Storing and Finding Maps

We keep electronic versions of the maps that we use in our google drive. We manually curate a spreadsheet listing all of those maps. Some printouts of course maps are in our file cabinet.

Permissions

Please pay attention to who owns the map and make sure you get permission from the copyright holder before using the map. Many of our maps are owned by CSU, NEOC or OUSA. We have access to CSU, NEOC and OUSA maps elsewhere as well; ask Barb for details. Generally, club members can use club maps for training and with permission for education. If we use others' maps we must include their copyright notice on the map.

Maps google drive

By using a consistent organization, we can start to easily programmatically access our maps. 

The MapsArchive drive is our original store for electronic versions of maps; this still has some maps and other documents that have not been transferred to our Maps drive and is kept around for that reason. This drive is organized by copyright holder and then location.

Now we keep maps in the Maps google drive, organized by Country / Region (eg State) / Municipality / Location Name / copyright owner and map type. Within those folders, we have subfolders Map and Courses. Please keep all maps and course maps in the Maps google drive, and link to them as needed.

• Country (eg USA)

  • Region (eg MA)

    • Municipality (eg Medford)

      • Location Name (eg Mystic River)

        • Copyright owner and map type (eg "O - CSU")

          • Map

            • Data (LIDAR data and background photos should be stored in this subdirectory, so they don't clutter the Map directory)

            • Versions (other versions of the map)

            • Archive (older versions of the map -- this is where you store a copy every time you go to edit!)

            • Layouts (different layouts on the main map)

          • Courses

To clean up the Maps drive:

• find . -name "*.ocd" > find_ocd.txt

• Open Excel. Data > Get Data from text. Use custom separator /

• Look for problems with organization and fix

Important conventions for Navigation Games

These conventions are important not only to help us find things, but also to allow programmatic access to the information through MapMap and other applications.

1. Use the folder organization shown above.

2. Name the latest map file "<Location> Latest"

3. Always archive the current version before editing a map; store it in the Archive folder with the current date.

4. Small maps can have layout items in the main map file, but if there is any chance of different layouts (different scales, etc), then the layouts should go into the Layouts directory. If the layout is a separate file, it is still fine to make notes in the main map file about authorship and changes to help us keep track. Use an area of the map outside of what will be shown in the layout.

5. Data (LIDAR, photos) should go into a Data folder so as not to clutter the Map folder.

6. Save a PDF version of the map in the main Map directory (this is served to the user by MapMap); it should be the one that we want users to see. Other PDF versions can go in the Layouts directory or, if needed, a separate PDFs folder, to distinguish them from the one main PDF that represents that map.

Maps database: a google spreadsheet

Maps and Courses database (a google spreadsheet).

To synchronize the manual database with the google spreadsheet of maps:

• Get a list of all our maps by doing the following in a linux-like prompt:

  • To get to the prompt - on my windows laptop, that's cygwin

  • Go to the mapped Maps directory (eg cd "H:/Shared drives/Maps")

  • find . -maxdepth 5 -mindepth 5 > find5.txt  ## this gives the map version level (O - OUSA) in the drive.

• Open this in a new google spreadsheet. Copy the relevant columns from our maps database into another sheet. Use vlookup to compare the two lists and fix any discrepancies.

Map of maps app

We have an app (limited access) that shows a map of maps and allows us to browse the courses that we have. This is an ongoing development project meant to support the work that we do. https://barb.shinyapps.io/maptest/  The app was written & is owned by Barb in R and published on shinyapps.io; code is tracked in github.

Below: a video about updates to the app, from December 2024.

To update the data behind this app:

1. Keep the Maps Google Drive organized properly 

   1. folders: Country > Region > Municipality > Location > Map Version (eg "O - NEOC")

   2. In here, there are Map/ and Courses/ folders. In Courses there are different "events" or collections of maps made from the same Purple Pen file with the same set of control locations. Try to name them in a sensible way, often starting with YYYY MM. In Map/ you have the OCAD or OOM map file, along with a PDF of the latest version. You can store old or alternative versions of the map in Archive/ and Versions/ subdirectories.

2. Keep the "Maps" tab of the "Maps and Courses for Navigation Games" google spreadsheet updated manually - only maps that are in this spreadsheet are shown in the app. Critical information are the lat (x) and lon (y) values. The Country/Region/City/Location/Map info has to match exactly with the google drive

3. Periodically, we run software to check for discrepancies between the google spreadsheet and the google drive, and to update the list of courses, which is determined only from looking in the google drive. 

4. In the future, we may start to track additional metadata such as map authorship, last updates, how to get permission to use the space, and so on.

For more details, documentation about the software, and alternative technologies that were considered, see our Map App page.

Manually created map - outdated

The map shows locations of some of the maps that we use, and indicates the owner of the map.

World of O Maps

Here is a map of maps from World of O. It's another great tool to determine whether there is an existing orienteering map near a potential client.