Ok here goes :)

We develop a control system for transport companies, at present each client PC has a copy of MapInfo installed and all Mapping, routing and postcode look-ups are done locally. Trouble is this means the client machines need to be pretty well spec'ed to actually make the system usable.

This is where MapPoint comes in, we have decided to opt for a Client/Server type Mapping system where the client systems (users) just post requests to a mapping server (very high-spec machine) which in-turn queries MapPoint for a Map, Route or address look-up, the server then returns an XML response to the client.

I have written the server product in Delphi and it has been designed as a multi-threaded application, so the MapPoint objects are self contained in their own thread and there-fore are only accessed when a request is to be processed, this means the system is stand alone and it is not possible for any direct user input into the MapPoint components, also all MapPoint COM/ActiveX objects are created and accessed at code level so there is no visible representation of MapPoint on the server.