Maptitude P&E Tech Corner
What do I need to do before I enter the P&E Mgt-Settings?
There are a few things you will want to do to prepare you data prior to
entering your P&E Settings. They are grouped below by the tab they
correspond to.
Precincts Tab
- Create a base map for P&E Mgt. The base map should include the most
recent geography for your precincts. To make it easier to get started,
we have designed a base map that uses many of the geographic layers that
are on the Customized P&E Management Data CD TIGER/Line.
For more information about creating maps, see Chapter 3, Creating Maps,
in the Maptitude User’s Guide.
- The Precinct Layouts section allows you to identify the layouts for
P&E. They are located in the Precinct directory where P&E is installed.
The landscape layout is named Precinct_Landscape.lay; the portrait
layout is named Precinct_Portrait.lay. You should open the layouts and
change their properties to reflect the printer you will be using.
Streets Tab
- Choose the street file for geocoding your voters. It can be the file
we provided (ccstreet.cdf) or any street file that conforms to the
guidelines set forth in the “Using a Different Street Layer” section of
Chapter 12 in your Maptitude User's Guide.
If you are using your own street layer, make sure it is in the Compact
Streets File format. If it is not, you can create a Compact Streets File
by choosing Tools-Export and changing the To drop-down list to Compact
Street File. See the section “Converting between Standard and Compact
Geographic File Formats” in Chapter 18 of your Maptitude User’s Guide
for more information.
Voters Tab
- The voter file requires an integer field that contains a unique
record ID.
- The voter file also requires an integer field that indicates whether
an address has been geocoded. Maptitude P&E puts a “1” in the field for
each record it successfully locates. We suggest naming this field
“Located.”
- The voter file can also have a field for each district layer (e.g.,
congress, house, senate, county commission, etc.). Maptitude P&E will
fill this field with the district name for each layer.
For more information on adding a field to a layer, see “Modifying the
Structure of a Table” in Chapter 9, Managing Data Tables, in the
Maptitude User’s Guide. To incrementally fill in the record Ids, see
“Filling a Range of Cells or Groups of Columns with Data” in Chapter 8
of your Maptitude User’s Guide.
Voter Counts Tab
- Each layer in your base map must contain an integer field with the
same name to store the counts. For example, you could add the field
“Reg. Voters” to each layer.
For more information on adding a field to a layer, see “Modifying the
Structure of a Table” in Chapter 9, Managing Data Tables, in the
Maptitude User’s Guide.
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