The control strip appears as a thin white bar along the top edge of the map. It contains controls that mainly change the way that the map appears, but also contain ways to access a few navigational features.

Terrain, Streets, Satellite Views

On the left hand side of the control strip are three icons representing the three different types of map displays possible. By default bristolstreets.co.uk uses the ”terrain" (mountains icon) map type because this includes road names and is less colourful which makes it easier to see the markers and overlays that are placed on the map.

The middle (street sign) icon is for the normal ”street” map that is most often used with Google maps.

The third icon (a satellite) is for the satellite view map. The "streets" and "satellite" icons can both be turned on at the same time which will combine the view into a "hybrid" which shows a satellite image with road names overlaid on it. If both icons are selected you can turn one of them off by clicking it.

Note: The different map modes are not available at all zoom levels. The terrain maps do not exist when zommed close in, and so changing the view type may also change the zoom and changing the zoom may alter the view type.

The zoom slider

The zoom slider in the control strip has "out" at one end and "in" at the other, dots in between and a slider "thumb" over one of the dots. This indicates the current zoom level but clicking on any part of this allows you to change the zoom of the map.

Clicking the "in" or "out" changes the zoom by one increment in that direction. Clicking any of the dots on the slider will move the thumb directly to that position and will change the zoom accordingly. You can also click and drag the thumb to reposition it.

TIP: If there is a marker window open when you change the zoom, the position of that marker on the screen will not change. So a good way to zoom in on a point is to click on it and then use the zoom controls so that the point of interest does not end up off the edge of the screen as you zoom in.

Zoom (an area)

If you want to zoom in on an area of the map, there is an easy way to both zoom in and centre the map on the point you are interested in by using the "zoom" command in the control strip.

Clicking this greys the whole map and changes the cursor to a cross hair. Then click and drag out a rectangle around the area you want to zoom in on. When you release the mouse button, the screen will refresh (which may take a second) and it will be zoomed in over that area.

Note that zooming occurs in set levels, so sometimes the rectangle you draw will not fill the screen after zooming. This is because to use the next closer zoom level, not all of the rectangle would fit on the screen.

Areas

Clicking the "areas" command in the control strip will show a list of area names in the side bar. Clicking on one of those area names will move the map to show that area. This can be a handy way to centre the map on an area when you are not sure where it is, or when you are zoomed in and don't want to bother with all that zooming in and zooming out.

Tip: After using areas to go to an "area" you can "save" the area marker into the "my stuff" list so that you can get to the area from that list too.

The areas list is alphabetical and the names of larger places are shown in larger text. There are two icon tabs in the side bar which let you change the list of areas between alphabetical and largest to smallest.

The sizing of the names is not strictly about geographical size or population, but has been done so that there are "big" places evenly spread around the map. This makes it easy to spot areas near where you want to look rather than finding the absolute specific area you want which can be quicker.

History

As you open marker windows, the markers are added to a history list. If you want to go back to a marker you looked at earlier you can click the "history" command in the control strip to show the history tab in the side bar.

You can also get to the history tab in the side bar by clicking the "my stuff" icon and then clicking the "history" icon that appears. The command in the control strip is often just more convenient.

Refresh

The refresh command will cause all of the markers and overlays on the map to be refreshed. You shouldn't really need to do this, but if you think something has not drawn properly then clicking this link can ensure it has.

In some map layers you can choose to only display markers within a sub region of the map. After doing that you can use the "refresh" command to show all of the markers including those outside the area.

Clear

When you have been looking at something on the map but then want to go a look for something else, the "clear" command will remove all markers and overlays from the map and will return the sidebar to the "home" tab. In essence the clear command takes you back to where you originally come in to the site.

(account)

This command in the top right corner of the control strip changes to your user name after you are signed in. Clicking on it will take you to the "account" tab within the "my stuff" section of the side bar. If you click it when you are not signed in, it will present the sign in dialog.

Sign in / Sign out

Clicking the "sign in" command will present the sign in dialog, which can be used to sign in or register or to get help if you forget your password. See the section on accounts for more details about the benefits of being registered.

If you are signed in, the command changes to "sign out" which indicates that you are signed in and also give you a way to sign out.