What a project contains

A project is a single map build inside one workspace. It stores the project name, optional description, optional icon, lifecycle status, setup metadata, target game, map selection, generated or uploaded assets, editor layers, task history, saved versions, and exports.

Projects always belong to one team and one workspace. The active team and active workspace determine which projects you see on the Projects page and where a new project is created. A project can retain several DTM, vector, and imagery assets over time, but it has one selected processed asset for each source family at a time.

• Metadata stores the creation mode, target game, area selection, data source choices, provider codes, upload file names, preprocessing choices, queued task IDs, selected source asset IDs, and selected worker ID.
• Assets store processed terrain, vector, raster, manual editor data, and export artifacts.
• Layers are the editor-facing organization of project data.
• Tasks are background jobs for DTM, OSM/vector, and imagery processing.
• Exports are queued game-ready outputs created from the current project state.

Use the Projects page

Open Dashboard -> Projects after selecting a team and workspace. If either context is missing, project creation is disabled and the page asks you to select a workspace. The page loads projects for the active team and active workspace only.

The project grid is designed for scanning. Each card shows a thumbnail or map preview, target game badge, lifecycle badge, setup status, updated time, description, task count, asset count, selected map size, latest task summary, and creation metadata such as center coordinates, overall area, playable area, rotation, terrain source, and vector source.

• Search matches project name, description, ID, game label, and game short label.
• Setup filters include Ready, Processing, Needs attention, and Draft.
• Lifecycle filters separate Active and Archived projects.
• Game filters separate Farming Simulator 25 and Minecraft.
• Area filters separate projects with and without an area selection.
• Sort options include recently updated, recently created, and name ascending.

Create a project

Click New project from the Projects page. Creation supports three modes: Project Wizard, Blank Project, and From backup. The wizard uses a six-step flow: Setup, Area, DTM, Vector, Imagery, and Review. Setup chooses the creation mode, project name, optional description, and target game. Area chooses the center coordinates, width, height, playable dimensions, and rotation.

The supported creation modes are Wizard and Blank project. Wizard is the normal path: choose a real-world location and let MapToPlay queue DTM, OSM, and optionally imagery tasks. Blank project skips provider downloads and starts from prepared files or empty data.

From backup creates a new project from a MapToPlay backup archive. It skips the area/source wizard steps because the archive already contains the project metadata, assets, layers, and saved vector feature data.

The target game changes area behavior. Farming Simulator 25 uses a separate playable area inside the full project region. Minecraft uses the full selected region, and the export flow later asks for Java or Bedrock Edition.

• Area center latitude must be between -85 and 85.
• Area center longitude must be between -180 and 180.
• Overall width and height can be up to 20,480 m.
• Farming Simulator 25 playable width and height can be up to 16,384 m.
• Minecraft playable size can match the full 20,480 m area limit.
• The UI offers size stepping presets such as 256, 512, 1,024, and 2,048 m increments.

Choose data sources

The DTM step chooses terrain elevation. Provider download queues a DTM task using a supported provider; the dialog ranks providers by coverage and resolution and includes SRTM 30 m as the global fallback. Upload accepts GeoTIFF for automatic processing or PNG/JPG as pre-processed terrain. Providers that require credentials can use saved team credentials or manually entered credentials, with an option to save them to the team.

The Vector step chooses OSM vector data. OSM download queues an OSM task for the selected area. Optional preprocessing merges connected road and waterway segments and splits polygons such as fields and forests around roads and rivers. Upload accepts .osm, .xml, or .pbf files.

The Imagery step chooses optional imagery. Provider download queues an imagery task, with Sentinel-2 L2A available as a global fallback. Upload accepts GeoTIFF for automatic extraction or PNG/JPG as pre-processed imagery. Blank projects can skip imagery or use pre-processed imagery.

• Upload size is limited by the active team tier.
• Each provider or upload path becomes a background task after the project record is created.
• If project creation succeeds but a follow-up task or upload fails, the project still exists and the completion message tells you which step needs attention.
• A selected worker can be passed to DTM, OSM, and imagery tasks when worker selection is available.

Understand status

Projects have two status concepts. Lifecycle status is Active or Archived. Setup status is calculated from tasks and processed assets, and it is what tells you whether the project is ready to open, still processing, or needs attention.

Active projects count toward your team project limit and can be opened, edited, processed, versioned, and exported. Archived projects remain visible and downloadable, but they are read-only: you cannot open them in the Editor, queue processing, create exports, edit metadata, change icons, or change versions until you unarchive them.

Archiving is reversible, but it has two safeguards. First, a project cannot be unarchived for 24 hours after it is archived. Second, unarchiving uses one active project slot, so a team that is already at its active-project limit must archive another active project or upgrade before unarchiving.

Setup status is calculated by the backend. If any linked task is queued, running, or retrying, the project is Processing. If at least one processed asset exists and no task is still active, it is Ready. If tasks exist but no processed asset is available, or if a task failed without producing usable output, it is Needs attention. If there are no tasks and no processed assets, it is Draft.

• Draft: no tasks and no processed assets yet.
• Processing: at least one task is queued, running, or retrying.
• Ready: processed assets exist and no active task is pending.
• Needs attention: work was attempted but no usable processed asset is available, often because a task failed.
• Archived: a read-only lifecycle state that does not count toward the active-project limit; archived projects still appear when the lifecycle filter includes them.

Use the project detail page

Click a project card to open the project detail page. This page brings together project metadata, source data controls, versions, assets, tasks, exports, and editor launch. It fetches project details, tasks, exports, and versions together for the active team.

