The Point List — edit coordinates, direction and SDZ

The Point List is the panel behind the View and edit graphic’s coordinates button. It is the place to work on a symbol numerically rather than by dragging it, and it is also where two things live that are documented nowhere else: the symbol’s direction, and the Safety Distance Zone controls.

Opening it

Select a symbol on the map, then press View and edit graphic’s coordinates in the main window.

The 'View and edit graphic's coordinates' button, third from the top on the right edge of the map.army main window
Hint: The button is disabled until a symbol is selected. It stays visible with a working tooltip rather than disappearing, which is why it reads as broken rather than as unavailable. If you lose the selection while the panel is open, the panel closes itself. The same precondition governs the MSS Symbol Editor — see Main window.

The coordinate table

Every point of the selected graphic appears as an editable row. A single-point symbol has one row; a line, an area or a corridor has one per vertex.

The Point List open on a line: one editable coordinate row per vertex of the selected graphic

  • Coordinates are shown in the format you have configured under Options → Coordinate Settings. Switch the display format and the table re-renders in the new one. You can type a coordinate in any format the app recognises.

  • Only the points you edit are changed when you apply; the others keep their exact stored position. Edits stay in the panel if you close and reopen it or change the coordinate format, until you apply them or the graphic changes on the map. A point the selected format cannot show appears empty and does not block applying.

  • Editing a row and applying it moves the point. This is the way to place a symbol on an exact grid reference rather than by eye, which matters for anything that will be fired at, flown to, or handed to another system.

    The Point List after editing a coordinate, with the Apply Changes button ringed

  • The edit goes onto the undo history. Ctrl + Z reverses it like any other geometry change. See Keyboard shortcuts.

  • Click into a row to see the point on the map. The point you are working in is shown as the selected (green) point of the graphic, which helps with long lines.

  • Attributes. Some graphics start with a few extra fields above the points: Attitude, Length, Radius and Width. Which ones appear depends on the graphic type. Attitude is an angle in degrees. Length, Radius and Width are distances in metres. Type a plain number, or add a unit such as 2 km and the value is converted. The same measures can be dragged on the map by the purple handles described in Edit Multi-Point Tactical Graphics. A width set by a yellow control point, as on an Axis of Advance, has no Width field: you change that width by dragging the point on the map.

If the application cannot apply what you typed it reports Could not apply the points and leaves the geometry alone — the usual cause is a coordinate that does not parse in the format currently selected.

Direction

Where the selected symbol supports a direction — the MIL-STD-2525 Q modifier, drawn as a direction-of-movement indicator — the Point List exposes it as its own control. It is a number field that starts at 0, and the map shows its value beside the selected symbol (0° in the screenshot).

The 'Direction' field in the map.army Point List for a symbol that supports it, set to 0

The control only appears when the symbol actually supports that modifier. A symbol that has no direction concept simply does not show it, with no message, so its absence is not a fault.

The same value can be set by dragging the blue handle at the tip of the selected symbol’s direction line on the map, or in the MSS Symbol Editor’s Modifiers menu. Whether the map then turns the symbol or draws an arrow out of it is decided by Rotatable Symbols under Options → Symbol Format — see Direction of movement.

Safety Distance Zones

For a single-point symbol, the Point List also carries the Safety Distance Zone controls, the map.army builder for a surface danger zone (SDZ) or range fan: distance, sector of fire, ricochet areas, vertical hazard, zone colours and saved weapon types. The Direction field above them is the direction of fire: the zone turns with it.

'Safety Distance Zone' ticked in the map.army Point List, showing the zone controls below it

This is a substantial feature in its own right and has its own page — see SDZ builder: Safety Distance Zones and range fans.

Hint: If you found no zone controls, check the tick box first. Until Safety Distance Zone is ticked, it is the only control the section shows — every parameter and action is behind it. The second reason is a multi-point selection: a line, an area or a corridor cannot carry a zone, so for those the section stays empty however you set the box.

Where to go next

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