AtlasHue Support
Answers to common questions, and how to reach us. AtlasHue needs macOS 14 Sonoma or later.
Contact us: richard@gohaddock.com
Painting a map
- Pick a color under Fill color in the sidebar, then click a country, state or county to paint it. Click it again to clear it.
- Zoom by pinching on the trackpad or with the − + buttons at the top right of the map. Drag to move around while zoomed; the arrows button shows the whole map again.
- Very small places (island nations, tiny counties) are easiest to paint after zooming in.
- Clear colors on this map clears only the map you're looking at; your other tabs keep their colors.
Choosing a map
The tabs above the map switch between:
- World — every country.
- Custom — only the countries you pick.
- States (or Provinces, Prefectures, Regions…) — the first-level regions of the country shown on the country button. Click the country button to choose another country.
- Counties — US counties.
Double-click a country to open its states, and double-click a US state to open its counties. The path in the sidebar (for example World › United States › Counties) takes you back up.
Each tab keeps its own colors and data choices, so one map file can hold a world map, a state map and a county map.
Why is a country greyed out in the country list?
About 30 countries — mostly very small states and island nations — have no state or province map. You can still color them on the World and Custom maps.
Why does France show regions, not departments?
For France, Italy, Spain, the UK and the Philippines, AtlasHue shows the familiar regions (France's 13 regions plus overseas, the UK's four nations, and so on) rather than the smaller units underneath them.
Custom maps
- Choose countries under Countries in the sidebar: a continent button fills the list, then check or uncheck any country. Your selection is listed at the top.
- The map frames just the countries you picked. Far-off territories such as Hawaii or French Guiana are left out so the map frames the mainland; use the World map to include them.
- The Europe button leaves out Russia, which would stretch the map to the Pacific — check it to add it.
US counties
- On the Counties tab, Show in the sidebar picks All counties or one state's counties.
- Colors are shared: a county you paint on a state's map also shows on the all-counties map.
- County maps are available for the United States only.
Shading by data
- Under Data overlay, check up to three data points to show their numbers on the map. Drag them to reorder; the first one is used for shading.
- Turn on Shade map by data to shade places darker for higher values. Painted places keep their color; unpainted ones shade in grey.
- Shading is by rank among the places on the map, so a few extreme values don't wash everything else out. The legend shows the lowest, median and highest values.
- Built-in data covers countries (World and Custom maps), US states and US counties. For other maps, import your own.
Importing your own data
Use Import CSV… to open a CSV or tab-separated file, or copy cells in Numbers, Excel or Google Sheets and click Paste. Use one column of place names and one or more columns of numbers; a header row is optional and becomes the data point's name.
Province,Customers Ontario,4210 Québec,3105 British Columbia,2480
- Names are matched loosely: accents, capitals and “&”/“and” don't matter, and codes work too (
ON,US-CA,FRA). - For US counties, use
Boulder County, CO,Boulder, Coloradoor the 5-digit FIPS code (08013). A bare name shared by several states, likeWashington County, is reported as not matched rather than guessed. - Values like
$1,200and12.5%are understood, and the number format is picked from them. - After importing, AtlasHue tells you how many rows matched and lists any it couldn't match. Imported data is saved in your map file; remove it with its trash button.
Pins, title and logo
- Pins: type a label, pick a style and color, click Add pin, then click the map. Drag a pin to move it. Pins are placed at real locations, so a pin in Paris also appears on any other map that covers Paris.
- Title: type it in the field at the top of the sidebar; it appears above the map and in exports.
- Logo: choose an image under Map logo (or drag one onto the map) and pick where it sits.
Exporting and saving
- Export map saves a high-resolution PNG or a PDF. Exports always show the whole map, whatever you're zoomed to, and leave out the on-map buttons.
- Maps save as
.atlashuedocuments (⌘S) and reopen with everything intact. Maps from StateMapper, AtlasHue's earlier name, open too.
Troubleshooting
I can't click a small country or county.
Zoom in with a pinch or the + button; small places become easy to hit.
A name in my spreadsheet didn't match.
Check the spelling against the name shown when you hover that place, or use its code. For counties, add the state (Washington County, OR).
Something else isn't working.
Email us at the address above with what you tried, what happened, and your AtlasHue version (shown at the bottom of the sidebar). A screenshot helps.
Map and data sources
- Country, state and province borders: Natural Earth (public domain).
- US county borders and county figures: U.S. Census Bureau — 2023 boundaries, Vintage 2023 population estimates, and Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates 2022 (public domain).
- Country figures: World Bank Open Data, licensed CC BY 4.0; most recent year available per country.
- US state figures are approximate, from Census and NCES; industry figures are rough placeholders.