3. Analysis

[Five narrated videos on this page - we recommend that you view these videos using full-screen and in High Definition.]

See also chapter 4, Appendix A and Appendix B in the BSBI MapMate Book.

Standard queries that come with MapMate

One of MapMate's strengths is the range of analysis queries that it is possible to run on your data. The first four videos cover aspects of analysis using the standard MapMate queries:

• The browse list control buttons - every time you run a query in MapMate the results are presented in a 'browse list' (looking rather like a spreadsheet). Each browse list has a standard set of controls at the top.
• Using the data entry window to filter your data and run queries - it's possible to do lots of data analysis from the data entry window, quite apart from MapMate's specific Analysis section.
• Using the "F9 Custom Query" from the data entry window to design your own query.
• Using "wildcards" to group together data for recorders or sites that have similar names, in the Analysis section of MapMate.

Adding a custom query to MapMate

If you need an analysis query that does something different to the standard ones that MapMate supplies, you'll need to add a Custom user query, covered in the fifth video on this page:

• Adding a custom user query

Some examples of BSBI queries that you can copy and past into your MapMate database are provided on the custom queries page of this website.

Appendix B of the BSBI MapMate Book contains a further range of custom queries, and more can be obtained from the Kitenet website, but if you can't find what you need try asking for help on the MapMate email group.

Writing your own custom queries

If you want to explore further and start writing the code for your own custom queries, Martin Rand's comprehensive Introduction to SQL for Mapmate Users (pdf download, 2.3Mb) is strongly recommended. See also the MapMate data model described in Appendix A of the BSBI MapMate Book.