XAML-Map-Control/README.md

# XAML Map Control

A set of controls for WPF, UWP and WinUI for rendering digital maps from different providers and various types of map overlays.

Map providers can easily be added by specifying a template string for their map tile URLs. 
Map overlay layers allow to draw and interact with graphical objects and pushpins on the map.
The Map Control API is similar to the Microsoft Bing Maps Control for WPF, except that no API key is required.

The project includes sample applications for both platforms, which demonstrate the features of XAML Map Control.

Map Control supports multiple map projections. However, the MapTileLayer class only works with WebMercatorProjection.
For other projections, an appropriate WmtsTileLayer or WmsImageLayer could be used.

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Main classes are

- **MapBase**: The core map control. Provides properties like Center, ZoomLevel and Heading,
which define the currently displayed map viewport.

- **Map**: MapBase with basic mouse and touch input handling for zoom, pan, and rotation.

- **MapTileLayer**: Provides tiled map content (e.g. from OpenStreetMap) by means of a **TileSource**.

- **MapImageLayer**, **WmsImageLayer**: Provides single image map content, e.g. from a Web Map Service (WMS).

- **WmtsTileLayer**: Provides tiled map content from a Web Map Tile Service (WMTS).

- **MapItemsControl**: Displays a collection of **MapItem** objects (with a geographic **Location**).

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The **TileImageLoader** class uses
[IDistributedCache](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/microsoft.extensions.caching.distributed.idistributedcache?view=dotnet-plat-ext-8.0)
for optional caching of map tile bitmaps. By default, the cache is a
[MemoryDistributedCache](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/microsoft.extensions.caching.distributed.memorydistributedcache?view=dotnet-plat-ext-8.0)
instance with all default options.

Map Control provides three minimal IDistributedCache implementations for persistent caching:
* ImageFileCache, an implementation that stores each cached map tile as a single image file,
in the original file format delivered by the map provider (typically PNG or JPG). ImageFileCache is part of the MapControl library.
* FileDbCache, based on [EzTools FileDb](https://github.com/eztools-software/FileDb),
a simple file based No-SQL database, in a separate library FileDbCache.
* SQLiteCache, based on [System.Data.SQLite](https://system.data.sqlite.org/index.html/doc/trunk/www/index.wiki),
in a separate library SQLiteCache.

You can of course also use a full-featured cache like
[RedisCache](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/microsoft.extensions.caching.stackexchangeredis.rediscache?view=dotnet-plat-ext-3.1&viewFallbackFrom=dotnet-plat-ext-8.0).

To try the sample application with persistent caching, add an appropriate package reference to its Visual Studio project
and uncomment the respective TileImageLoader.Cache assignment in MainWindow.xaml.cs.

Please note that some map providers may not allow persistent caching of their map data.

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XAML Map Control is available on NuGet, with Package Id [XAML.MapControl](https://www.nuget.org/packages/XAML.MapControl/).

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The project is not open for contributions. Pull requests will not be accepted.