Map Components

A map consists of numerous components including a background or template map and a stack of layers that are displayed on top of each other in a window. A map has an associated coordinate system that all layers in the map must share. The map can be an image file, the object representation of an image file, or a URL that refers to an image file.

• Main Content - The main content is the background or template map, which provides the background geographic data and zoom levels. The main content can be an image such as the floor maps of office buildings or the appearance and presence of items such as countries, cities, and roads.
• Layers - One or more interactive or custom layers can overlay the main content.
• Toolbar - The toolbar is visible by default and you can click its buttons to manipulate map contents directly. The map view itself has a toolbar. The content designer specifies whether to display the toolbar for the map view on a dashboard page. On a dashboard page, the toolbar is displayed directly over the map and contains only the Pan, Zoom Out, and Zoom In buttons.

  The toolbar in the Map editor contains additional options for modifying the map view.

• Zoom Controls - These controls adjust the detail of the geographic data that is shown in the map view. For example, zooming in from a country might show state and city details.

  The administrator specifies which zoom levels each layer is visible for. You can have multiple zoom levels for one layer, and you can have a single zoom level associated with multiple layers. When you zoom, you change the map information at that zoom level, but you do not affect the display of BI data at that level. You affect the display of data by drilling.

  The zoom controls include a zoom slider that is displayed in the upper left-hand corner of the map view with a thumb for large scale zooming and buttons for zooming a single level. When the zoom control is zoomed-out all the way, the zoom level is set to 0 and the entire map view is displayed.

  You determine the visibility of the zoom control. When you create a map view, by default the map is initially zoomed into the highest zoom level that fits the entire contents of the top-most layer. For example, if the highest ordered layer contains data only in the state of California, then the map zooms to the highest zoom level that still shows all of California.

• Scale Tool - Also known as the Distance Indicator, this tool provides a key to distance interpretation of the map and consists of two horizontal bars that display in the lower left-hand corner of the map view below the information panel and above the copyright. The top bar represents miles (mi) and the bottom bar represents kilometers (km). Labels are displayed above the miles bar and below the kilometers bar in the format: [distance] [unit of measure]. The length and distance values of the bars change as the zoom level changes and as the map is panned.
• Legend - The legend is a semi-transparent area in the upper right-hand corner of the map view that you can display and hide. The legend shows the information that relates to the current zoom level. The legend provides a read-only visual key for symbols, layers, and formatting on the map and displays all visible formats that are applied to the map. If a format is turned off, then the corresponding legend item is hidden also. If a format is turned on but zoomed out of view, then it is not displayed in the legend. The legend displays text such as "No formats defined for current zoom level" if you have no formats defined at the current zoom level.

  When you select a format on the map, the corresponding legend item is highlighted. Highlights have varying granularity, depending on the selected formats (for example, a pie graph does not have the level of granularity that color fill has).

  Use the Expand Map Legend and Collapse Map Legend buttons in the upper right-hand corner to control the display of the legend.

• Overview Map - The overview map consists of a miniature view of the main map that is shown in the lower right-hand corner of the main map. This overview map provides regional context.

  The reticule displays as a small window that you can move across a miniature view of the main map. The position of the reticule in the miniature map determines the viewable area of the main map. As you move the reticule, the main map is updated automatically. You can also pan in the overview map without using the reticule.

  The overview map is automatically hidden if the reticule can't be shown. This hiding generally happens when the scale difference between successive zoom levels is too small to show the miniature view in the overview map.

• Interactive Panel - The top section of the interactive panel enables you to create and edit BI data formats in the analysis editor. If a format has editable thresholds, then a slider is displayed in the Map editor that enables you to edit thresholds by dragging the slider. The interactive panel enables you to rearrange formats within a geographic layer. For example, if the States layer has three formats, then you can select the order in which the formats are displayed.

  When displaying a tooltip by hovering the cursor over a map area, the corresponding detail is updated and highlighted in the interactive panel.

  Dashboard users can control the visibility of formats (by turning them on or off) and can adjust format thresholds if the content designer has allowed them to.

  The lower section of the panel includes the Feature Layer area, where you can select non-BI layers to add to the map. A non-BI layer is one that has not been associated with a BI column. You can't apply formats to non-BI layers.