Latest Contributions by OwenGeo

Hi Kevin, Sorry you are having an issue building a Map Tour. If you are using an organizational/subscription account then it's possible you don't have sufficient permissions. To be able to create a Map Tour by uploading photos you'll need to be in a Publisher role (or be in a custom role that is able to publish hosted feature layers and create, update, and delete content). This is because your account needs to be able to authorize the Map Tour builder to create and update a feature service to store photos in your ArcGIS account. If you don't have these permissions you can still create a map tour but will have to use photos that are already on the web (like on Flickr or your own web server). Owen ... View more

Victoria, You can embed some story maps inside other story maps. Shortlist could be embedded in a Series, for example, but other story maps can't be embedded inside a Shortlist. Even though you *can* embed story maps inside other story maps we recommend using this technique sparingly. It's often preferable to simply link out to another story map rather than embed too many things in a single story. Here's a blog with some more information about how to do this and recommendations: Embedding a Story Map within a Story Map | ArcGIS Blog  Owen ... View more

Hi Victoria, Thanks for your interest in Cooper's story. As has been discussed above already, he used a customized version of Map Tour that is not currently available as a template. However, we have just begun work to re-design Map Tour from scratch with a new builder and several new layouts. One of the new layouts will be similar to the Iran story that Cooper did. We hope to have the initial release the new Map Tour in the first half of next year. Owen ... View more

Hi Austin, Dan's right, Cascade doesn't include the ability to show a legend at this time, and the resources he pointed to are helpful to show you how you can explain your maps without legends in a Cascade or any story map. It sounds like you are also trying to give your audience some control over the visible layers in the map. We typically don't recommend including standard GIS-style layer controls in story maps. Story map builders are designed to help you, the author of the story, lead your readers through your maps in a deliberate and directed way. In Cascade, for example, you can use the same web map in several views of an immersive section and change the layers shown (or move the map to another area or even show pop-ups) in each view, so all your readers need to do is scroll and the app will adjust what is shown in the map to match your story. Here's an explanation of how to use this technique: http://arcg.is/29ig7Db  Map Journal also has a similar capability called Main Stage Actions, which you can read more about here: Using Story Map Journal Main Stage Actions | ArcGIS Blog  There are some situations where a layer control may be useful in a story map: You are creating a story map for a technical audience of subject matter experts who is familiar with GIS apps whom you expect to be very engaged in your topic and will benefit from being able to explore the maps in your story in a more self-guided fashion. You are creating a story map that is to be used by you or a colleague as a presentation tool where you anticipate questions or discussion that will stray from the main thread of your story. In these cases you can embed a configurable app like the Basic Viewer or Web AppBuilder in your story map to include a layer control, but even in these situations it is still often better to link out to one of these exploratory apps at the end of your story (so they open in a new browser tab) rather than embed them inside the story. Hope this is helpful! Owen ... View more

Hi Emmanuel, Since you can't predict the size or shape of the device or browser window your viewers will use to read your story there isn't a single recommended size for main stage images. For images with typical aspect ratios like 1:1 (square), 4:3, 3:4, 5:4, 4:5, etc. I think you'd want the image to be about 2000 pixels wide so that A) it looks good on large, high resolution displays and B) isn't too large that it loads slowly. This recommendation would be for main stage images in Map Journal or Map Series. In terms of image position settings, we'd recommend always using the "Fill" option (the default) for photographs so they fill the main stage area (regardless of the size/shape of the device/browser window). However, if you have a photo or image that you do not want to crop, like an image of a chart, graph, or scanned map we'd recommend using the "Fit" option so the entire image will always be visible. Owen ... View more

Hi Lauren, We are planning to add the ability to upload audio files in the Cascade builder in a future release (but not in December). But in the meantime, if you host an audio file on a site like SoundCloud you can get the embed code for that file and add it to your Cascade story using the "Link to Content" panel of the Media Picker. On SoundCloud you go to the file and click Share > Embed and copy the <iframe> code. Owen ... View more