue with “Never Anti-Alias Pixels” option in batch conversion not being obeyed if the automatic export resampling option is enabled (the default) on the General tab of the Configuration dialog.
  • Fixed problems with cropping to selected areas during batch conversion and also gridding vector data, like Simple ASCII Text or Lidar files, as part of the conversion.
  • Fixed issues with some .ntf files being recognized as NTF Grid files rather than NITF files and not loading.
  • Corrected tiny (about 1 parts in 6 million) over-reporting of calculated area values.
  • Corrected flight date written to Lidar LAS files to be days of year rather than days in month so it won’t always be in January.
  • Display FLIGHT_DATE for Lidar LAS files in the metadata dialog for the layer.
  • Fixed issues in v13.2 that could cause some buffer areas to be created with spikes back to the original feature being buffered.
  • Added keyboard access to GPS menu items Save Tracklog (Alt+G then S) and Mark Waypoint from Average Position (Alt+G then A).
  • Updated SPS format load to auto-detect the format version if no header was provided so that the attributes can be decoded properly from SPS v2.x files.
  • Corrected cell type written to ERS files exported along with floating point BIL elevation files.
  • Updated raster KML/KMZ export so that if you have the box checked on the Gridding tab to create separate folders for each row that your KML/KMZ super-overlay export will create separate folders for the zoom levels and rows of tiles to avoid sticking huge numbers of files in a single folder for very large exports.
  • Added Ctrl+Shift+S as shortcut for Save Workspace As.
  • Corrected reporting of minimum clearance location for line of sight and also storage of line of sight to a KML file to save the great circle path it was calculated with rather than the straight line path. These can be significantly different for very long line of sight paths.
  • Added metadata about layers that were combined and the combine operation used to new elevation layers formed by combining terrain layers. You can see these values on the Metadata dialog for the combined layer.
  • Improved handling of loading multiple unknown file types at once by remembering the type selected if prompted. Also made MSI Planet files load regardless of filename.
  • Allow exporting grid lines to a raster file even if nothing else is loaded.
  • Made sea level display as blue in the Global Shader.
  • Added support for loading JP2 files with no embedded position information but with an accompanying .aux.xml file with position information.
  • Made the vector type filter dialog for the Map Layout dialog resizable and have right-click options on each type list for clearing or setting all types.
  • Added option to GPX export to include all feature attributes and not just those officially supported in the GPX format.
  • Support additional GML flavors, like new OSGB INSPIRE maps.
  • Improved loading of LandXML files, including adding support for loading contour lines.
  • Added support for using index.txt (and other index files from MSI Planet) to position most image formats, like BMP.
  • Fixed issue from v13.2 loading NITF files with embedded high-bit-depth JPEG2000 images.
  • Significantly sped up the drawing speed of some NITF files with embedded JPEG2000 images.
  • Allow setting up attribute-based styling that matches against a blank value.
  • When loading KML files, obey any designated and for custom icon symbols.
  • Added option to the Advanced Section of the General tab of the Configuration dialog to disable copying error message text to the clipboard automatically. Use this if you have issues with error text wiping out text you were copying on the clipboard when an error pops up in a Global Mapper process.
  • Updated import of color fields from generic text files to support some common color names, like RED, BLUE, GREEN, etc. in addition to specific RGB colors.
  • Added buttons on the screen capture dialog allowing you to easily increase or decrease the capture size by a multiple of the default size.
  • Drastically sped up exports of multiple terrain layers to new GeoTIFF elevation files.
  • Fixed issue in v13.2 and later with pan arrows not showing at edges of map display in image rectifier on some touch-screen systems (Fix in v14.0.1).
  • Added new right-click option on vector search dialog to minimize the size of each column (added in v14.0.1).