topic Re: Graphic Element Order in ArcObjects SDK Questions

Graphic Element Order

LakshmananVenkatesan — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 07:01:36 GMT

Hi,

I am adding graphic element to my graphic container on top of active view for Print functionality. Graphic element added successfully but it hides the layer below. For example I add polygon element with Line Fill symbol it hides the below layer label. I tried with different Z order values but nothing seems work. Please help me on this issue.

All I want is to add transparent element on graphics container so that user can see the both element and layer beneath with labels.

SR

Re: Graphic Element Order

LakshmananVenkatesan — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 03:50:24 GMT

Can anyone help me on this?

Re: Graphic Element Order

LeoDonahue — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 14:15:57 GMT

What type of graphic element are you adding?

Are you adding it to a page layout?

Did you notice that the zorder parameter of addElement() doesn't work with all types of graphic containers?
http://help.arcgis.com/en/sdk/10.0/java_ao_adf/api/arcobjects/com/esri/arcgis/carto/PageLayout.html#addElement%28com.esri.arcgis.carto.IElement,%20int%29

(which would be these: CompositeGraphicsLayer, FDOGraphicsLayer, GlobeGraphicsLayer, GraphicsLayer3D, GraphicsSubLayer, IGraphicsContainerProxy, Map, PageLayout )
http://help.arcgis.com/en/sdk/10.0/java_ao_adf/api/arcobjects/com/esri/arcgis/carto/IGraphicsContainer.html

Re: Graphic Element Order

LakshmananVenkatesan — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 17:28:33 GMT

Hi Leo

Thanks for help.

Below is code path for adding graphic element. I use FillShapeElement

ESRI.ArcGIS.Carto.IFillShapeElement FillShpElement = null;
                        FillShpElement = new ESRI.ArcGIS.Carto.PolygonElementClass();

                        if (isLineFill)
                        {
                            FillShpElement.Symbol = (ILineFillSymbol)gensymb;
                        }
                        else
                        {
                            FillShpElement.Symbol = (ISimpleFillSymbol)gensymb;
                        }

                        element = (ESRI.ArcGIS.Carto.IElement)FillShpElement;
                        element.Geometry = (IPolygon)geo;
                        graphicsCont.AddElement(element, 0);

Please help.

Re: Graphic Element Order

JeffreyHamblin — Sun, 12 Dec 2021 05:28:49 GMT

You can use this to set an ISimpleFillSymbol transparent:

ISimpleFillSymbol fillSymbol = new SimpleFillSymbolClass();

IRgbColor rgbColor = new RgbColorClass();
rgbColor.Red = 255;
rgbColor.Green = 255;
rgbColor.Blue = 255;
rgbColor.UseWindowsDithering = true;
rgbColor.Transparency = 0;

fillSymbol.Color = rgbColor;

Then you need to set the background of your element to that fillSymbol.

Re: Graphic Element Order

LakshmananVenkatesan — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 18:15:49 GMT

Jeff

if I set rgb color transparency to zero am not seeing the graphic element at all. What is wrong with that?

Re: Graphic Element Order

JeffreyHamblin — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 18:51:02 GMT

From your original post:
"All I want is to add transparent element on graphics container so that user can see the both element and layer beneath with labels."

It is not clear to me exactly what needs to be transparent. As I mentioned, you probably need some sort of element that has a background and set that transparent.

It might help if you create the effect manually in ArcMap and post a screenshot.

Re: Graphic Element Order

LakshmananVenkatesan — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 21:21:01 GMT

See the attached image, I have drawn a polygon as element on top of my layer. The layer has labels in all the polygons (ie.'ALAM') but labels behind the graphic polygon (blue color ) is not appearing.

Hope this is clear now.

Re: Graphic Element Order

JeffreyHamblin — Sun, 12 Dec 2021 05:28:51 GMT

You need to add your polygon outline to the layout in order for labels to be visible through it. If the graphic element is instead added to an active dataframe, the labels are moved or hidden as your screenshot shows.

In ArcMap, ensure that no data frame has focus before drawing the polygon (click outside the map page).

If you are making an Add-In, then set the graphics container to the PageLayout:

IGraphicsContainer graphicsContainer = ArcMap.Document.PageLayout as IGraphicsContainer;

Re: Graphic Element Order

LakshmananVenkatesan — Sun, 26 Jun 2011 12:30:46 GMT

Here are below steps which am doing..

1) IActiveView av = pMapDocument.ActiveView;
2) av = (IActiveView)pMapDocument.ActiveView.FocusMap;

//stores coordinates minX, minY, maxX, maxY
3) env.PutCoords(minX, minY, maxX, maxY);
4) graphicsContainer = (ESRI.ArcGIS.Carto.IGraphicsContainer)pMap; // Explicit Cast
5) Adding all graphics - here
6) IPageLayout docPageLayout = pMapDocument.PageLayout;
       av.Extent = env;
      av.Extent.CenterAt(midPt);
      av.Refresh();
7) ExportActiveView((IActiveView)docPageLayout, 300, 1, imgType, "D:\\", true);

Please let me know where am going wrong

Re: Graphic Element Order

AlexanderGray — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 12:07:54 GMT

Instead of using the focusmap property you need the pagelayout property to draw too. That means adding the graphic polygon element to the layout instead of the map. PageLayout can be cast into an ActiveView and you can deal add the polygon element and export that view. That should work ok but you will only see the rectangle if you switch your ArcMap view to layout.

There is another way to do what you want with the data frame view (elements drawn to the map.) In ArcMap, right click on the dataframe name (layers by default.) Under labels, select label weight ranking. In the label weight ranking form, the first layer should be "default", set the feature weight to none. Your labels should appear through the polygon even if it has a fill. If your polygon is not drawn to the default annotation graphic layer, you will need to set the feature weight of whatever annotation graphic layer it is in.

The problem is that a map annotation graphic layer acts a lot like a database annotation layer. Annotation and labels have weights to prevent them from overlapping. For most text annotation and text within a box (rectangle) you want this. In your case you don't, so you have to change the default properties. If you have elements in your graphics that you don't want to labels to overpost and so you do, you can create a new annotation group from the drawing menu of the drawing toolbar and set different properties.