MssStick

The MssStick is our "ready to run" solution to create and manage military map overlays, to design military reference grid systems as well as to organize military structures and resources. An easy share and exchange between the partners in the military workflow is included as well.

What is the MssStick?

The "ready to run" environment includes two main applications:

This tool has been designed to be very flexible and operational within minutes. There is no installation required to start the application. Nor is a long preparation phase needed as commonly known from a larger and heavier C4I system.

Our main goal of the MssStick is to accelerate the operational planning phase over multiple hierarchies as well as enabling the work between different organizations as Armed Forces, Police, Civil Defense and the Media.

MSS^®

The Military Symbol Service.

 What is MSS?

MSS (Military Symbol Service) is a very powerful, compact and complete library of military symbols and tactical graphics. The library itself contains today more than 3500 symbols and tactical graphics which are defined in the following national and international regulations:

Who is using MSS today?

MSS is implemented in a number of systems by the following suppliers: TADIRAN, EADS, THALES, AMPER, ELTA, ELCA ... . It is nationally used by the Swiss Armed Forces and internationally by NATO (JC3IEDM / MIP) as the symbol and tactical graphic provider.
 

What is the advantage of MSS?

Symbols or tactical graphics are not exchanged as images; they are handled via their SymbolString. This enables the system independent exchange of graphics within only a few characters. The MSS library which contains all symbols and tactical graphics can be extended with country and/or product specific graphics. This includes as well the display options and settings.
The service can be implemented in any system requiring military symbols and tactical graphics. It provides a wide range of export formats including,*.svg, *.png, *.wmf, *.emf, *.jpg, *.bmp, ...
 

Where can I get more information?

Don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any question regarding MSS. More information can also be found on the MssStick page as this application runs with the latest version of MSS.

MilX^®

The format for a light, fast and flexible exchange.

What is MilX?

What is the advantage of MilX?

It provides the light, fast and flexible exchange between different systems. This is especially targeted to
provide an exchange which doesn’t require much data and therefore is possible via a simple radio connection.
Additionally it’s possible to export a MilX-Layer into GoogleEarth. As the following images show:
 

Who is using MilX?

Today companies as THALES, ELBIT, Airbus, ELCA... have implemented MilX in some of their military systems.

<iframe src="https://www.map.army " width="800" height="600" frameborder="0"></iframe>

 The following steps are required for the implementation:

Step 1 – Save Map Overlay(s)

Create your layers in the web application map.army. Save one or multiple overlays into a single MilX file (layer collection). 

Step 2 – Upload

Load the MilX file created in step 1 on your web server. Test whether the layer can be downloaded as a file using a web browser. Example of a link to a layer: www.gs-soft.com/CMS/files/Layer.milxlyz
If you are not able to download the file: Check whether the web server supports the MilX file format (MIME Type):

Example of MIME Type definition for *.milxlyz and *.milxly.

Step 3 - Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS)

Is your web server supporting CORS? This is required for the MilX files on your web server to be loaded by a web browser running the web application on www.map.army. CORS therefore must be activated for the domain www.map.army. Depending on the web server this can be done by the following steps:

Apache: The *.htaccess file (in the folder on the web server that contains the *.milxlyz file) should be extended with the following permission:

Header add Access-Control-Allow-Origin: https://www.map.army

Note: If there is no *.htaccess file in this folder, it must be generated and the permission listed above has to be integrated.

IIS: The following customization has to be made in the IIS GUI:

As an alternative, the following permission can allow CORS using the web.config file (in the folder containing the *.milxlyz file):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>  
  <configuration>  
      <system.webServer>  
          <staticContent>  
              <mimeMap fileExtension=".milxlyz" mimeType="application/octet-stream" />  
          </staticContent>  
          <httpProtocol>  
              <customHeaders>  
                  <add name="Access-Control-Allow-Origin" value="     
    https://www.map.army" />
                </customHeaders>  
          </httpProtocol>  
      </system.webServer>  
  </configuration>

Step 4 - Test

Is it possible to load a military map overlay (layer) directly from the web server in www.map.army using the URL parameters? To test this, you can replace the URL of the MilX layer (www.gs-soft.com/CMS/files/Layer.milxlyz) in the following example: https://www.map.army/?layer=www.gs-soft.com/CMS/files/Layer.milxlyz

Step 5 - Read-Only Parameter

Depending on the application the layers loaded via the URL parameter should be editable or not. For this purpose, the "readonly" parameter is provided. It can be attached to the URL as the following example demonstrates:

https://www.map.army/?layer=www.gs-soft.com/CMS/files/Layer.milxlyz;readonly

Step 6 - Adjust iFrame

After completing steps 1 - 5 your are able to add the URL parameters to the iFrame on your web page. Here is an example of code that you can copy:

Example 1:

<iframe src="https://www.map.army/?layer=www.gs-soft.com/CMS/files/Layer.milxlyz;readonly"  
width="800" height="600" frameborder="0" style="border:0"></iframe>  

Example 2:

<iframe src="https://www.map.army/?layer=www.gs-soft.com/CMS/files/Demo-Layers.milxlyz;readonly"   
width="100%" height="98%" frameborder="0"></iframe>

 
If you have further questions, we are happy to assist you in our Google Group.