Tutorial: Custom borders

Help Pages » Tutorial: Custom borders

UUorld ships with several border sets to get you started, but if those border sets do not suit your needs, you can always import your own.

UUorld is able to import most borders that use Shapefile format, a common GIS standard created by the company ESRI. Shapefile is used widely by governments and other data providers. These files are usually indicated by the ".shp" file-name extension.

To begin, open the File menu and select Import Borders.



The file selection interface automatically highlights .dbf files. Select the .dbf file with the same name and in the same directory with the desired .shp file. These two files and a .shx file constitute the full shapefile package. For example, we see three shapefiles in the list below:



Once you have selected your shapefile, choose the region names from the shapefile to match the region names in the data you intend to import. (If you are making your own shapefile, embed your region names in the DBF file.) Be sure to use a naming convention with unique names.



The "Label Field" selector (shown above) lets you choose the names that will be displayed on the map when you load data using these boundaries. This setting can be adjusted after import by choosing Edit  from the  FILE menu.

The Optimization Slider regulates how many points are drawn for each border. Lower optimization provides more detailed shapes, but requires more processing power for high-performance rendering.
 
Note: The border import may require several minutes if many regions are included in the border set imported, and/or if lower optimization is used.

Once borders have been imported, a region list for the border set will be automatically created with the title "All - ".

After new borders have been imported, you will be able to import statistics that match these borders by following the steps in the stats import tutorial.



If you have questions beyond what is covered in here, don't hesitate to write to us. We're happy to help.