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

General--
1.  Name & version of program: Vectors v. 0.98 (11/94)
2.  Written by: Mel Park, Pres. CRF, Assoc. Prof. Univ. Tenn., Memphis
    mpark@utmem1.utmem.edu
3.  Year completed: 1993
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: Vectors is a full-featured cave survey program for
    the Macintosh that incorporates CML (Cave Map Language) as its computing
    engine.
7.  System requirements & capabilities, including peripherals: Mac plus or
    better. System 6.04 or later.
8.  Can use math coprocessor: Yes
9.  Printer/plotter drivers available: NA. Use Mac printing manager. 
10. Advantages of program: Based on Cave Map Language, which is a text-based
    system for writing down just about all 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: 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. Vectors is also a text editor so data files can be 
    manually edited and output files viewed by it.
13. Data entry screen can be customized: Vectors implements configurable
    WYSIWSBLL data entry windows. 
14. Station name auto prefixing/suffixing: Auto prefixing implemented.
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/Vectors implements a system for 
    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: Yes, as scalable line-plots in growable, scrollable
    windows.
23. On-screen scale & north arrow: no.
24. Map rotation: no yet implemented.
25. Oblique/profile views: not yet implemented.
26. Perspective view: not yet implemented.
27. Attributes/colors: Clicking on a passage hilites it and data queries
    about that passage made.
28. Coordinates/GIS features: Clicking on a passage hilites it and data 
    queries about that passage made.
29. Cross-sections: not yet implemented.
30. Clipping: yes.
31. Positioning of title, scale on plot: no.
32. Quadrangle plotting: Postscript output produces quads.