Tips For Using Downloadable Maps

The downloadable maps on the Syracuse Community Geography website are provided in a number of different file formats. These include Adobe Acrobat files (.pdf), JPEG images (.jpg), GIF images (.gif) and/or TIFF images (.tif). This tutorial provides tips for viewing, downloading, printing, editing, and using the downloadable maps on this site. If you need further assistance, email the This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Viewing maps on your computer screen

To view the Adobe Acrobat (PDF) maps on our website, you must have Adobe's Acrobat Reader installed on your computer. To download this free program, click here.

Note: if you are using Adobe Acrobat to view maps and are seeing strange symbols (e.g. there are dollar signs instead of highway shields on the map), you could be using an outdated version of Adobe Reader. Click the icon above to download the latest free version.

The JPEG, GIF and TIFF images on our website are standard image file formats, and will be viewable on most computers without any additional software installation. Both Windows and Mac users can access and view these files within their web browsers.

Downloading maps to your computer

All map file formats may be saved to your computer for later use. To save maps, right click on the file format you are interested in and choose “Save Target As”. Navigate to the file folder where you would like to save the file, name the file, and click save. Once an image is saved, you may view it by double clicking on it.

Printing maps

Syracuse Community Geography maps can be printed from any format. To print maps in Adobe Reader, select "Print" from the File menu. Printing JPEG, GIF and TIFF images is most easily done using your operating system's picture viewer software. Save the desired map to a location on your computer. When you double click the map to open it, it should open in your computer’s default picture viewer. Within the picture viewer, click the print icon. Follow your operating system's prompts from there.

Editing maps

If your computer has a design program installed, such as Adobe Photoshop, you can add additional design elements to any of the downloadable maps. For example, if you would like to place a dot on a map to demonstrate your agency’s location on a map depicting poverty in Onondaga County, open the desired map in your design program, add a dot at the desired location, and save your changes. Click here to see an example a map that was edited using Adobe Photoshop. If you are interested to customize a map but don’t have the requisite software or expertise, complete the project request form to request a customized map.

Using maps in Microsoft PowerPoint and Word

The JPEG, GIF and TIFF images can easily be pasted into Microsoft PowerPoint presentations and Word documents. First, download the desired map to your computer. Once saved, right click the image file and select copy. Open the presentation or document file you would like to paste the map into. Right click again and click paste. Once pasted into the desired presentation slide or document, click on the image to resize it to an appropriate size (most maps will initially appear too large for your document. This is because maps are saved at a high resolution so that they retain their sharpness at large sizes). You can resize the image by clicking once on the image to highlight it. Then, hold your left mouse button down and drag one of the map’s corners toward the center of the image. When you depress the left mouse button, the image will be smaller. Repeat these steps until you reach the desired size.