A useful function on a web-mapping site is the ability to zoom to a named location, or the location of a feature. The IMF contains some pre-built routines for zooming to locations, and it is easy to add more of your own.

The find location page (usually opened using a tab), contains a list of the types of location searches available. The location types are configured in the site configuration XML using the <FIND-LOCATION> element. This document shows some of the predefined location searches.

<FIND-LOCATION
 type="Personal Bookmark"
 url="$IMF/imfZoomToBookmark.jsp"
 target="dataFrame" />

<FIND-LOCATION
 type="Latitude / Longitude"
 url="$IMF/imfZoomToLatLongForm.jsp"
 target="dataFrame" />

<FIND-LOCATION
 type="Canadian Place Name"
 url="$IMF/imfCgdiGazetteerForm.jsp"
 target="dataFrame" />

<FIND-LOCATION
 type="BC Municipality"
 url="$IMF/imfZoomToExtentListForm.jsp?type=Municipality"
 target="dataFrame" />

The last entry above uses a particularly useful routine. Using a database table containing locations and their extents, this routine shows a list of values that can be chosen by the user. When selected, the map extent is set to the extent of that feature. More information on how to set up a location extents table can be found on the site.properties page. Contact us for an Avenue script that can be used to create SQL insert statements from a data set with unique names and associated extents.