Method: projects.locations.maps.create

  • The maps.create method generates a map ID used with GetTile to render map tiles visualizing computation results.

  • This method takes an expression and output options, returning a temporary map ID valid for a few hours.

  • The primary use case is populating a map viewport with computed output visualizations, requiring output to meet format requirements like band count and value range for formats like JPEG or PNG.

  • The HTTP request is a POST to https://earthengine.googleapis.com/v1alpha/{parent=projects/*/locations/*}/maps and requires specific IAM and OAuth scopes for authorization.

Creates an ID that can be used to render map tiles showing the results of a computation. The resulting ID should be used as part of GetTile requests.

This is used in conjunction with GetTile. A call to maps.create provides an expression and some output options. The result of maps.create is a map ID that represents an image that is the result of evaluating that expression and applying those options. Subsequently, calls to GetTile can be made to get image data for a tile of the resulting image, at any desired location and zoom. The map ID will be valid for a moderate period (a few hours).

The most common use case for this pair of endpoints is to populate a map viewport with a visualization of the output of some computation. In order for that to be possible, the computation output has to meet some reasonable requirements for the requested image format. In particular, JPEG or PNG format requires that there be one or three output bands, and clips values that are outside the 0-255 range.

HTTP request

POST https://earthengine.googleapis.com/v1alpha/{parent=projects/*/locations/*}/maps

The URL uses gRPC Transcoding syntax.

Path parameters

Parameters
parent

string

Required. The parent of the map collection (e.g., "projects/*").

Authorization requires the following IAM permission on the specified resource parent:

  • earthengine.maps.create

Query parameters

Parameters
workloadTag

string

User supplied tag to track this computation.

Request body

The request body contains an instance of EarthEngineMap.

Response body

If successful, the response body contains a newly created instance of EarthEngineMap.

Authorization scopes

Requires one of the following OAuth scopes:

  • https://www.googleapis.com/auth/earthengine
  • https://www.googleapis.com/auth/earthengine.readonly
  • https://www.googleapis.com/auth/cloud-platform
  • https://www.googleapis.com/auth/cloud-platform.read-only

For more information, see the OAuth 2.0 Overview.