Worked example: solving a task

For students — you were sent a link to a task. Here is how to solve it, start to finish.

Your teacher sent you a personal link. You don’t need an account or any software — just open the link in a browser. Read the clues, mark the zone where the answer must be, and submit it.

Two kinds of task. At the top of the screen it says either Simple task or Advanced task. In a Simple task the map layers are already drawn for you, so you go straight to the buffers. In an Advanced task you first trace the layers yourself. Everything after that is identical.

How to tell which you have: if you see drawing tools and a “Trace the layers” panel (Line, Points, Brush…), it’s an Advanced task — start by digitising. If the buffer-zone panel is available right away, it’s a Simple task — skip straight to step 3.

1Open your link and read the case

The link opens your case straight away — no install, no sign-in. On the left is the case: a short story and a set of clues. Each clue is a distance rule — the answer lies within or beyond so many metres of something (a road, water, buildings, woodland). Read them all before you start; together they pin down one small area.

The case panel: the objective, a short story and four within/beyond distance clues, with a Complete task button — **The case.** The objective, the story and the four clues — each a *within*/*beyond* distance. These four rules are exactly what you will reproduce with the tools.

2Advanced task: trace the layers first

If the top of the screen says Advanced task, you begin by drawing the map yourself. The Trace the layers panel lists the four themes — Roads, Rivers & water, Buildings, Woodland & parks. Pick a theme, then draw it over the satellite image: Line for free-hand, Points for click-by-click, Brush to paint an area, Erase and Undo to fix mistakes. When every theme you need is traced, press Done — build buffers. (A Simple task skips this step entirely — the layers are already there.)

The Trace the layers panel: the four themes with counts, and Move, Line, Points, Brush, Erase, Undo, Clear tools — **The tracing tools.** Choose a theme, then draw it with Line, Points or Brush; Erase and Undo fix mistakes. The number on each theme counts what you have drawn.

An advanced task mid-tracing: a road drawn in orange and woodland outlined in green over the satellite image — **Tracing in progress.** Here the road is being drawn in orange and a patch of woodland in green. Trace the features the clues mention, then press **Done — build buffers**.

3Set the buffers

Now the Theme layers panel on the right is your workbench. For each clue, switch its layer on, press Buffer, and set the distance and the within / beyond direction to match the clue exactly. Each buffer shades the ground that obeys that one rule — you can see the coloured bands appear on the map.

The Theme layers panel with buffers switched on for each layer, coloured buffer bands drawn along roads and the river — **Buffers set.** Each layer has its own **Buffer** with a distance and a within/beyond toggle. Match every clue: e.g. *within 150 m of water*, *beyond 90 m of a road*.

4Overlay — find the answer

Turn on the Suitability zone. GIScases intersects all your “within” buffers and subtracts the “beyond” ones, leaving the one patch of ground where every clue agrees at once — drawn in red. The panel reports its area and how many conditions it meets. That red patch is your answer; make it as tight as the clues allow.

The suitability zone shown as red patches where all buffers overlap, with a readout of suitable area and conditions met — **The answer.** The red patches are the overlay of all your buffers — here **Suitable area 2.74 ha · 3 conditions**. **Fit** re-centres the map on the result.

5Submit

When you are happy with the zone, press Complete task. Your answer goes to your teacher and is scored automatically against the correct zone. Note that once you submit you can no longer edit it — so check your buffers first. That’s it: you’ve solved a real GIS problem.

Your work is saved automatically. You don’t have to finish in one sitting. Everything you trace and every buffer you set is saved as you go, so you can close the tab and come back to the same link later — your progress will be waiting exactly where you left off. It is only locked once you press Complete task.

Tip. Stuck on a term — a buffer, a layer, overlay? Every idea here is explained in the main Lessons.

Made by Solebo GIScases · Learn — free to use in your classroom.