The unique imaging technology selected by the United Kingdom's property titles office, Her Majesty's Land Registry (HMLR), was developed and supplied by Onstream Systems, an imaging company which operates in the UK, the United States and New Zealand.

The technology - the software for creating, storing and viewing every property title and its accompanying documentation, enables on-line retrieval and viewing of this data.

Based on Onstream Systems flagship Trapeze™ technology, the HMLR methodology provides a revolutionary new way of transmitting, viewing, navigating and printing map documents.

The technology enables remote users to download the organisation's A3 maps up to 10 times faster than any other technology available anywhere in the world. Unlike other viewers currently in the marketplace, the Trapeze™ Desktop system has been completely designed to allow folder documents - including maps with handwritten annotations - to behave and be used in just the same way as physical files, not as an unwieldy set of images.

Designed as a "hands-on" viewer, Trapeze™ Desktop allows a user to do everything he or she could do with an 'old-fashioned' paper file. Trapeze™ Desktop enables viewers to carry out measurements and print to scale for almost any size that the user's printer is capable of. It will also carry out several other user functions, not available in any other viewer

Particularly relevant to archival image capturing, Trapeze™ Desktop has special features which slash the cost of back file capture. With a multi-layered Document Map Viewer, Trapeze™ Desktop creates multi-layered TIFF files from coloured image maps, which are a mere fraction of the size of the same image in a usual colour format. The resulting files are small, clean to view and very quick to transmit on-line. In addition, the technology allows sophisticated overlays and printing controls for large-scale applications.

Announcing the British land titles office contract the chairman of Onstream Systems, David Kelly, estimated the number of UK users of the technology would quickly grow as HMLR provided increased access to its legal and other clients for the on-line viewing of maps.

Noting that the prime supplier to HMLR had undertaken a global search for enabling technology before settling on Trapeze™ Desktop, Mr. Kelly said, "None of the major players could provide the required speed and functional performance. In fact, we were the only ones they found who could."

Onstream Systems, which established a presence in Britain and the United States some 12 months ago, has been providing specialist imaging technology in New Zealand since 1992.

Onstream Systems imaging and mapping pedigree began with farm mapping computer applications in New Zealand in 1989.

The company has been creating sophisticated and durable imaging applications since 1992 and is known for the creation of the first DOS and Microsoft Windows multi-page document viewer to reach the international market. Since then, it has created bespoke imaging solutions for several New Zealand and international clients, carrying out work over the years for several multi-national organisations, including Xerox and Insoft.

Along with Trapeze™ Desktop, the sophisticated image and mapping Application Programming Interface, released both as a DLL and an OCX, Onstream also has released Trapeze™ Webstreamer, a product specifically designed for the bureaux market to slash the often prohibitive cost of indexing document files during back capture.

Onstream Systems also has supplied Courtroom Image Systems technology for several mission critical courtroom documentation viewing systems.