Finding your way around

Groundwork has two halves: the map canvas on the left, and the Data panel on the right. The map shows where things are; the Data panel shows what they are.

The map canvas

Pan by dragging, zoom with the scroll wheel or a pinch. Hovering over a feature shows its name in a small tooltip; clicking it opens its details in the Data panel.

The Data panel

The right-hand panel is where everything except the map itself happens. From top to bottom:

• Breadcrumb — shows which map you’re in. Click the map name to switch between maps.
• Layer bar — the active layer’s name, its feature count, and a ⋮ menu of layer actions (filter, hide, download, and more). Click the layer name to open the layer picker.
• Legend — the coloured swatches under the layer name show what each symbol means. Hover over it and expand it to filter by value.
• Feature list — every feature in the active layer, with a search box and a sort menu at the top. Click a feature to select it on the map and open its details.

Maps

Groundwork can hold more than one map, each with its own layers — like separate projects. The breadcrumb’s map name switches between them. Your own maps remember their layers and view between visits.

Layers

A map is made of layers — in our street-trees example, a layer of trees and a layer of parks. One layer at a time is the active layer: the one whose features fill the list and the one you’re editing. Switch the active layer from the layer picker — click the layer name at the top of the Data panel — where you can also show or hide each layer with its visibility toggle.

The Add layer panel (the + Add a layer row in the layer picker) also offers other data sources beyond cloud folders; they’re not covered in this guide.

Finding a place

The search box on the map finds street addresses and place names, and drops a marker on the result. You can also right-click anywhere on the map and choose Set location to identify that spot’s nearest address; placed markers appear under Recent in the search box.

Changing the background map

The background street map can be swapped for other street/reference maps or aerial imagery from the Add layer panel’s Background layers card — useful when you’re checking context or what’s actually on the ground.

Display theme

Open the settings menu to switch Groundwork between light and dark display themes. New sessions start in light mode until you choose dark mode.

Next: Viewing and finding features.