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NOTES FOR SMAPS USERS 1. CONVERTING SMAPS DATA. SMAPS data can be converted to COMPASS data fairly easily.

SMAPS uses two interchange formats: RSD and SEF. The RSD format was used with SMAPS versions 3.X and 4.X. The SEF format was used with SMAPS 5.X. Refer to your SMAPS documentation for instructions on exporting the data. The COMPASS Project Manager has tools that will import SEF files into COMPASS. For detailed information on converting SEF File, refer to the Project Manager Help. Since the RXD format is older, the program used to convert it to COMPASS format is a part of the COMPASS for DOS package. This package is available on the internet. If you need to import RSD data from SMAPS 3 and 4, you will have to use the DOS program SMAP2CSS.EXE to convert the data. Refer to the DOS COMPASS documentation for complete instructions. 2. SURVEY ORGANIZATION IN COMPASS If you are used to using SMAPS, you may be confused by the way COMPASS organizes data. This is because COMPASS has a very different philosophy about how to manage cave data. Let's look at the differences. First, it is part of SMAPS' philosophy to maintain total control over all the cave data. For example, with SMAPS, every survey is kept in a separate file and the program chooses the filename for each file. If you look in a SMAPS directory, you will see dozens of files with names like: AAAAAAYF.CY. These files hold your data, but you have no control over them. The only way you can look at or manipulate them is through SMAPS. This is because the format of the files is secret. This means that SMAPS has to keep track of the all the files and organize them into cave systems. There are several disadvantages to this format. The biggest disadvantage is that it is very easy to corrupt the data. If you delete the wrong files or change a single byte in a SMAPS file, you can corrupt all the caves and surveys in the directory structure. If you keep two caves in the same directory, the data can become cross linked. If you copy data, you must be absolutely sure you get the right files or the copy will be useless. Since file format is secret, there is no way to fix any problem that may occur. COMPASS on the other hand is based around normal DOS/Windows files. The file format is not secret and you can even edit them with a word processor if you are careful. Each file can hold hundreds of surveys which makes it easy to copy surveys and also makes the software run faster. It also means that you can move your files around without confusing the program or the risk of damaging the data. Because the data format is not fragile, your data is much safer in COMPASS files. Even in the worst case, you can use an editor to repair the data. There are many advantages to the COMPASS format, but if you are used to SMAPS, organizing your data may seem confusing. In SMAPS, the user is presented with a directory structure and you put your surveys and control points into this directory structure. In COMPASS, you use normal DOS/Windows files, directories and folders to organize your cave data. In COMPASS you get to create and name the files that are used to organize your data. You can still have the same kind of directory structure as SMAPS and it is just as easy to create, it just involves different steps and a slightly different thought process.

SURVEY DATA FILES. The first level of COMPASS data organization in COMPASS is the survey. Basically, a survey is the data from one surveying session. Usually this means that the data that was collected by the same people, on the same day in a particular part of the cave. Usually, an individual survey will be confined to single passage. If you switch to another part of the cave, the data would normally go into a new survey, even if the same team is doing the surveying. This allows COMPASS to display more detail about how the cave was surveyed. This is pretty much the same as SMAPS. The difference is that in COMPASS the data for many surveys is generally saved in a single file. Thus, the first step in creating a new COMPASS cave survey is to create a new file to hold the data. You can do this in one of several ways. You can instruct the COMPASS Project Manager to create a new file with an empty survey in it, or you can go directly to the COMPASS Editor, enter the data, and then save the data to a new file. You should choose a name for this file that corresponds to the cave. For example, if you were starting a new survey in Groaning Cave you'd probably name the file GROAN.DAT. (Data file in COMPASS have the extension ".DAT". Remember, a Survey Data file can hold hundreds individual caves surveys, so you can enter as many surveys as you want during each editing session. Whenever you survey more passage in a cave and want to expand the data, you simply return to the file and add more surveys. SMAPS users sometimes feel that they must put each survey in a separate file. Although you can do this, it is very inefficient. Normally, you would put all of the data from a single cave into a single Survey Data file. For example, you could put all 1200 surveys in Lechuguilla Cave into a single file called LECH.DAT. (Note: COMPASS for DOS is limited to about 30 miles of cave per file.) PROJECT FILES. The next level of organization in COMPASS is the Project File. Project Files are used to combine several individual caves into a cave system. For example, I have data for the Huautla Cave System that consists of over 60 separate caves combined using a single Project File. If you have a very large cave, you can also split the cave into several Survey Data files and use a Project to combine them all. For example, the Wind Cave data is split into seven separate data files, each containing a particular section of the cave. SMAPS users sometimes get confused about Project Files and think that the Project File actually holds part of the data. A Project File is simply a list that tells COMPASS which Survey Data files to combine. This means you can have more than one Project File that uses the same data. For example, you could have one project file that combines Lechuguilla and Carlsbad and another Project file that combines Lechuguilla and Spider Cave. This process of combining has no effect on the original data. It just creates a combined image of the caves without modifying the original Survey Data files. THE PROJECT MANAGER These files may seem a bit confusing, but COMPASS has a special program that is designed to display, control and manipulate Survey Data Files and

Project Files. The program is call the Project Manager. The Project Manager allows you to create and maintain Survey Data files and Project files using a simple mouse actions. In the Project Manager the survey data is displayed visually as "tree" diagram. This makes it easy to visualize and organize the cave data. PROCESSING AND VIEWING DATA Once you have entered your data into a Survey Data file you can close, process, view and print images of the data. These operation can be carried out automatically by the Project Manager. Survey data can be processed and viewed at the "Project" level or at the "File" level. For example, if you have a project that consist of several caves, you can process and view the individual caves or the whole project. You simply highlight the section you are interested in. SOFTWARE TOOLS Although the Project Manager makes it look like COMPASS is a single program, COMPASS actually consists several individual programs. This is part of the philosophy of COMPASS which is designed around the "tool box" concept. Instead of trying to design a single huge program that tries to do a little bit of everything, COMPASS consists of several "tools" that do one job and do it very well. In other words, instead of giving you a "Swiss Army Knife" program that does everything, but nothing really well, COMPASS gives you a screwdriver, a hammer and a saw, each one carefully designed to do one job really well. Most of the time you don't need to think about the individual COMPASS programs, because the Project Manager automatically runs the programs when they are needed. However, there are instances where it is very useful to run the individual COMPASS programs. For example, you might run the Viewer manually to make it easy to view different caves that you have already processed. You could even run multiple copies of the Viewer compare caves maps.

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