Digital Map Services

Survey Solutions displays maps in several different pages and the sources of the map data depend on the service that provides the corresponding capability:

Useful links:

Online maps key

Usage of online maps is possible in Survey Solutions by consuming data sources of Esri.

By default the API key is blank (not specified) and the online maps are not selectable on mobile devices. Specifying a valid key facilitates using Esri’s services supplying tiles for base map layer when:

• using the map dashboard, and/or
• answering geography type questions

in Interviewer and Supervisor apps.

Usage of the ESRI API key may (and likely will) cost you money. It is important to familiarize yourself with the pricing, plans, charges and limits as applicable. These conditions may be changed, possibly even without prior notice. Pricing and billing conditions may depend on whether the user is a private user or an organization. All of the billing for this service occurs between you and the corresponding provider, the Survey Solutions developers are not charging you for this service.

Map files

In Survey Solutions all maps are first uploaded to the server, then distributed to the interviewers based on assignments of maps.

This functionality is accessible for the users in roles headquarters and administrator only.

The Map files page is the page where the maps are managed at the Survey Solutions server (Headquarters). It can be accessed by

The Maps dialog is using two icons to denote types of the uploaded maps:

Digital Map Formats

Survey Solutions offline maps may be prepared in any of the following formats:

FORMAT	EXTENSION	TYPE	EXTERNAL LINKS
ESRI tile package.	*.tpk	raster	USDA Tutorial on creation of TPK tile packages. ESRI documentation Create Map Tile Package
ESRI mobile map package.	*.mmpk	raster	ESRI tutorial on creating MMPK mobile map packages.
GeoTIFF	*.tiff	raster	OGC GeoTIFF standard Example file and description. Pacific Community (SPC) tutorial How to generate offline maps for Survey Solutions in QGIS.
Shapefile	*.shp *.shx *.dbf	vector	QGIS tutorial on creation of shapefiles. ESRI Shapefile Technical Description

Useful links:

Shapefile maps

Survey Solutions Interviewer App displays maps for two purposes:

• The dashboard depicts the assignments and interviews on the map by placing markers that correspond to the coordinates of an identifying question.
• Geography questions (single- and multiple points, polyline and polygon) allow capturing geographical information by marking it on the map layer, typically a satellite or aero-photography.

Survey Solutions has been employing this functionality for several years already using the ESRI ArcGIS Android SDK components. A common problem for the interviewers is understanding the boundaries of their area of responsibility when using the above mentioned capabilities, because satellite and aero photography typically lacks the labels that help identify streets, blocks or landmarks.