WeoGeo Support for Multi-File Datasets: Say Hello to the ToC

If there is one thing that I have learned over the years, it is that nothing is easy.  Sure sure, they may look easy on the surface, but deep down, they can get pretty hairy.  , I am referring to the world that I eat, sleep and breath, …the geospatial world of course.  You all know just as well as I do that simple lines on a map lead to complex databases and business processes that make the hair on the back of your neck stand straight up.  So, how do we share data if it is so complex?  I’m willing to bet that most of you out there have used FTP to share data.  I took the liberty of outlining why I think this causes problems for effective workflows here.  Also, if you think about it, throwing up one link to a zipped dataset (even a multi-file one) is easy, but you can’t customize it, you can’t deliver the whole thing (possibly GBs of data), much less break them out into a bunch of individual datasets.  Well, I am excited to say, life in the geospatial world, just got a whole lot easier.  This very issue is something we’ve been attacking at WeoGeo.  We asked ourselves, “How can you share multi-file datasets, but still allow customization of what is delivered”?

The answer? By creating a new feature, called the Table of Contents (or ToC).  Our new ToC is part of our latest release coming out this week.  You can also check out Dan Dye’s blog about WeoGeo support for the Table of Contents that was posted earlier this month.  The ToC is what we use to allow users to upload multiple file datasets to WeoGeo.  While we’ve seen web services that have multiple datasets in them, there hasn’t been a solution to date that gives users the ability to customize the data to suit their own needs/wants and then deliver that customized file back to the user.  The uniqueness of WeoGeo’s solution helps deliver these datasets to end-users without the need for the dataset provider to do anything beyond listing or uploading their data to WeoGeo.

Let’s go through how this works.  So, like you, most maps I create have multiple layers in them.  For example, I might have some simple background data from Natural Earth, some road data from TIGER and some environmental data from the US Fish and Wildlife Service.  These multiple datasets blended together make my map.  I could of course upload all these datasets individually, but that could mean tens of layers that a user would have to download to replicate my map.  With the WeoGeo ToC, I can put all those datasets into one WeoGeo entry, including cartography (MXD, LYR, Mapnik) allowing users to download the data all at once and perform the customization themselves, picking and choosing only the layers they actually want in their end product.

Photo by roboppy – http://flic.kr/p/eDy3A

Once you start using the ToC feature, you won’t ever want to hear the words zip file, or FTP again. I know first hand that trying to break up maps into discrete datasets is sheer lunacy.  What you need is the ability to share exactly what is on your GIS desktop with whomever needs or wants it.  The ToC gives WeoGeo users the ability to do this, and much much more.  Replicating your GIS projects into the WeoGeo Library content management system is as easy as pie with ToC.  You can see this ToC in action with this Natural Earth dataset or learn how to create one yourself on our Support Wiki.

Photo by sea turtle – http://flic.kr/p/5zZ3aC