20 replies to this topic

[jerseysbest]

I've never run into a problem with points, lines and polygons on either computers I have, one has 3GB of ram, the other 8GB (64 bit xp).

But...

I do run into problems with text. I just finished up a very large map with street level detail of a very dense county, and I'd run into problems just opening up a document with just half the local street annotation and nothing else.

For the local and some of the larger street annotation that was too much to open by themselves, I exported each layer in 10 files, each file contained annotation with ObjectID's ending in 1, then 2, then 3 and so on (by way of a definition query [ObjectID like '%1']). I tried doing just 2 files of each layer, then 5, but they were still too big.

After I get them out of Arc, I open them up in Illy, and convert the text to outlines. Funny how this dramatically increases the file size, but actually makes the files much more manageable. Then, just copy and paste in front in the target document. Very time consuming, and painstaking, but I know of no alternative without buying more software.

Keep in mind, for this particular map, that I did most of the text editing in ArcMap (the follow this feature function is great), and very little in Illy.

[MapMedia]

I've never run into a problem with points, lines and polygons on either computers I have, one has 3GB of ram, the other 8GB (64 bit xp).

But...

I do run into problems with text. I just finished up a very large map with street level detail of a very dense county, and I'd run into problems just opening up a document with just half the local street annotation and nothing else.

For the local and some of the larger street annotation that was too much to open by themselves, I exported each layer in 10 files, each file contained annotation with ObjectID's ending in 1, then 2, then 3 and so on (by way of a definition query [ObjectID like '%1']). I tried doing just 2 files of each layer, then 5, but they were still too big.

After I get them out of Arc, I open them up in Illy, and convert the text to outlines. Funny how this dramatically increases the file size, but actually makes the files much more manageable. Then, just copy and paste in front in the target document. Very time consuming, and painstaking, but I know of no alternative without buying more software.

Keep in mind, for this particular map, that I did most of the text editing in ArcMap (the follow this feature function is great), and very little in Illy.

Another fix I found was to resize the street text to a larger point size. I was using something like 4pt with Myrion Pro. Possibly this is not a native size so there is a lot of memory used to resize it at draw time etc in Illy. When I increased the size to 7pt, Maplex adjusted the placement, which was still acceptable, and I could export the entire map project in once file and Illy likes it a lot too.

[pfyfield]

I've found that a build-up of scratch files can seriously slow Illustrator down. They're supposed to delete when the program is closed, but don't if the program crashes (which happens a lot when you're having memory issues!).

Look for the AITEMP folder (I'm working in Windows, so it may be different on a Mac). I was amazed at the number of scratch files in there, and how much better Illustrator performed once I cleaned them out.

[pfyfield]

Something we've been finding with MAPublisher is a lot of compound paths in the data we import that don't need to be there. I'm talking arc data, not polygons. That really taxes the memory as Illustrator tries to draw all those compound paths. So, now whenever I import data, I release compound paths (unless, of course, I need them).

Ted, if you see this, is there a reason for this, or a fix I could use?

[Ted Florence]

Hi Paul.
I just happened to see this but in the future if you want my attention and/or the attention of an Avenza person on a more immediate basis, then please email directly to Avenza or myself personally. That way you will definitely get a response much sooner.
You said that these compound paths don't need to be there but might they have been represented in that manner in the GIS to begin with, like a street that stops at a dead end and then continues later but with the same name and attributes?
In any event, we would like to examine your compound path issue more closely so if you have a GIS file that, when imported, exhibits this behaviour please send it our way and we'll have a look.
Regards
Ted

Something we've been finding with MAPublisher is a lot of compound paths in the data we import that don't need to be there. I'm talking arc data, not polygons. That really taxes the memory as Illustrator tries to draw all those compound paths. So, now whenever I import data, I release compound paths (unless, of course, I need them).

Ted, if you see this, is there a reason for this, or a fix I could use?

[Ted Florence]

For those of you watching this thread, Paul did contact us directly and did send in his file. We dealt with this off the forum but just to provide closure to the viewers, here is the result of our findings.

The representation of the data when imported through MAPublisher appears correct. We don't see anything that suggests this is a data misinterpretation issue on MAPublisher's part. The number of paths in the imported data layer correspond, with Selstats in MAPublisher (3 paths) as they do in the attribute table in ArcMap.

As the creator of the data did a classification based on highway type, prior to importing into Illustrator with MAPublisher, the resultant attribute table has three records, one for each highway type. This is correctly represented in Illustrator after importing as 3 compound paths. So as far as the handling of the database and grouping aspects of the of the dissolved shapefile it seems correct. Geometrically speaking when you perform a dissolve in Arc you are essentially creating a compound path. Illustrator considers any aggregate path a compound path and the MAPublisher importer basically takes this "multi-segment" structure and converts it to a compound path in Illustrator which is the same thing but in Illustrator-speak.

Please note that different results may occur depending on whether one has the "Create multipart feature" option enabled or disabled at the time of the dissolve operation.

This is ESRI's explanation for this option

Multipart option gives users control over the existence of multipart features in the output feature class. When this option is checked on the dialog, multipart features are allowed in the output feature class; otherwise, the output will contain single_part features only.

Hope this helps.

Ted