Note: this tool is new in XTools Pro 12.0

 

Map Theme Manager

 

 

Purpose

 

The new Map Theme Manager tool is provided for creating and managing map themes.

 

Description

 

The Map Theme Manager functionality consists of two parts. Theme Manager allows creating map themes and applying them to the maps. The Auto-rendering feature being activated allows automatically apply properties from the selected map theme to the new layers added to the maps.

 

 

Working with Map themes

 

With the new Theme Manager you can create, delete, edit and apply advanced themes to the maps in ArcMap.

 

 

Creating new map themes

 

New map themes can be created in tow ways:

 

• Create from map

- This is the easiest and recommended option. You can take one of your maps with all the map and layer properties set and create a new map theme from it in just one click. Then you can edit this new theme in order to make it applicable to more various datasets.

 

• Create new

- Alternatively you can create a new map from scratch, the Theme Editor provides everything you may need to add new layers, group layers and set all rules and properties for them.

 

Editing map themes

 

Map themes can be edited using the Theme Editor:

 

 

Theme Editor allows managing the content of the map adding, deleting, copying, pasting and moving layers and group layers.

 

For each separate layer or group layer you can specify the following layer properties:

 

• General

- Layer name

- Visibility

- Minimum/maximum scales

- Transparency

- Definition query

Only these general properties can be manages for group layers.

 

• Symbology

Symbology can be taken from:

- Map layer (this option is disabled if there are no layers added in the map)

- Layer file (selected from disk)

- Or you can select a simple symbol from the Symbol selector

 

• Labeling

Labels can be imported from:

- Map file (this option is disabled if there are no layers added in the map)

- Layer file (selected from disk)

As well, you can add new classes, delete existing classes and edit symbols for the classes.

 

An essential part of layer properties are the Rules:

 

 

Map theme layers are applied to the layers in the map according to the specified rules:

 

• Feature class name

- allows to search feature classes by name

• Feature class name

- allows to search feature classes by alias

• Geometry type

- allows to search feature classes by geometry type

• Fields

- allows to search feature classes by certain fields of selected type

 

In general, it is recommended to combine and use as more rules as possible selecting flexible conditions (Contains, Starts with, Ends with) as shown on the example above.

 

Importing/exporting map themes

 

Created map themes can be exported and imported to/from the .xml files for the exchanging purpose.

 

Auto-rendering data in ArcMap

 

When you set one of your map themes as default you an enable the Auto-rendering functionality. With this feature enabled all the data layers you add the new or existing map will be rendered according to the selected default map theme.

 

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