From the detail page you can edit the project name, description, and icon while the project is active. Project icons use the managed image upload flow, including client-side validation and cropping. You can also remove the icon later.

The project card menu and detail page menu include Archive or Unarchive depending on the lifecycle state. Archive uses a confirmation dialog and immediately makes the project read-only. Unarchive also uses a confirmation dialog and checks both the 24-hour archive lock and the team active-project slot limit.

• Source data panels show how terrain, vector data, and imagery were configured.
• When multiple processed assets exist for DTM, vector data, or imagery, the setup panel shows an asset selector for that source family.
• Failed tasks can be retried from the task history.
• DTM, OSM, and imagery can be reprocessed from provider or upload sources when replacement controls are available.
• The project card menu includes Backup for downloading a MapToPlay project archive.
• Assets list downloadable processed outputs with size, checksum, source task, metadata essentials, and badges for project-selected or editor-used assets.
• Task history lists provider, actual provider, attempt number, timestamps, output asset, and error message.
• Recent exports list target, status, map size, attempt number, detail link, and download link when an artifact exists.

Back up and restore projects

Project Backup downloads a MapToPlay archive with the extension .m2pbackup.zip. The archive is a zip file containing a manifest plus the project source assets that are stored in MapToPlay storage.

The backup manifest stores the project name, description, metadata, lifecycle status, non-export project assets, editor layers, and saved vector features. Asset files are copied into the archive and checked with SHA-256 hashes during restore.

Restore is available from New project -> From backup. Upload the backup archive, and MapToPlay creates a new active project in the selected team and workspace. Restore does not overwrite the original project.

• Creating a backup costs 1 Task unit from the shared task/export balance.
• Backups include project assets except export artifacts.
• Backups include layer metadata and vector feature edits/modifiers.
• Restore remaps old asset IDs and layer IDs to the new project records.
• Restore is checked against active project limits, selection size limits, upload size limits, and storage limits.
• Restored projects start active even if the backup was made from an archived project.

Archive and unarchive projects

Use Archive when you want to keep a project record and its source data, versions, tasks, and exports available for reference without spending an active project slot. Archive is different from Delete: it does not remove the project or its storage objects.

Archived projects are frozen until unarchived. You can inspect the project, download available assets or backups, and delete the project, but editing, Editor launch, reprocessing, version changes, and new exports are blocked.

After archiving, the project has a 24-hour safeguard lock before it can be unarchived. When the lock has passed, unarchiving succeeds only if the team has an available active project slot.

• Archive an active project from the project card menu or the project detail page three-dot menu.
• Unarchive from the same menu after the 24-hour lock expires.
• If unarchive fails because the team is at the active-project limit, archive another active project first or move to a tier with a higher limit.
• Archived projects remain subject to the normal retention policy for the team tier.

Asset selection and reprocessing

Reprocessing does not replace the old file in place. It creates another project asset. This is intentional: you can compare outputs, keep traceability to older tasks, and avoid silently changing editor layers that may already contain edits.

After reprocessing DTM, OSM/vector data, or imagery, the project can select the newest matching processed asset as the current source for that family. If more than one matching asset exists, the project detail setup card lets you switch the selected asset manually.

For vector data, the selector shows processed source assets such as the local JSON output created from OSM or upload processing. Raw OSM/XML/PBF files and editor-managed vector stores such as manual-vectors.json are not selectable project sources.

The Editor has its own usage state because layers reference the asset they were created from. That is why the dashboard can show both Project selected and Used in editor badges for the same asset list.

• Project selected means the project setup currently points at that processed source asset.
• Used in editor means at least one saved editor layer or vector feature still references that asset.
• Editor-managed vector files are protected as Used in editor because they store manual vector edits, even when they are not selectable as the project source.
• An asset can be both selected and editor-used, selected but not yet imported, editor-used but no longer selected, or unused.

Versions, editor, and exports

Project versions are named snapshots saved inside the project. They use the same backup archive format as project backups, stored in MapToPlay storage rather than downloaded immediately. A version captures project metadata, non-export project assets, layer metadata, and saved vector features.

The versions panel shows the number of saved versions and the tier limit. If versioning is unavailable or the limit is reached, the create-version action is disabled with a reason. Creating a version also checks storage limits because the version archive counts toward team storage.

Checking out a version restores that snapshot into the current project. Before checkout changes anything, MapToPlay automatically saves a safety version named before the restore, so you have a path back if the checkout was not what you wanted.

Open sends the project to the Editor in a new window with the project ID, team ID, workspace ID, setup status, area selection, and bootstrap origin. The editor then loads the project data through the API and works on the same project record.

Export is available only when the project is ready and the selected target is valid for the project game. Farming Simulator 25 exports use FS25 targets. Minecraft exports use Minecraft targets and require choosing Java or Bedrock Edition in the export dialog.

• Version checkout replaces the current project metadata, layers, vector features, and project assets with the version snapshot.
• Version backup archives are listed on the Assets page because they count toward storage.
• Deleting a version removes its stored backup archive and cannot be undone.
• Exports are queued as background work and appear in Recent exports and the Exports page.
• The export dialog applies per-hour throttling from the active team tier.
• Export size options are filtered by project game and user permissions.
• Completed exports expose their artifact asset as a download link.

Delete a project

Open the project card menu or project detail page and choose Remove/Delete. The confirmation dialog warns that project removal is permanent.

The backend blocks deletion while any linked task or export is queued or running. When deletion is allowed, it removes the project record and deletes linked S3 assets, uploaded task source files, version backup archives, and the project icon object. It also updates community achievement state related to deleted projects.