Manifold now shipping GIS product for SQL Server 2008 Spatial (Katmai)

I thought readers of this forum would be interested to know commercial products are now supporting Katmai.

Manifold Release 8 started shipping last Tuesday, 28 August 2007, to the general public with direct, native support for SQL Server 2008 (Katmai) Spatial built in.

Links...

Home page (SQL Server 2008 featured prominently):

http://www.manifold.net/

News page overview of Release 8:

http://www.manifold.net/info/news.shtml

Spatial DBMS user manual topic:

http://demo.manifold.net/doc/spatial_dbms.htm

The spatial DBMS user manual topic is long because it introduces the general ideas behind spatial DBMS for users new to this part of GIS. SQL Server 2008 users will probably want to skip right down to the "Supported Spatial DBMS" section of that topic, as well as the "Projections and Spatial DBMS" section, which discusses use of EPSG codes within Katmai data stores.

From the user manual page:

"Manifold supports SQL Server 2008 spatial today for those Microsoft employees, partners, beta testers and independent developers who have been given access to SQL Server 2008 spatial, and will continue to support SQL Server 2008 spatial when it is released to the public."

Note that Manifold Enterprise Edition ($395) is required to work with native Katmai connections and native Katmai geometry types. This is true of SQL Server 2008 as it is of the other spatial DBMS's supported by Manifold (Oracle, IBM DB2 with Spatial Extender, PostgreSQL/PostGIS). If you have the Katmai spatial CTP you don't need to get anything than the standard Release 8 production edition of Manifold. It will automatically recognize SQL Server 2008 spatial data stores upon connection using the new, dedicated SQL Server data source. For example, once you connect (you can connect to many different types of spatial DBMS at once) you can copy data from Oracle Spatial or legacy storage like ArcSDE and paste it into Katmai. The Database Console in Manifold also works with Katmai, which provides a useful way of crafting and executing queries.

By the way, we'd like to compliment the Katmai team on a job well done. We've had a lot of experience with spatial DBMS and GIS and this is clearly a world-class entry from Microsoft.

Ah, almost forgot: if you work for Microsoft, Manifold is free for you. Drop me an email and I'll arrange a free license for you.

Regards to all,

Clearing open "question".

Manifold now shipping GIS product for SQL Server 2008 Spatial (Katmai)

I thought readers of this forum would be interested to know commercial products are now supporting Katmai.

Manifold Release 8 started shipping last Tuesday, 28 August 2007, to the general public with direct, native support for SQL Server 2008 (Katmai) Spatial built in.

Links...

Home page (SQL Server 2008 featured prominently):

http://www.manifold.net/

News page overview of Release 8:

http://www.manifold.net/info/news.shtml

Spatial DBMS user manual topic:

http://demo.manifold.net/doc/spatial_dbms.htm

The spatial DBMS user manual topic is long because it introduces the general ideas behind spatial DBMS for users new to this part of GIS. SQL Server 2008 users will probably want to skip right down to the "Supported Spatial DBMS" section of that topic, as well as the "Projections and Spatial DBMS" section, which discusses use of EPSG codes within Katmai data stores.

From the user manual page:

"Manifold supports SQL Server 2008 spatial today for those Microsoft employees, partners, beta testers and independent developers who have been given access to SQL Server 2008 spatial, and will continue to support SQL Server 2008 spatial when it is released to the public."

Note that Manifold Enterprise Edition ($395) is required to work with native Katmai connections and native Katmai geometry types. This is true of SQL Server 2008 as it is of the other spatial DBMS's supported by Manifold (Oracle, IBM DB2 with Spatial Extender, PostgreSQL/PostGIS). If you have the Katmai spatial CTP you don't need to get anything than the standard Release 8 production edition of Manifold. It will automatically recognize SQL Server 2008 spatial data stores upon connection using the new, dedicated SQL Server data source. For example, once you connect (you can connect to many different types of spatial DBMS at once) you can copy data from Oracle Spatial or legacy storage like ArcSDE and paste it into Katmai. The Database Console in Manifold also works with Katmai, which provides a useful way of crafting and executing queries.

By the way, we'd like to compliment the Katmai team on a job well done. We've had a lot of experience with spatial DBMS and GIS and this is clearly a world-class entry from Microsoft.

Ah, almost forgot: if you work for Microsoft, Manifold is free for you. Drop me an email and I'll arrange a free license for you.

Regards to all,

Clearing open "question".

