Preparing input data

How do I structure my location data?

GeoMarker accepts locations as either latitude/longitude point coordinates or as street addresses. Note that GeoMarker only works for locations within the United States.

In either case, you should upload a CSV containing just the location information and a unique ID for each record. Other data pertaining to each record should be kept locally and associated with the same set of unique IDs. You can then use the unique IDs to link contextual data from GeoMarker to your other data.

Point Locations

Include 3 fields in your CSV:

• A unique identifier to link to other data
• Latitude
• Longitude

The exact text in the column headers does not matter. You will select the columns in your file that represent each field during the upload process.

Latitude and longitude should be in the WGS84 geographic coordinate system. Coordinates in a projected coordinate system (e.g., Albers, UTM, Web Mercator) are not latitude / longitude, and will produce erroneous results. (WGS84 is the most common coordinate system for latitude / longitude data.)

Example:

You may use our sample point input file as a template, or directly as input so you can explore the system if you do not yet have your own data.

Street Addresses

Include 5 fields in your CSV:

• A unique identifier to link to other data
• Street address - Include street number, street name, and unit (if applicable) in the same field
• City
• State - Either spelled out or the two-letter postal abbreviation
• ZIP code - Five digit or ZIP+4

The exact text in the column headers does not matter. You will select the columns in your file that represent each field during the upload process.

All five fields must be present in the data file. If you are missing data for one of the fields, include it as a blank column.

Example:

You may use our sample address data file as a template, or directly as input so you can explore the system if you do not yet have your own data.

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