Projects vs Sites
Understand the difference between projects and sites in TreeMapper and how they work together to organize your restoration work.
What Is a Project?
A project is the core container for restoration in TreeMapper. It represents a restoration initiative or program where all related activities are grouped together—interventions, sites, monitoring plots, team members, and analytics.
When you sign in to the mobile app or start using the web dashboard, you will be asked to create or select a project so that all your restoration efforts are linked to the right context. You can create as many projects as you need.
Project Details
When creating a project, you typically provide:
- Name: The name of the restoration project
- Project Type: For example, organizational or personal (if it's only for personal use)
- Location: Optional geographic location or region for the project, selected on the map
Once saved, the project is created and you can start using other features such as team management, site creation, interventions, monitoring plots, and analytics. Project details can always be edited later from the project edit section.
Projects can be created from both the mobile app and the web dashboard with the same options.
What Is a Site?
A site is a specific polygon area within a project where tree planting and other restoration activities take place. While a project defines the overall initiative, sites define the actual geographic areas on the map.
A single project can have many sites. This allows you to represent multiple planting areas, farms, reserves, or landscape units under the same project.
Site Details
When creating a site, you typically provide:
- Name: The site name
- Site Type: The type/category of the site
- Boundary: A polygon defining the site area
Defining Site Boundaries
You can define site boundaries in multiple ways:
- Draw Polygon on Map: Manually draw the boundary over the map to mark the site
- Upload GeoJSON: Upload an existing GIS file if you already have an accurate site boundary
- Trace with Mobile GPS: In the mobile app, walk along the border of the site and trace the boundary using GPS when no accurate GeoJSON is available
Access and Permissions
Projects and sites both play a role in access management, but at different levels of granularity.
Project-Level Access
At the project level, access is managed via team collaboration and roles:
- Owner and Admin: Full project management, including team, sites, and settings
- Contributor: Can contribute data to the project (interventions, monitoring, etc.)
- Observer: Read-only access to project data for analysis and validation
Site-Level Access
Sites also have access management so you can give limited access to specific sites for certain team members. This is useful when:
- Different teams work on different areas within the same project
- You want to restrict contributors to only some sites
- External partners are involved in only part of the project area
How Projects and Sites Work Together
In summary:
- A project defines the overall restoration initiative (who, why, and high-level where)
- Sites define the specific geographic areas (exact where) where restoration happens
- Interventions, monitoring plots, and plant data are associated with sites and projects
- Analytics and reporting aggregate data across sites within a project
Quick Comparison
- project: Who is involved, what the initiative is, and overall scope
- site: Where exactly restoration takes place on the map
- One project → many sites; each site belongs to a single project
- Project-level roles manage overall access; site-level access refines who can work where
What's Next?
- Create your first project to start a new restoration initiative
- Create sites within your project to define restoration areas
- Learn about plots & plot groups for detailed long-term monitoring inside sites