'Find a Place' tool does not work

Description

In MapStudio, when locating a specific place using the 'Find a Place' tool, no place is found or no pop-up window opens to select a location from a list of candidates.

Cause

Possible causes:

1. The name of the place entered into the 'Find a Place' tool is either greatly misspelled or is not a place in the gazetteer database.

A good test to determine if this is part of the problem is to enter an obviously significant place like 'London', 'Tokyo', or 'Chicago'. That helps to determine whether or not there is a temporary problem with MapStudio's Gazetteer service.

2. The browser has a pop-up blocker enabled. If the name of the place entered is ambiguous, the 'Find a Place' tool will often provide a list of candidates to select from in a browser pop-up window.

MapStudio application commonly uses browser pop-up windows to provide some core functionality. In this case, if 'Orange' is entered, a pop-up would open to provide the user a list of candidate places from which to choose, since 'Orange' is a place name uses in many different places.

The 'Find a U.S. Address' and 'Download' tools are others that also make use of browser pop-ups.

A good test to see if problem #2 is part of the cause is to use a third-party pop-up blocker test Web site, like www.popuptest.com. Sites like these have tools that allow the user to trigger pop-up windows to open. If it is found that pop-ups from these sites also do not open, then it is a very good chance that problem #2 is at least part of the problem.

Solution or Workaround