Title: Mapping Your World: Exploring free web-based tools to map and visualize your data and tell your story to the world
Instructor: Scott Rutzmoser, Lehigh University
Time: 9:00am — 10:45am
This workshop will provide an overview of some of the free tools that can be used to spatially enable your data and view it on a map. We will also discuss how to create web maps that convey your story in a meaningful way. Additional topics will include how to share your data with small groups and/or make it available to the public as well as embedding your map in a website. All tools and technology discussed and presented in this workshop are free services provided by Esri.
*** For all of you attending this workshop, Scott has created a website for the class: http://gisweb.cc.lehigh.edu/thatcamp/
Bring laptops not tablets:
Participants are expected to bring a laptop computer to the workshop to get the full experience of participating in this hands-on workshop.
Develop a basic understanding of how datasets are spatially enabled and placed on a map. We will review address matching (geocoding) and using spatial coordinates to map datasets. We will also explore the potential to join data to other freely available datasets.
The workshop will focus on how to get your data on a map. Participants should expect to produce a fully functional web-based map using either their own dataset or the sample dataset provided. If you bring a dataset you will leave with a published map (in the cloud) of your data. You will be able to edit this map, share this map with others, use it to build custom web applications (optional), and embed it into other web pages.
Familiarity using an internet web browser to view and explore maps (Google Maps, Bing, etc.).
While it is not required, it is strongly recommended that participants create an Esri account (for personal use) prior to the workshop. Visit http://www.arcgis.com/home/ to create an account and explore how other people use this technology to tell their story: http://storymaps.esri.com/home/
Participants are also encouraged to bring their own datasets to the workshop. We will provide sample datasets so all participants can step through the process. The key is to have a spatial component in your dataset that we can use to put points on the map. This can be latitude or longitude or it can be an address. Esri has made the process is very straight forward absolutely no programming is required.
If you don’t have a dataset, don’t worry, we will also go over how to create map layers from scratch. If you are preparing a dataset for the workshop the easiest way is to use Excel (or some other spreadsheet) to create/manage your data. You can create as many attribute fields as you like but the typical fields for map layers include:
• NAME – This is the proper name for the location
• CAPTION – A description of the location or some additional information about the location
• URL – Full URL of a photo (full-sized) for use in a pop-up
• THUMB_URL – Full URL of a photo (thumbnail) for use in pop-up (optional)
• LINK – Full URL to link to a website with additional information
Spatial Attributes can be one of the following:
• LAT – Latitude of point in decimal degrees (example 40.60661587)
• LONG – Longitude of point in decimal degrees (example-75.37724030)
• ADDRESS – Full one-line address (example 3765 Elvis Presley Blvd., Memphis, TN 38116)
-or you can use separate fields for address-
• HOUSE – 3765 Elvis Presley Blvd.
• CITY – Memphis
• STATE – TN
• ZIP – 38116
If you already use GIS and have a shapefile or kml we can use those as well. Depending on the file type, the ‘free’ services from Esri have size limitations. If you are address matching you will be limited to 300 records, if you are uploading a csv or shp file the limit is 1000 records.