Location catalog overview

The location catalog is the backbone of the geospatial InfoEx system. All observation entered into the InfoEx system need to be associated with a pre-defined location from your location catalog. This document gives a general overview of the location catalog functionality of the InfoEx application.

Locations types

The InfoEx system currently supports the following location types:

• Operation area
• Forecast area
• Operating zone
• Permanent closure
• Road
• Rail
• Route
• Ski run
• Avalanche path
• Weather site
• Shot placement

See Location types and symbology for a detailed description of supported location types and the symbols used to display them on the location catalog map.

Location hierarchy

Locations entered into the InfoEx system are organized in a location hierarchy. The location hierarchy implemented in the InfoEx system has a tree structure where a location can only have a single parent, but multiple children. Every location needs to be derived from a single parent location, except the operation area, which is the top parent location of a location catalog. To ensure meaningful location catalogs, there are numerous restrictions on what type of locations can be contained by other locations. See Location hierarchy for a detailed description of the supported relations.

There are currently two main uses of the location hierarchy in the InfoEx application:

• It helps to keep your location catalog tidy
• It is used in the Observations module to pull previously entered observations into the workflow. Only observations associated with locations that are direct or indirect children of the location associated with the workflow are automatically presented for review and submission to the InfoEx.

The hierarchy in the location tree needs to be defined explicitly and it not directly derived from the geospatial information of the locations. This approach allows for a more flexible use of the location hierarchy. For example, a weather site that provides valuable observations for a forecast region can be made a child of this forecast region even if the site is not located within the forecast region.

Related documents

• Location catalog overview
• Location types and symbology
• Location hierarchy
• Adding locations to the location catalog
  • Creating the geometry of a new location using the available drawing tools
  • Importing the geometry of a location from a KML file
• Editing locations in the location catalog
  • Editing the geometry of an existing location using the available drawing tools
  • Importing the geometry of a location from a KML file
• Deleting locations from the location catalog
• Changing the hierarchy among your locations
• Searching for a location in the location catalog
• Viewing photos
• Downloading your location catalog as a KML file