Voyager is a powerful search tool that allows an organization or individual to manage, audit and search for all GIS files across an organization. Voyager allows a user to search for files by a spatial query through a map interface or by a text search. In addition to these search methods, data can be filtered by location, file extension, theme, version, spatial reference, author, properties, keywords, geometry type, file format or file type. Voyager allows a user to quickly and easily search for geographic files that may be difficult and time consuming to find, even in an organized data catalog. Voyager automates the indexing of files and drastically cuts down on the time and inefficiency of managing, locating and retrieving spatial data.
It is possible to run a number of searches in succession with Voyager. For instance, a user could perform a spatial query in and around a particular county, from the dataset created by that query, a text query could be used to find elevation files, and finally a filter could be applied to only locate raster files. The results of a search can be easily previewed with thumbnail images of the files. A Voyager search returns not only image files and spatial data files, but also Word, PowerPoint and PDF files that may be related to GIS projects or data. There is an ArcGIS plug-in as well, that allows a user to work directly in ArcGIS. Files can be searched for and then seamlessly brought into ArcMap by dragging and dropping them into the ArcMap table of contents.
Voyager also allows a user to perform audits and clean up of a data catalog. Voyager is able to find duplicate datasets, maps that contain broken links, maps that are in need of a spatial reference, files without metadata and which files are being used most often.
In addition to its spatial data management and search capabilities, Voyager allows an organization to publish a catalog of data, by simply sharing its URL. An organization is able to save searches to highlight different data, or create different views for different user groups.
Voyager can be run on a user’s desktop or can be run as a server based solution, accessed through any web browser. In either case, Voyagers automated indexing tool only requires a user to point to a location on a local computer, a server or a web URL. Once a location is added to Voyager, the files in that location are automatically added and indexed into your Voyager search tool, whether the files contain metadata or not.
Voyager can help an organization improve its productivity, by allowing users to focus on their projects and tasks, without wasting large amounts of time trying to locate data. Time and money can also be saved because data that already exists within an organization will not be purchased or recreated.