A CalAmp geofence is an area of interest to your organization, such as a job site or an unsafe road you want to designate as off-limits. During the process of creating a new geofence, you draw a boundary around it on the map, which is a geocoded perimeter that our devices can use to inform the system of asset arrivals and departures in the area (the CalAmp geofence events). You can add a geofence to your CalAmp account on the Admin - Geofences screen (see Adding a Geofence) or on the Tracking screen; for the latter, follow these steps:
Note: For more details about geofences, see the article Viewing Your Geofences on the Tracking Screen.
- In the Group Chooser in the banner, select the group you want to assign the geofence to, as shown in Choosing a Group to View Globally. (This is the only current way to specify which group to place it in.)
- In the sidebar menu on the left, click
.
The Tracking screen will open.
By default, the geofence view is turned off, so your geofences may not be visible when the map first appears. This will automatically change when you begin to draw your geofence. (Also, if you turned on geofence visibility in your preceding session, you will be able to see them, as this setting persists across user sessions.)
- Optionally, you can switch to a satellite view if that will help you draw the correct boundary by clicking
on the vertical toolbar at the top right and then selecting one of the Imagery options.
- Click
on the vertical toolbar.
The Create Geofence widget will open.
- Follow the set of steps below for the type of shape you want (circle, polygon based on a rectangle, or drawn irregular form):
Circular Boundary
- Click
.
An address field will appear.
- In the Enter Address, Coordinates, or Places field, type the address or place name where you need to draw the geofence.
Note: Don't try entering latitude and longitude values, even though "coordinates" suggests that you could do so. This currently doesn't work but is planned to be added in the future.
Matching locations will appear in a drop-down list.
- Click the correct address.
The CalAmp application will place a large circle at that location with a 1000-meter radius.
- Zoom in on the shape by clicking
on the bottom-right toolbar as many times as necessary, and click and drag the map to be precise.
- Click and drag the Radius slider to the size you'd like the circle to be in meters. (Slide to the left to make it smaller or right to make it larger.)
You can zoom in or out more as needed (using and 
).
- If the placement of the circle isn't quite where you want it to be, click the blue handle in its center and then drag it to the right spot.
You can further tweak the radius size by clicking and dragging the white handle on the edge of the circle in or out.
- When the circle is at the location and size you want, click Next in the widget.
Property fields will appear.
- Skip down to step 6.
- Click
- Polygonal Boundary with a Rectangular Starting Point
Note: It's a little difficult to use the Polygon tool to draw a shape that is very irregular with specificity. This works best with mostly square shapes. For freeform shapes, you might have better luck with the Draw type of geofence. (See the next subsection, "Irregular Boundary.")- Click
.
An address field will appear.
- In the Enter Address, Coordinates, or Places field, type the address or place name where you need to draw the geofence.
Note: Don't try entering latitude and longitude values, even though "coordinates" suggests that you could do so. This currently doesn't work but is planned to be added in the future.
Matching locations will appear in a drop-down list.
- Click the correct address.
The CalAmp application will place a large square at that location.
- Zoom in on the shape by clicking on the bottom-right toolbar as many times as necessary, and click and drag the map to be precise.
- Click and drag one of the white handles on the edge of the square in or out to roughly the size you'd like the geofence to be.
You can zoom in or out more as needed (using and ).
- If the placement of the square isn't quite where you want it to be, click the white handle in its center and then drag it to the right spot.
You can further tweak the size by clicking and dragging the white handles in or out again.
- You can click one of the circle handles to split its side into two, which will help you create a shape that is more than four sides.
- To change the shape to a more freeform polygon, click within the shape.
The handles on the sides will become orange.
- Click and drag one of the handles to the shape direction you want.
- Repeat step i as many times as necessary.
- When the geoboundary is the size and shape you want and at the correct location, click Next in the widget.
Property fields will appear.
- Skip down to step 6.
- Click
- Irregular Boundary
- Click
.
An address field will appear.
- In the Enter Address, Coordinates, or Places field, type the address or place name where you need to draw the geofence.
Note: Don't try entering latitude and longitude values, even though "coordinates" suggests that you could do so. This currently doesn't work but is planned to be added in the future.
Matching locations will appear in a drop-down list.
- Click the correct address.
The CalAmp application will place a blue dot at that location.
- Zoom in on the dot by clicking on the bottom-right toolbar as many times as necessary, and click and drag the map to be precise.
- Move your cursor over the map, placing it at the top-left corner of the boundary you plan to draw.
- Click the first point of the shape and drag to the right.
- Click at the end of the first line.
- Drag away from that point in the direction of the second line of the shape.
- Click at the end of that second line.
- Drag away from the third point in the direction of a third line to continue your shape.
- Click at the end of that line.
- Repeat steps j and k for as many lines as you need to create your shape.
- After you've drawn your final line, double-click.
- Click Next in the widget.
Property fields will appear.
- Click
- Type the name you want to use for the geofence in the Geofence Name field, such as "Library Worksite."
- In the Geofence Description field, type a short description of what the geofence is, such as "Library construction job site."
- If your organization has designated geofence categories, click the Category drop-down arrow and select the category this one belongs to, such as Worksite.
Note: The categories listed will be those that are available for the geofence's assigned group or parent. - If you want Enter and Exit events monitored for the geofence (for geofence events, reports, and notifications — if you plan to create any), select the Generate Enter/Exit Events for Reports check box.
If you just want the geofence to appear on the map but not trigger any geofence events (such as for a home office), leave this check box deselected.
- If you need to restrict visibility to the geofence (such as if it's a police officer's home), select Restricted Geofence.
Note: If a geofence is designated as restricted, only users in its assigned group will be able to view activity there — NOT users from subgroups. The restricted geofence won’t be included in reports and won’t be associated to assets in the regular (visible) way. Entered/Exited geofence alerts won’t be visible to users below its assigned group. - Click Save Geofence.
A success message will appear at the bottom of the screen. If you selected Generate Enter/Exit Events for Reports, it will ask if you want to create a geofence notification so that alerts will be sent out when assets enter and exit the new geofence.
- If you click Set Up Now (and you have Admin privileges), the Add Notification dialog box will appear. (See Adding a Notification [Alert] for instructions on how to create your alert.)
If you select No, Thanks, the message will close, and your new geofence will appear on map.