Managing Release Compatibility

I have been tasked with the responsibility of managing "Release
Compatibility" of our products with Microsoft products.
Basically, it is my job to make sure that we keep a detailed list of which
of our products work with which of Microsofts products. This includes not
only different versions of the OS, but also different service packs. It
also includes versions of Microsoft Products such as IIS, SQL Server,
Exchange Server, Outlook as well as all the associated service packs for
each.
This is all to be cross-referenced against each version of our own products,
to see where we are compatible and where we are not.
Right now, we are tracking this in a simple word document with some tables
in it, that details the different versions, but this is not a very good
solution, as it is hard to maintain, has a lot of duplicate information, and
still does not hold all the information we would like it to. For example,
it does not track *interactions* of different products, nor does it track
things like hotfixes.
I am looking for a database driven solution that we could implement that
will facilitate this tracking. I know there must be other Microsoft
partners who have this same problem, what do you use to keep track of this
sort of thing?
-please reply in the newsgroup, I cannot receive emails from here.
Hi Brian,
Thanks for your posting!
Based on my understanding, you would like to have database to record and
keep the steps of release of our hotfix or service pack. Something like a
notification system. Correct me if I was wrong. However, there is no such
funcationality now. I will try to make a further research internally and
try to see whether there are any available workaround.
Thank you for your patience and cooperation.
Sincerely yours,
Mingqing Cheng
Online Partner Support Specialist
Partner Support Group
Microsoft Global Technical Support Center
Introduction to Yukon! - http://www.microsoft.com/sql/yukon
This posting is provided "as is" with no warranties and confers no rights.
Please reply to newsgroups only, many thanks!
|||Hi Brian,
This question is very specific to your environment and is more like a
consult type of an issue. You are welcome to wait for MVP or other peer
response, however we will not be able to assist you with this as this is
not a break/fix type of issue and is more like a consult type question. You
can contact Advisory Services (AS) . Microsoft Advisory Services provides
short-term advice and guidance for problems not covered by Problem
Resolution Service as well as requests for consultative assistance for
design, development and deployment issues. You may call this number to get
Advisory Services: (800) 936-5200.
Thank you for your patience and cooperation. If you have any questions or
concerns, don't hesitate to let me know. We are here to be of assistance!
Sincerely yours,
Mingqing Cheng
Online Partner Support Specialist
Partner Support Group
Microsoft Global Technical Support Center
Introduction to Yukon! - http://www.microsoft.com/sql/yukon
This posting is provided "as is" with no warranties and confers no rights.
Please reply to newsgroups only, many thanks!

Managing Release Compatibility

I have been tasked with the responsibility of managing "Release
Compatibility" of our products with Microsoft products.
Basically, it is my job to make sure that we keep a detailed list of which
of our products work with which of Microsofts products. This includes not
only different versions of the OS, but also different service packs. It
also includes versions of Microsoft Products such as IIS, SQL Server,
Exchange Server, Outlook as well as all the associated service packs for
each.
This is all to be cross-referenced against each version of our own products,
to see where we are compatible and where we are not.
Right now, we are tracking this in a simple word document with some tables
in it, that details the different versions, but this is not a very good
solution, as it is hard to maintain, has a lot of duplicate information, and
still does not hold all the information we would like it to. For example,
it does not track *interactions* of different products, nor does it track
things like hotfixes.
I am looking for a database driven solution that we could implement that
will facilitate this tracking. I know there must be other Microsoft
partners who have this same problem, what do you use to keep track of this
sort of thing?
-please reply in the newsgroup, I cannot receive emails from here.Hi Brian,
Thanks for your posting!
Based on my understanding, you would like to have database to record and
keep the steps of release of our hotfix or service pack. Something like a
notification system. Correct me if I was wrong. However, there is no such
funcationality now. I will try to make a further research internally and
try to see whether there are any available workaround.
Thank you for your patience and cooperation.
Sincerely yours,
Mingqing Cheng
Online Partner Support Specialist
Partner Support Group
Microsoft Global Technical Support Center
---
Introduction to Yukon! - http://www.microsoft.com/sql/yukon
This posting is provided "as is" with no warranties and confers no rights.
Please reply to newsgroups only, many thanks!|||Hi Brian,
This question is very specific to your environment and is more like a
consult type of an issue. You are welcome to wait for MVP or other peer
response, however we will not be able to assist you with this as this is
not a break/fix type of issue and is more like a consult type question. You
can contact Advisory Services (AS) . Microsoft Advisory Services provides
short-term advice and guidance for problems not covered by Problem
Resolution Service as well as requests for consultative assistance for
design, development and deployment issues. You may call this number to get
Advisory Services: (800) 936-5200.
Thank you for your patience and cooperation. If you have any questions or
concerns, don't hesitate to let me know. We are here to be of assistance!
Sincerely yours,
Mingqing Cheng
Online Partner Support Specialist
Partner Support Group
Microsoft Global Technical Support Center
---
Introduction to Yukon! - http://www.microsoft.com/sql/yukon
This posting is provided "as is" with no warranties and confers no rights.
Please reply to newsgroups only, many thanks!

Managing Hierarchies in Dimension Tables

I am currently looking at the capabilities in SSIS from the point of view of an ETL developer who has worked with other products eg. Informatica, Cognos DecisionStream and one of things I note is a lack of support for dimensional hierarchies.

It appears that MS have assumed that SSIS users will automatically use SSAS.

We use Hyperion Essbase. Other sites have Cognos or Business Objects for their OLAP/BI.

I would like to be able build multi-level dimension hierarchies directly from within SSIS.

Has MS considered this for future versions?

We don't have any support for building hierarchies in these products simply becuase we do not connect directly to their metadata. However, it is possible to load hierarchies in SSIS - although again without direct metadata support.

Could you outline some features that you think would be useful? Or perhaps some issues you are currently facing in loading hierarchies?

Thanks

Donald Farmer

|||

Hi Donald,

Many enterprises are moving towards the concept of Master Data Management. This is the function of maintaining the reporting dimensions externally to any DW/BI system. There are specialised tools to do this but it can be managed in spreadsheets and fed into a dimension repository. This may be as simple as a few tables which store the attributes and parent/child relationships. The data in this repository has been validated.

As an ETL developer, when I wish to build dimensional tables, I can use the Master Data to source the hierarchies etc and then build the appropriate dimensional tables for either a star or snowflake schema.

Cognos 8 Data Integration (formerly the DecisionStream ETL tool) allows a developer to define a hierarchy. The GUI allows them to select the parent, child, description, and Top Parent Node of the hierarchy. It then generates a table containing chiild, description, parent, and level. From this, I can build a star schema dimension. One of the best features is that it checks the hierarchy for errors. The Developer can also view the hierarchy tree.

With SSIS, and I am a relative newbie, the only way to do the above is to too build a dimension in SSAS and then call that component from SSIS.