Pima County Department of Transportation

Geographic Information Services Division

Using ARC/INFO on Windows

Workstation ARC/INFO under SunOS (UNIX) has been our main platform for many years. We are now using the Windows version of ARC/INFO on PC platforms in addition to ARC/INFO on UNIX.

The online ArcDoc help has good information that is unique to running ARC/INFO on Windows. Select "Contents", "Getting Started", and then "Using ARC/INFO on Windows". In particular, see "Using UNIX AML applications in Windows".

ESRI has done a great job porting ARC/INFO to Windows. It's essentially the same program you had under UNIX. However, they didn't port UNIX to Windows. Wherever you have something in ARC/INFO that is operating system dependent, you may need to adjust it to accommodate the Windows environment.

UNIX ARC/INFO users tend to think of the whole of ARC/INFO-UNIX as one environment. For instance, upon installing ARC/INFO on Windows, they ask "How come ls doesn't work?" This page discusses options for getting UNIX commands on Windows, but they should be used to ease migration, not for AML programming. There are ARC/INFO AML functions that are operating system independent to do many operating system type things. AMLs should be converted to use those functions. Clearly, UNIX scripts are going to be a problem. Most all UNIX dependent code needs to be modified, hopefully in a manner that is operating system independent. In the worst case, you can have conditional code in your AMLs for each operating system.

Even with these conversion issues, we like ARC/INFO on Windows and find the operating system differences are manageable.

Here are notes on our experiences converting to ARC/INFO on Windows:

• Specification of the path to data differs.

• Access to data:
  • PC's running ARC/INFO can get to data on other PC's using Windows networking or data on UNIX systems via Intergraph's DiskAccess. But, be sure to read about an incompatibility problem with DiskAccess first.
  • UNIX systems can't get to data on PC's because without Intergraph's Disk Share, UNIX systems can't see the Windows files with NFS.
  (There are other products that provide these NFS functions for Windows too. For instance, see Hummingbird Communications' Hummingbird Maestro or Microsoft's Windows Services for UNIX.)

• PC's that serve ARC/INFO software or standalone ARC/INFO PC's also need customized system files. Generally, these PC's are running the License Manager. Among others, customized system files include:
  • Custom shadesets and markersets go in the PC's \arcexe71\symbols directory.
  • To use UNIX Librarian data, the contents of $ARCHOME/tables must be copied to \arcexe71\tables on the PC.

• Window behavior is Windows style, unlike UNIX. That is, the user must click on a window to change focus and that window is brought to the front. Microsoft's Tweak UI is a solution for Windows users.

  Another method for having the active window follow mouse tracking is to use REGEDIT to change the value of "ActiveWindowTracking" under HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Control Panel/Mouse from 0 to 1.

• You'll want to increase the "Screen Buffer Size Height" so you have a vertical scroll bar and can scroll back in command windows. This is a Windows function. See the online help.

• UNIX users miss the easy ability to copy and paste text in the ARC command window when using Windows. See Copying and Pasting in the ARC Command Window for the solution.

• On Windows, environment variables such as CANVASCOLOR WHITE are set in the System Control panel or with the NT "set" command.

• UNIX commands are not available on Windows, including favorites like ls and vi. There are several ways to get UNIX Commands on Windows.

• AML's that use UNIX operating system commands for managing files should be converted to use AML functions that are platform independent. These AML functions include: [ACCESS] [COPY] [DELETE] [DIR] [ENTRYNAME] [EXISTS] [FILELIST] [JOINFILE] [LISTFILE] [PATHNAME] [RENAME] and [SCRATCHNAME].

  If you use UNIX Commands on Windows, then you won't need to use some of these AML functions. However, it's good programming practice to use these platform independent AML functions instead.

• AML errors are reported by line number, but the Windows Notepad editor doesn't show line numbers. To see line numbers, use an editor or file browser that supports line numbers.
  • EditPad Pro EditPad Pro is a great Notepad replacement. You'll like it.
  • Or, see UNIX Commands on Windows for free or low-cost vi replacements.
  • Emacs fans should check out GNU Emacs on Windows.
  • Another free editor that does this is "T", available from ftp://ftp.pc.ibm.com/pub/pccbbs/os2_ews/tinyed.zip. T is a DOS-based program, but it's simple, free, runs fine under Windows, and does the job.

• Plotting is handled differently on Windows.

• Your search path may need to be adjusted because ARC/INFO causes a network path to be searched.

• You can serve your ARC/INFO licenses from UNIX if you want. See Using a UNIX License Manager for ARC/INFO on Windows.

You may find our ARC/INFO Setup Check List helpful.