Manifold creates helper files to improve performance, to assist interoperability, to assist in tracking down workflow errors, and for redundance. These include:
.MAPCACHE - A persistent cache file that improves performance when linking a file or creating a data source using a file. Created in the same folder as the file. Manifold will automatically use and update as necessary an existing .MAPCACHE file. See the MAPCACHE File topic.
.MAPINDEXP - A file that contains a specialized spatial index for points that is created when linking LAS or LAZ LiDAR point cloud files into a Manifold project. The specialized index creates a hierarchical data structure, stored as a .LAS.MAPINDEXP or a .LAZ.MAPINDEXP file in the same folder as the LAS/LAZ file. The spatial index is then used to service spatial queries, including internal spatial queries such as those performed to display the point cloud within Manifold. The size of a .MAPINDEXP file is significantly smaller than the size of an uncompressed LAS file on which it is built, but it is usually larger than the size of a compressed LAZ. The file is versioned so that future Manifold builds can choose to reuse files created by an earlier build or overwrite them with new versions. The .MAPINDEXP file is only created for a linked LAS/LAZ file in a writable location. See the Tools - Index LiDAR Files , LAS, LAZ LiDAR , and librarylas topics.
.MAPMETA - A text file containing JSON coordinate system information created when exporting data to a file. Created in the same folder as the file. Manifold will automatically read coordinate system data for the file from an existing .MAPMETA file, giving it final priority over any .XML, .PRJ or world file setting forth coordinate system information for the file.
.SAVEDATA - An accessory file created in the save folder as a .map file or .map file connected as a new data source. The .SAVEDATA file collects all changes made to the .map file before those changes are written to the .map file or data source. Only after changes successfully are saved to the .SAVEDATA file are those changes made in the .map file. This provides fault tolerance in case of hardware failure, Windows crashes or other unexpected interruptions.
.RWB .RWT - Accessory files created when exporting to raw binary (RWB) or raw text (RWT). Text files in human-readable JSON format that capture a description of the raw files created, like the .rwb or .rwt files created by the Scan Raw tools discussed in the Tools - Scan Raw Binary / Text File topic.
manifold.opt - Manifold remembers recent settings, such as the size and location of undocked Project and other panes, using a file called manifold.opt, an ordinary text file that may be opened with Notepad. It is located in C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Manifold\v9.0 where <username> is the login name used. Deleting the file restores factory defaults (it will be automatically recreated when Manifold is next launched).
Log files - Manifold writes the contents of the log window to a cumulative file for every calendar day Manifold is used, created using a name such as 20190501.log. The file name consists of <year><month<day> numbers concatenated to form the name of the file. It is located in C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Manifold\v9.0 where username is the login name used. if desired we can change that location to one of the Manifold system folders such as the extras folder if our user login has write privileges to that folder.
To do so, we create a blank manifold.loghere file in the desired folder. For example, within the extras folder we can create a logfiles folder and within the logfiles folder we create a blank manifold.loghere file. Thereafter logging files will be created in the ~\extras\logfiles folder.
As a practical matter most users will not have write permissions to Manifold system folders so they will leave their logfiles in the default path of C:\Users..., but in the case where we are using a portable installation and have full control with write permission to the Manifold system folders we can change the path for logfiles to a system folder.
Manifold starts a new log file every day. A working session of Manifold will use the log file for the day it was launched. If the log file for the current date is locked by a different Manifold session, the system will create a different log file for the same date with a unique postfix. The files are tiny, typically 1 KB to 3 KB, so a few years of every day use will result in less than 10 MB of log files.
If Manifold is used from another application all logging is turned off.
The log also records the results of loading system libraries and non-system libraries on startup. Successful loads of system libraries report nothing, successful loads of non-system libraries report the full path of the loaded module (useful when there are multiple modules with the same name) and failed loads report errors both for failed loads of system libraries as well as failed loads of non-system libraries.