This tutorial video above shows you how to use Valarm’s sensor and monitoring solutions, particularly the GeoRSS API, with the Esri ArcGIS Online Platform.
A few key things to remember:
- Valarm compatible sensors and hardware are available at shop.valarm.net.
- The Valarm Pro app + environmental sensors turn an Android device into a remote environmental monitor.
- Your real-time Valarm sensor data is available at tools.valarm.net for mapping, graphing, downloading, and forwarding using the Valarm APIs for JSON, KML, GeoRSS, and CSV.
Video Transcript / Voiceover Text:
Howdy, my name’s Edward, I’m the president of Valarm. In this video you’ll see how to use the Valarm API to make a GeoRSS feed with real-time, geo-tagged Valarm sensor data. You’ll also learn how to import the real-time sensor data into the ArcGIS platform and ArcGIS Online.
First log in to the Valarm Tools Cloud then go to the Device Manager. In the Device Manager click your Valarm device you’d like to publicly share via GeoRSS. For this example you’re seeing sensor data from a Valarm device deployed on a boat in California. Once you’re viewing a Valarm device, verify that the public feeds option is turned on and the checkbox is checked. Then click the Generate URLs button to set up the Valarm API.
You have two options for how you want to use the Valarm API: The first option is Query, which allows you to specify begin and end dates for your sensor data as well as which sensors you would like the API feed to contain. The second option is Latest – gives you the most recent alerts, which you can customize to receive however many you would like.
In this case we’ll select the Latest API and then we can choose the output format. Your API choices are JSON, CSV, KML, and GeoRSS. Here we’ll pick GeoRSS. Notice that the Generated API URL automatically updates based on your selection. You don’t have to use the URL generator although it is helpful to get an idea of the syntax. Now copy the Valarm API URL to the clipboard to later paste into the ArcGIS Platform and ArcGIS Online.
In your web browser open a new window or tab and go to arcgis.com. Sign in to ArcGIS Online and then click Map at the top to create a new, empty map. On your map go to Add then Add Layer from Web. Next change the data type to “A GeoRSS File” then paste in your Valarm Sensor API URL. That’s it! Click Add Layer and the map will automatically zoom in to your Valarm sensor dataset. You can click a point to see its associated sensor information, in this case we see temperature, humidity, and pressure data from a meteo sensor. As I zoom out you can see this Valarm sensor data was collected on a sail boat off the coast of the Pacific ocean near Los Angeles, California. Note that you can also change the symbols of the sensor data on Esri’s ArcGIS Online as well as turn on a refresh interval, which will automatically refresh the GeoRSS data with the latest Valarm sensor information.
That’s the overview of how to use Valarm’s GeoRSS API with the ArcGIS platform and ArcGIS Online. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for another video, don’t hesitate to contact us at info@valarm.net!