Toolboxes

ToolBoxes is the analysis panel of the Map Builder. You open it from the tool rail on the left edge of the map, and it holds every geoprocessing tool ALIGN can run: reshaping vector layers, deriving slope and watersheds from an elevation model, filtering satellite imagery, gridding a point cloud, and much more.

Everything you see in this panel runs inside your browser. There is nothing to install, no server to configure, and your data is never uploaded to run a tool.

The eight toolboxes

Toolbox	What it is for	Tools
Vector	Reshape, combine, join, filter and analyse vector layers.	23
H3	Aggregate data into the H3 hexagonal grid.	2
Statistics	Measure spatial patterns: clusters, hotspots, density.	5
Terrain	Derive slope, aspect, curvature, roughness and visibility from an elevation model.	99
Hydrology	Condition a DEM, route flow, extract streams and delineate watersheds.	97
LiDAR	Classify, filter, measure and grid point clouds.	64
Remote Sensing	Filter, enhance, correct and classify imagery.	152
Projections	Reproject vectors and georeference rasters.	3

The first three toolboxes are ALIGN’s own tools, written for the kind of layers you build maps with. The other five come from the Whitebox analysis suite, a scientific geoprocessing library compiled to WebAssembly so it runs in the page.

How the panel works

The panel has three levels, and the header always tells you where you are.

1. The toolboxes. Eight cards, each with its tool count. Click one to open it.
2. The tools. The list of tools in that toolbox. In the five Whitebox toolboxes the tools are grouped under sub toolbox headings, which is how this documentation is organised too.
3. The tool. Its parameters, a Run button and the run log, all inline in the panel. No dialog opens over your map.

A back arrow in the header takes you up one level, and the close button on the right closes the panel.

Finding a tool by name

There are two search fields, and they do different things.

The one at the top of the panel searches every tool in every toolbox at once, which is what you want when you know the name but not the family. ALIGN’s own tools answer instantly. The Whitebox tools join the results a moment later, as soon as the analysis engine has loaded.

The one inside an open toolbox filters that toolbox only, by tool name and by sub toolbox heading.

Reading what a tool does

Every tool opens with a short description of what it computes, in a framed box above the parameters. Fold it away with the arrow if you do not need it, and it stays folded for every tool until you open it again.

Running a tool

Pick the input. Most tools take a layer from your map. The field only lists layers of the right kind: a raster tool lists your rasters, a vector tool lists your vector layers. You can also browse a file from your computer instead, in which case the file is read in the page and never uploaded.

Set the parameters. Required fields are marked. The rest have sensible defaults, and this documentation explains the ones worth changing.

Run. A banner shows which tool is computing. The map and the panel stay usable while it works, so you can keep panning, styling or reading. One analysis runs at a time, and the run outlives the panel: you can switch to another tool or close the panel entirely, the result still lands when it finishes.

Collect the result. A raster result becomes a new raster layer on your map, a vector result becomes a new vector layer, and anything else, such as an image, a point cloud or a table, is downloaded to your computer.

Where the computation happens

ALIGN’s own tools (Vector, H3, Statistics) run on the page’s own engines, so they start instantly.

The five Whitebox toolboxes run on a WebAssembly build of the analysis suite. The first time you open one of them, or the first time you search, ALIGN downloads that engine once, about 5 MB. Afterwards every tool starts immediately. The computation itself happens on a background thread, which is why the interface never freezes while a watershed is being delineated.

Two practical consequences. Your data stays on your machine, including for the heaviest terrain analysis. And your input has to fit in the browser’s memory, so keep your first runs to reasonably sized layers and work up from there.

Before and after processing

Loading the layers you want to analyse is covered in Data, and what you can do with the result in Layers and Style.

You can also ask the AI Assistant to run these operations for you, in plain language, rather than filling the form yourself.

Credits

The Terrain, Hydrology, LiDAR, Remote Sensing and Projections toolboxes are built on WhiteboxTools by Prof. John Lindsay, University of Guelph, and on its Next Generation port maintained by the GeoLibre project. Both are open source under the MIT licence.