Geoportal FAQs

do a wildcard search?

Searching with either an asterisk * or a question mark ? in your query is a way to capture more results and cast a wider search net.

Truncation

The asterisk * will search for any number of characters after your initial phrase, including zero. For example, india* retrieves India, Indiana, Indianapolis, the Indian Ocean, etc.

Wildcard

The question mark ? will represent any single character and must be repeated to represent multiple characters in a query.

For example, india? will only retrieve Indian, while india* above retrieved any number of characters after india.

Similarly, a search for india??????? will retrieve only Indianapolis because we put 7 question marks after india and therefore any results must be words 12 characters long.

find out more information about an item?

Look at the Links box on the right side of the item page.

Visit Source

Clicking on the Visit Source button opens the data portal or library catalog where the data or map image is hosted. There may be additional details about the item available from this page. If you still have questions, you can use the contact information on the source page to inquire further about the resource

Metadata

You may see an option in the Links box for Metadata. This means you can view more detailed documentation about that item, including information about purpose, use limitations and data quality. It is also possible for you to download the detailed metadata record directly from the BTAA geoportal for future reference using the Download button in the View Metadata window.

find items with the map on the homepage?

Option 1: Browse for records using a geographic extent

The interactive world map on the homepage supports map-based searches for specific places. One way to conduct a map-based search is to locate all items within a geographic extent. A user can pan the map with the mouse and zoom with the controls in the upper left corner. When the desired area is in view, click the blue Search here button at the lower left. Items that are within the geographic extent will display in the search results. Only part of an item needs to be in the geographic extent to appear in the search results.

Option 2: Drill down using the cluster and marker icons

A second option for map-based searching is to click on the icons that appear on the map as you pan and zoom. Blue marker icons show the center point of a single item record. Cluster icons represent many item records. Click or zoom in on clusters to display blue markers corresponding to specific items. Click on a single blue marker icon, and then click the link in the popup to display that specific item record.

find items by place name?

Option 1: Browse the Place Filter

The Place filter is available on the Homepage and the Search Results page.

Click on the more link at the bottom of the Place filter to browse all available place names. Place names can be sorted alphabetically or numerically the number of results.

Option 2: Use the Keyword search box on the Homepage or Search Results page.

A general keyword search will return more results than using the Place filter. It will find records that include the entered terms anywhere in the record, such as in the title, creator, or description fields.

limit my search to scanned maps?

From the Homepage

On the homepage, select the button Maps to limit all results to just scanned paper maps.

Using the Resource Class Filter

Refine a search by selecting the genre Maps from the filters on the left side of the screen.

Use the Year Filter on the Search Results Page

The Year filter lets you type in a specific date range.

Use the Provider filter

The Provider is an organization that made the resource available. For geospatial data, it is typically a city, county, state, or university. For scanned maps, it is typically the original publisher of the work.

Use the Creator filter

The Creator can be a person, a government department, or a unit of government.

use the Open in ArcGIS button?

Finding ArcGIS Rest Services

ArcGIS Rest Services are web services that display geospatial data online. To browse ArcGIS Rest Services in the geoportal, open the Type filter and select Service.

Opening in ArcGIS Online

If the web service for an item is an ArcGIS Rest Service, the geoportal provides a shortcut for adding it to ArcGIS Online. For these items, you will see a button labeled Open in ArcGIS. Click this button and it will open a new instance of ArcGIS Online with the service loaded.

Working with the data in ArcGIS Online

Once the data is in ArcGIS Online, you can change the symbology or perform geospatial analysis. To save your work, you will need to sign in to ArcGIS Online and save the maps.

Adding additional layers to ArcGIS Online

The Open in ArcGIS Online button will only open one dataset at a time. To add more layers, paste the web service URL into your map, or download a geoportal item and upload it to ArcGIS Online.