The Map View provides some layer types that can visualize geographic data that is read from files in specific formats (e.g. Shapefile or GeoTIFF files). To enable the display of such files in a Map View these files first have to be stored on the Application Server as so called Map File Sets. The name Map File Sets results from the fact that many commonly used formats for storing geographical data are actually formats that use more than one file. E.g. while the term "shapefile" is quite common, it is misleading since the format consists of a collection of files with a common file name prefix, stored in the same directory.

Map File Sets are stored in a Domain context i.e. with a link to a specific domain. Map File Sets are propagated down the Domain structure, i.e. a Map File Set defined in a Domain is available in any sub domains of that domain.

Creating and modifying Map File Sets in a domain requires the domain Permission Manage Map file sets (19). Using a map file set, i.e. to display the contents of a map file set in a Map View layer requires Read (0) permission on the domain the Map File Set belongs to.

The Application Server determines the Map File Set format by inspecting the files the user stores with that Map File Set. The Application Server will only store a Map File Set if the files provided by the user are valid for one of the supported format. The following chapters describe each of the supported formats and the validation rules applied by the Application Server.

Each Map File Set on the Application Serer must be associated with one of the available coordinate systems. The Application Server will interpret the data in the Map File set as being in that specific coordinate system. Coordinate System specifications that might be inside one of the source files of a Map File Set are not used by the Application Server.