About geographic information

Once you have an account, you can add five basic kinds of geographic information to the portal: maps, layers, files, tools, and applications. This information may come from within your organization or from the web.

The information that you add to the portal can be shared with the members in your organization to perform a variety of tasks, such as creating maps from data files and embedding them in a website, developing applications that use address locators and other tools, and downloading layers for use in a desktop application. You can also choose to keep these items private so only you can access them.

For a complete list of the items that you can add to your portal, see What can you add to your portal? To learn more about maps, layers, files, tools, and applications, see the sections below.

Maps

Maps are visual presentations of useful spatial information. They typically contain a basemap, data layers, an extent, and a legend. Interactive maps that you find on the web also contain navigation tools such as zoom, pan, place finders, and bookmarks and allows you to change the basemap, for example, from streets to imagery.

The most compelling maps tell stories about trends and patterns over geographic space. For example, they may explain where people are buying homes, where sea surface temperature is changing, or where elephants travel in the summer. When you make a map, you overlay the data that best tells your story. For example, you might choose a topographic basemap and add layers of business data (such as available stands of timber) and reference information (such as boundaries or labels). These maps share information for a purpose; they don't just display data.

The web map is the most common type of map. Other types of maps include those that can be opened in ArcGIS applications such as ArcMap documents, map packages, and tile packages.

Using the map viewer, you can create and save web maps. Web maps typically reference shared layers and files from your organization. Web maps can be opened and used in web browsers, mobile devices, or desktop map viewers.

To learn more, see About authoring web maps and Adding web maps.

Layers

Layers are a specific collection of geospatial information such as boundary lines, bird sightings, local imagery, and historical fire perimeters. These are used in web maps and applications. They can be hosted on your portal, a GIS server, or referenced from an external URL.

There are two types of layers: map layers and feature layers.

Map layers

A map layer is a prerendered collection of map cartography organized by location and scale. Map layers can be displayed dynamically or as cached map image tiles. Map layers can be managed as part of your content or referenced in a web map or application.

Dynamic maps generate map images when requested by the client viewing the map. As you browse the map, new map images are displayed. Dynamic maps also include image services. Image services are based on raster data, which is essentially a grid of cells. Rasters are commonly used to store imagery and other information captured by satellite sensors.

A cached map is an organized collection of map image tiles for specific geographic extents, projections, and levels of detail that are pregenerated on a server. Cached maps support fast visualization of complex maps since the server distributes the map images whenever someone asks for a map.

Feature layers

A feature layer is a collection of geographic features. Each feature in the collection has a location, set of properties, map symbology, and pop-up window. Feature layers allow you to execute queries on the features and perform live edits on the features using templates for an enhanced editing experience. A feature layer can be managed as a part of your content or referenced in a web map or application. The contents of some feature layers can be downloaded.

To learn more, see Adding items from the web. If the layer you want to add from the web is secured, see Connecting to secured services.

Files

Files are a specific collection of static information such as customer lists, addresses, images, and location information that can be shared with your organization. You can add files from your computer and from the web. To learn more, see Adding files from your computer and Adding items from the web.

Shapefiles and CSV files can be published and hosted as feature services. To learn more, see Publishing a hosted feature service using a shapefile or CSV file.

Tools

Tools are services that perform an analytical function such as locating streets and addresses, geoprocessing, finding a place, routing, or accessing a geodatabase. You can also add locator packages and geoprocessing packages as tools. To learn more, see Adding files from your computer and Adding items from the web.

Applications

An application combines maps, data, and tools for a targeted use such as a polling stations mobile application or an Arctic ice flow web application. Applications can be based on templates or developed with APIs. In general, applications are constructed from information in web maps and supplemented with additional application-specific customization.

Applications can be hosted as a part of your content or they can be managed independently and added to the website using the application URL. Applications can also include add-ins, a customization file that plugs into a desktop application to provide supplemental functionality for accomplishing custom tasks.

For more information, see Adding applications.