Instructions for use

A legend is an explanation of the symbols and colors on a map, concentrated in a corner or side, which helps to better understand the map. It serves a dual purpose: as a standard for illustrating map content during map compilation, and as an essential reading guide when using the map. When we need to add a legend to the map in the current layout, it can be achieved by drawing the legend.

Function Entry

• Features tab -> Objects group -> Legend button.

Operation Steps

1. Select a map in the layout that requires a legend to be drawn.
2. Click the Legend button in the Features tab -> Objects group. This provides two methods: Legend and Custom Legend.
3. Draw Legend Position: At the position in the current layout where the legend needs to be drawn, click and drag the mouse to pop up the Select Layer dialog box.
4. In the Select Layer dialog box, you can perform the following operations:
   • Layer Filtering:
     • Hide Text and Label Thematic Map Layers: If selected, it hides text and label thematic map layers in the layer list, and is selected by default; if not selected, text and label thematic map layers are displayed normally in the layer list.
     • Only Show Visible Layers of the Map: If selected, it only shows layers with visible status set in the layer manager, and is selected by default; if not selected, it shows all layers in the layer manager.
   • Use the Bring to Front, Up, Down, Bring to Back buttons in the toolbar to adjust the layer list order.
   • Search: Directly locate layers by keyword search in the search box.
   • Current Map Layer List: Use the checkboxes in front of the layer list to select the layers to display in the legend.
5. After confirming the layers, the legend for the selected layers will be added at the drawn position.
6. Modify Legend Properties: Right-click on the legend and select Properties, then modify legend-related attributes in the Layout Object Properties window that pops up on the left, including Basic and Geo. The following describes the parameters under Basic:
   • Map Name: Used to display the name of the map associated with the current legend.
   • Legend Title: Used to set and display the name of the current legend, default is "Legend".
   • Legend Column Count: Used to set and display the number of columns in the current legend, default is 3.
   • Fill Color: This drop-down button is used to set the fill background color for the entire legend. Click the button to select a default color or customize a color from the color panel that pops up.
   • Font Settings: The font settings area is used to set the font style for the legend title, legend items, and legend sub-items. Among them, legend items refer to the legends of vector layers; legend sub-items refer to the legends of thematic map layer sub-items, including unique value thematic map, graduated color thematic map, statistical thematic map, graduated symbol thematic map. Click the drop-down button on the right of the corresponding item to pop up the font styles dialog, where you can set the font style for labels in the current legend. For specific setup methods, refer to: Modify the "Style" tab of the uniform label thematic map text style setup method.
   • Border Margin: The numeric display boxes to the right of the top, bottom, left, and right labels in the margins area are used to set the spacing between the border and internal legend of the current legend.
   • Item Visibility: Checking the layer checkbox indicates that the legend item or sub-item is visible; unchecked indicates it is not visible.
   • Legend Item Auto-Update: Automatically updates legend items based on changes in the map's visible bounds, keeping the legend synchronized with the associated map. If selected, legend items update automatically with map visible bounds changes, not selected by default; if not selected, it shows the content set in the legend item list, and legend items do not change with the data range within the map frame.
   • Display Thematic Map Layer Caption: Selected by default, it displays the title of the thematic map layer; if not selected, the thematic layer title is not displayed, and a thematic map layer title font setting is added under the font settings group.

Related Topics

Draw Scale

Draw North Arrow

Draw Map