CAVE SURVEYING PROGRAMS
A List of Features Compiled by the Texas Speleological Survey

General--
1.  Name & version of program: CML V 1.9 (11/94)
2.  Written by: Mel Park, Pres. CRF, Assoc. Prof. Univ. Tenn., Memphis
    mpark@utmem1.utmem.edu
3.  Year completed: 1992
4.  Price: free
5   Available from: the author, or anonymous ftp at nb.utemem.edu or the 
    Cavers' Digest ftp site (Yale and gserv).
6.  Thumbnail description: CML (Cave Map Language) is a multi-platform,  
    command-line driven cave survey program designed to be able to handle 
    the CRF data of Mammoth Cave. It is a full-featured, general purpose
    cave survey program that has been compiled to run on the PC, Unix 
    workstations and on the Mac.
7.  System requirements & capabilities, including peripherals: Runs on 
    anything.
8.  Can use math coprocessor: Yes
9.  Printer/plotter drivers available: NA. Can generate Postscript and DXF 
    files for plots and text or binary files to interface with Survex.
10. Advantages of program: Based on Cave Map Language, which is a text-based
    system for writing down just about all the data about a cave that can
    be written down. It is free format and any caver can understand the data
    just by inspecting it. This is because CML accepts all the ways in which 
    we normally write data in our survey books. It has its own memory manager 
    so it is not limited in size or number of files it can process or the 
    complexity of the cave.
11. Possible disadvantages of program: Command-line interface. Also it prefers 
    (but does not require) the hierarchical station-naming convention that we 
    use for the CRF data.
                                                                            
Data Management--
12. Data management style (one file, hierarchical, etc.): One or more text
    files. Connectivity is derived from semantics so the data can appear in
    any sequence.
13. Data entry screen can be customized: For plain CML, a set of micro-emacs
    is supplied for data entry. People experienced in emacs could customize
    this.
14. Station name auto prefixing/suffixing: Auto prefixing implemented in 
    emacs.
15. Input/output units: Default is decimal feet. Feet and inches and metric
    are supported.
16. File import/export: SMAPS 4.x (ASCII dump) to CML translator provided. 
    Exports SEF, DXF, Survex, Super3D (a Mac graphics program), Postscript. 
    Produces many kinds of reports: Least-squares closure parameters, 
    schematics, trip reports, cartesian data, cave attributes data.
17. Database/inventory features: CML implements a system for including
    tagged data fields with the survey data. This can be used to attach 
    passage attribute information to stations and party information to trips.

Data Processing--
18. Maximum number of vectors: no limit.
19. Type of loop closing: Least squares, based on the CMAP algorithms.
20. Processing speed (slow, medium, fast): fast.
21. Statistical error analysis: CMAP/SMAPS-like table plus much pre-
    closure reporting on raw closure error.
   
Graphics--
22. On-screen graphics: relies on Survex.
23. On-screen scale & north arrow: relies on Survex.
24. Map rotation: relies on Survex.
25. Oblique/profile views: relies on Survex.
26. Perspective view: relies on Survex.
27. Attributes/colors: relies on Survex.
28. Coordinates/GIS features: relies on Survex.
29. Cross-sections: relies on Survex.
30. Clipping: relies on Survex.
31. Positioning of title, scale on plot: relies on Survex.
32. Quadrangle plotting: relies on Survex. Postscript output produces quads.