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Image Tile Providers

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A MapControl uses image tile data providers to provide map image layers with data from imagery services. Specify the ImageLayer.DataProvider property to add tiles from imagery services to the map.

The Map control supports the following tile providers:

Create a data provider to use another online imagery service or load image tiles from an intranet server.

You can also generate tiles from an image tile source at runtime.

Bing Maps Data Provider

This data provider loads image tiles from the MS Bing Maps.

Important

On May 21, 2024, Microsoft announced that Bing Maps for Enterprise and its API will be discontinued. Azure Maps will be a single unified enterprise mapping platform available from Microsoft.

We are working on API compatible with Azure Maps and expect to ship it with our next major release (v24.2).

If you have an existing license to Bing Maps for Enterprise, you can continue using our existing API. You need to transition to new API until June 30, 2025 (free and basic license) or until June 30, 2028 (enterprise license).

The last date you can get a new license to Bing Maps for Enterprise is June 30, 2025. If you do not have an existing license after that date, you would not be able to use our map controls with Bing Maps or Azure Maps (until we release the new API). During that time, you can use other map providers supported by our controls, such as OpenStreetMap.

BingMapProvider

Note

Read and accept the Microsoft® Bing™ Maps Platform APIs Terms Of Use before you use Bing Maps.

You should register a Bing Maps key to use the Bing Maps services. Refer to How to: Get a Bing Maps Key for more information.

Use the BingMapDataProvider class to work with Bing Maps:

<dxm:MapControl>
    <dxm:MapControl.Layers>
        <dxm:ImageLayer>
            <dxm:ImageLayer.DataProvider>
                <dxm:BingMapDataProvider BingKey="Your Bing Maps key here"
                                         Kind="Hybrid"/>
            </dxm:ImageLayer.DataProvider>
        </dxm:ImageLayer>
    </dxm:MapControl.Layers>
</dxm:MapControl>

Use the following API members to connect the Map Control to the Bing Maps service:

Member Description
ImageLayer Displays map images obtained from the map image data provider.
ImageLayer.DataProvider Gets or sets the provider used to obtain images from an image source.
BingMapDataProvider The class that loads map images from the Bing Maps data provider.
BingMapDataProvider.BingKey Get or sets the key that is required to connect to the Bing Maps data provider.
BingMapDataProvider.Kind Gets or sets a value specifying the type of images to be displayed on a map.

The Map Control also supports the following Bing Maps data providers:

OpenStreetMap Data Provider

This data provider loads image tiles from the the OpenStreetMap service.

OpenStreetMapDataProviderExample

Note

Review the Copyright and License and Tile usage policy pages before using map images in the OpenStreetMap format.

You should provide the UserAgent parameter with a valid value to identify your application.

Use the OpenStreetMapDataProvider class to work with OpenStreetMap:

<dxm:MapControl>
    <dxm:MapControl.Layers>
        <dxm:ImageLayer>
            <dxm:ImageLayer.DataProvider>
                <dxm:OpenStreetMapDataProvider TileUriTemplate="http://{subdomain}.tile.MyCustomOSMProvider.org/{tileLevel}/{tileX}/{tileY}.png"
                                               WebRequest="OnWebRequest"/>
            </dxm:ImageLayer.DataProvider>
        </dxm:ImageLayer>
    </dxm:MapControl.Layers>
</dxm:MapControl>

Use the following API members to connect the Map Control to the OpenStreetMap service:

Member Description
ImageLayer Displays map images obtained from the map image data provider.
ImageLayer.DataProvider Gets or sets the provider used to obtain images from an image source.
OpenStreetMapDataProvider The class that loads map images from a web resource that provides data in the OpenStreetMap format.
MapImageDataProviderBase.WebRequest Occurs when the Map control sends a request to a web service.
OpenStreetMapDataProvider.TileUriTemplate Gets or sets a template that is used to obtain image tiles from the current OpenStreetMap provider.
MapWebRequestEventArgs.UserAgent Gets or sets the value of the user-agent HTTP header.

The Map Control also supports the following OpenStreetMap data providers:

Generate Tiles at Runtime

Perform the following steps to populate a map with custom tiles created at runtime:

<Window
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008"
        xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006"
        xmlns:local="clr-namespace:DXMapInMemoryTileProvider"
        xmlns:dxm="http://schemas.devexpress.com/winfx/2008/xaml/map" 
        x:Class="DXMapInMemoryTileProvider.MainWindow"
        mc:Ignorable="d"
        Title="MainWindow" Height="450" Width="800">
    <Grid>
        <dxm:MapControl>
            <dxm:ImageLayer x:Name="imageLayer"/>
        </dxm:MapControl>
    </Grid>
</Window>

The Map Control stores the loaded tiles in cache. To customize cache parameters, use the MapControl.CacheOptions property.

Custom Image Data Provider

To develop a data provider, create a MapDataProviderBase class descendant and define a custom image tile source for it. This image tile source should be derived from MapTileSourceBase and provide a way to retrieve image tiles.

Example:

See Also