ArcGIS Server 9.3 WebADF

To start off, I created a standard out of the box application via Visual Studio. The first change I noticed was in the MapResourceManager. There is a new section called LayerDefintions.

The LayerDefinitions section is a very helpful addition. It lets you choose symbology for search and identify results. In addition, it lets you fully customize the attribute table that is returned with the results. By the way, the attribute results are now displayed like map tips for points, lines, and polygons.

Next I wanted to take a look at performance. From a quick test, the application seemed to load faster than 9.2. The page_load event is called on 4 times in the initial startup, which is better than the 6 to 8 times I have seen in 9.2 As the map is loading, a progress bar has been added to map which is much better than waiting on a blank white map.

Here are a few very noticeable changes in the Web Mapping Application: - Task Items are displayed across the top of the map where the standard toolbar used to be. (Visually, I like the change. However, I can see this becoming a problem if you have a lot of tasks or tasks with long names)

- The standard toolbar is now positioned on the right side above the map.

- The ZoomLevel control is now visible even with non-cached maps and is displayed above the map with the Navigation control.

- The overview map has been added to the standard toolbar and can be turned on and off.

- There are zoom to previous and zoom forward extent buttons on the standard toolbar

I am very eager to see how much effort will go into migrating my customized 9.2 applications to 9.3.

Trent Tinker

GIS Application Developer

ROK Technologies