Area of interest

Before you upload a survey you can show the portal where you are working. The area is drawn on the map, the public deposits, permits and geology inside it are listed, and any survey line outside it is flagged when you upload your survey.

The area is optional. It does not change what you can upload, or which lines you can choose. It does not fetch survey data for you: you still upload your own survey.

Four ways to give the area

Open the Area of interest card under step 1 (Upload your survey) of New survey.

• Draw. Press Start, click the corners of your area on the map, then Finish. Undo corner removes the last one.
• Point. Enter a distance in kilometres (0.05 to 100), press Place it on the map and click the point. The area is the circle that distance around it.
• File. Upload a .kml or .kmz file, or a .zip holding a shapefile (see Files).
• Permit ID. Type a permit or tenement ID as it is written, for example E 45/2526, EPM 12345 or EL 6543, choose the state if you know it, and press Find. The matches are shown on the map; press Use this on the right one.

One area is kept for you at a time; a new one replaces it. Clear removes it.

Files

• KML and KMZ (from Google Earth and most mapping programs): every polygon in the file becomes part of the area, holes included. A point in the file becomes a circle of the distance in the Point tab (2 km if none is given). Lines, pictures and links in the file are ignored.
• Shapefile: zip the .shp with its .shx, .dbf and .prj, one shapefile per zip. The .prj says which coordinate system the file is in. Without it, or when its positions do not fall where the .prj puts them, the portal asks you to choose the system (search for it as in Coordinates), and the file is read again in that system.
• Up to 10 MB, up to 500 shapes, and an area at most 10 degrees across. A very detailed outline is simplified evenly when it is stored.
• We read the shapes and their names only. Files that are password-protected, hold another zip inside, or name files outside the zip are refused.

Finding a permit

The lookup searches the current permit maps of Western Australia, the Northern Territory, South Australia, Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania, the same public maps shown on the portal. Each state writes its IDs its own way; spaces, slashes and leading zeros do not matter (EL6789 finds EL006789). An exact ID is listed first, then IDs that contain what you typed. If a state's map is not answering, the portal says so; try again later.

Permit outlines and details come from each state's public map service and carry its attribution.

What is inside

Once the area is set, the card lists the public deposits and mines, current permits and geological provinces, basins and domains that touch it, with a count and the names, layer by layer. They come from the same public maps as the map layers. An area wider than a layer can be asked for says so; draw a smaller area to list it.

Survey lines outside the area

When you upload a survey, the upload step says how many of its lines lie outside your area, or partly outside, and names them. This is a reminder only: those lines can still be chosen and submitted.

Who can see your area

Your area is kept for your own sign-in and is not shown to other people in your organisation or to anyone else. Our operations staff can see it for support. See Your data.