Getting started

Your first survey

This page walks the complete loop from installation to export: opening the app, downloading the area you will work in, choosing a recording protocol, entering observations in the field, reviewing what you collected, and getting the data out. Each step links to a dedicated page with the full detail.

Opening the app for the first time

When you open EarthCape for the first time, no sign-up is required. The app creates a project for you automatically, named after your device, selects it, and assigns the Casual / incidental protocol. The project is empty — it contains no sample data, no demonstration observations, and no pre-loaded species lists. Use it as it is, or rename it before you begin.

The home screen carries the Record button, quick actions for a new observation or locality (camera, gallery or blank form), and the weather card. Everything else — the map, your data lists, protocols, projects and Admin — is reached from the Menu button at the bottom left.

1. Open the app. The home screen loads with your auto-created project selected.
2. If you want to rename it, open Menu → Projects, tap the project and edit its name.
3. Take note of the protocol shown — it is Casual / incidental by default. You can change it before you start recording; see Setting the protocol below.

Downloading the map area

The basemap covers the whole planet via vector tiles served from our own infrastructure — no API key, no usage cap. Before you go into the field, download the area you will be working in so the map, terrain and 3D relief all function with the radio off. See Map and tile server and Offline maps for the full detail.

Downloading a region

1. Open the map (Menu → Map).
2. Navigate to your field site and frame the area you need in the viewport.
3. Tap Tools in the toolbar at the bottom of the map screen, then tap Offline.
4. The panel shows "Download current view". A region name is suggested automatically while you are online — for example, "Bostanlik district, Tashkent Region, Uzbekistan"; otherwise type one.
5. Check the coordinates and size estimate. The estimate depends on the area and terrain — the district-sized example in the screenshot is about 11 MB at z6–14 — and includes the map and the 3D terrain model.
6. Tap "Download this area" and wait for the download to finish before you leave a connection.

Adding the world overview

The world overview (z0–5, approximately 80 MB) gives you a rendered basemap at all zoom levels, so the map is never blank when you zoom out beyond your downloaded region. It only needs downloading once.

1. In the same Offline panel, scroll down to World map. The detail line reads "Detail: z0–5 · ~80 MB"; the slider lets you change the depth (z0–7).
2. Tap "Download world map".

Setting the protocol and the form

A survey protocol defines the structure of a recording session: what a visit is, which fields appear on the observation form, and how the data is organised for export. Every observation in a project is recorded under the project's active protocol. Seven protocols ship with the app, including Casual / incidental, which is assigned automatically to new projects. You can change the protocol, clone a built-in one to edit it, or write a new one in the Protocols Studio — all on the device.

The Form builder lets you control the field layout for each entity type: show or hide fields, reorder them, group them under headings, and add custom fields. Custom fields defined before the season starts travel with the project, so the whole team's form looks the same from the first day.

1. Open Menu → Protocols. The list shows all seven built-in protocols and any you have created.
2. Tap a protocol to view it. To assign it, open Menu → Projects, tap your project and under Survey protocol tap Assign a protocol (or Change).
3. To add a custom field, open the protocol in Protocols, switch to the Form builder tab, choose the Entity type (for example Observation) and tap Add custom field. Set the caption, key, data type and section, and whether the field is Required and Show in list.
4. To share the configuration with colleagues, open the project under Menu → Projects and tap Share; the app writes a .ecsurvey setup file with the project, protocol, forms, custom fields, sites and vocabulary. Colleagues open the file on their device, or use Import under Menu → Projects. To move the records as well, export a Frictionless Data Package from Menu → Admin → File Import & Export.

Recording in the field

Recording a session means starting a GPS track, which creates a visit for the session, and entering observations as you work through the site. The Recording observations page covers all of this in detail.

1. Open Record from the home screen or the Record tile in the Menu.
2. Check the GPS status fields before you start: Latitude, Longitude, Accuracy, V-Accuracy, Altitude, Speed, Bearing, Satellites and Timestamp are all shown. Wait until Accuracy reaches an acceptable value for your work — ±5 m or better is typical in open terrain.
3. The screen shows "Project to record under" with the active project name. Confirm it is correct.
4. Tap Start recording. A visit is created for the session automatically, and observations you add while recording are linked to it.
5. Add observations as you move through the site. Each observation opens the protocol's form; fill in the taxon, any protocol fields, and optionally attach a photo.
6. When the session is finished, tap Stop & save. The track and all observations are saved to the on-device database.

Checking what you collected

The data lists give you access to every record in the project as a filterable list. After a day in the field, use them to check completeness, find entry errors and open records for correction.

1. Open Menu → Observations (or Visits, Localities, Taxa, or Files depending on what you want to review).
2. The list opens with the default column set. Tap the columns icon (Choose columns) to add, remove or reorder columns — for example, add Accuracy or Altitude to check GPS quality.
3. Type in the Filter… box to narrow the list; it matches text in any shown column. In the wide (tablet) grid each column has its own filter cell, and tapping a column header sorts by it.
4. Tap any row to open the full record and edit it.

Getting the data out

EarthCape exports to twelve formats. The right choice depends on your destination: Darwin Core Archive for a biodiversity repository, GeoPackage for a GIS, Excel for spreadsheet work. If several people are collecting data on the same survey, Google Drive lets you push each person's contribution to a shared folder and merge them — without an EarthCape account or a server (a Google account is needed for Drive). See Export formats and Google Drive collaboration for the full procedure.

1. Open Menu → Admin → File Import & Export.
2. Choose the format that matches your destination. The twelve formats are listed on the export screen.
3. Tap the format to generate the file. The filename is set automatically from the project name, its id and a timestamp.
4. Share the file through the Android share sheet (Quick Share, Drive, Messages, Bluetooth, Gmail, or any other installed target), or send it directly to a configured cloud destination.
5. Alternatively, open Menu → Admin → Integrations and tap Export to Google Drive to push the current project — setup, your contributions, photos and an analysis-ready merge — to a shared Drive folder.

What to read next

Each topic covered in this walkthrough has a dedicated reference page with the full detail.