Mapping a block

How to map a vineyard block in the Archer mobile app by marking the row posts with GPS/RTK.

Platform: Mobile (the Archer app)

Mapping a block is usually the first real job you do with Archer on a new site. You don't trace the boundary by hand — you mark the row posts. Drop a GPS point at each end of your first and last rows and of one row in the middle (plus any row where the block changes shape), tell Archer which two rows those are, and it works out every row in between and the block outline around them. Accuracy matters here — this geometry is what every future operation is based on — so RTK GPS is strongly recommended.

Before you start

The vineyard the block belongs to needs to exist. If it doesn't, create it first and sync your device.
You should be signed in to the Archer app with the correct management group selected.
Ideally, you have an RTK GPS receiver (such as the X8-M1) paired and showing a Fixed solution. Phone GPS works but will be far less accurate.
You're physically at the block, ready to go to the posts you want to survey, on foot, by bike or on a quad.

Checking GPS status

The GPS status bar lives at the top of the block-mapping screen, just under the title. You can check it before and during mapping:

Open the Maps tab to confirm GPS is alive while you're getting set up.
Once you're in the block wizard, watch the status bar at the top. It shows the source (for example Phone GPS or X8-M1) on the left and the fix quality on the right.
You want to see RTK Fixed ±2cm. Float ±50cm means RTK hasn't locked yet — wait for it to settle. On phone GPS it always reads ±3.0m. The phone doesn't give Archer an accuracy figure, so treat that as a placeholder, not a measurement.

With an RTK receiver, the Add Point button waits for a proper fix — it reads Waiting for GPS..., or RTK Fix Required with the current fix in brackets (for example RTK Fix Required (Float)), until then. On phone GPS it enables as soon as the phone has a position.

Planning your survey — which posts to ping

The whole trick of mapping in Archer is that you don't survey everything. Two posts define a row's line, and two rows let Archer fill in everything between them — so the skill is choosing which posts earn a ping:

Always survey your first and last rows — the end posts of each. They anchor the whole block, and they're the only two rows you ever have to number.
Add both ends of one row in the middle, even on a neat block. The outline needs at least six posts you've marked, across at least three rows, before it can be confirmed. Four corner posts aren't enough on their own. The middle row needs no number: once the first and last rows are done, its posts join it by themselves.
Ping the ends, not the middles. A post at each end of a row defines its line; posts along the middle of a straight row add nothing. The exception is a row break — a gap for a power pole, frost fan, or road — which gets a pair of points of its own.
Add a middle row wherever the row spacing changes — where rows get closer or wider, or stop being straight. Each real row you mark pins the fill to reality around it.
Mark the outline as you go. Archer builds the block boundary from the posts you mark, and uses that boundary to decide where each filled-in row starts and ends. So a block whose row ends step or curve (a taper, a stream cut-in, a bent headland) is handled by marking the posts along that edge — see Mapping tricky blocks.
Don't map the headland. The turning space at the row ends isn't part of any row — survey the row's end post and stop there. Go round the block in order. The outline joins your posts in the order you add them, so go once round the edge: both ends of the first row, along the headland (adding the middle row's end on the way), both ends of the last row, then back along the other headland to the middle row's other end. Either direction and any starting corner is fine. Zig-zagging across the block makes an outline that crosses itself ("Outline crosses itself near rows N–M"), and it can't be confirmed.

Steps

Open the List tab and tap the vineyard you're working on.
On the vineyard detail screen, tap Create new block. A New Block dialog asks for the Block Name and Variety first (both required), Under Planting (optional), Plant spacing and Plants per bay are prefilled from the vineyard's defaults. Under Row numbers (optional) you can enter a First row and Last row if you already know how your rows are labelled. Tap Save to open the mapping screen. Cancelling here creates nothing.

You can change any of these later by tapping the block title at the top of the mapping screen (it has a small edit icon next to it) — see Editing block details.
Go to the first post of your first row.
When the status bar shows a good fix, tap the full-width Add Point button at the bottom of the screen. The phone gives a short vibration buzz as the point drops, and the button turns green and reads Point added for a moment, so you can keep your eyes on the post — the buzz fires even if your system touch-haptics are turned off.
For this very first post only, the Edit Point dialog opens by itself. It leads with two lines, First row and Last row. If you typed both row numbers in the New Block dialog, each line shows its number as a purple button: tap the First row one (for example 1). It assigns the post and closes the dialog. If you didn't, type your first row's number in the box on the First row line and tap Set.

Row numbers can start at 0 if that's how your vineyard labels its rows — Archer accepts a genuine row 0. Only negative numbers are rejected (the app shows "Row number can't be negative").

💡 Type both row numbers up front. Entering First row and Last row under Row numbers (optional) in the New Block dialog means all your typing is done before you go out. Each end post is then just a tap on its row number.
Go to the other end of that row and add another point. The dialog doesn't open this time, and the post isn't attached yet: tap it on the map to open Edit Point, then tap the First row number again.
Go round to your last row and do the same at each end: add the point, tap the post, and tap the Last row number (or type it — for example 30 in a 30-row block — and tap Set). Archer doesn't use a post's position to choose between the two rows, so pick the right line. Once both rows have both ends, Archer knows the two anchor rows, and every row between them is filled in and numbered automatically.

On the way between your first and last rows, add a point at the end post of a row in the middle, and on the way back, its other end. Don't number them. They join the middle row by themselves once the last row is done (each needs to land within about half a row's spacing of where Archer expects that row). That gives the outline the six posts it needs.
Add any other rows the block needs (see the planning section above). Once the first and last rows each have both ends, a post you add within a metre or so of a filled-in row joins it by itself, and a green message says "N point(s) auto-assigned to rows". A post further from any row stays unattached until you tap it and assign it.

How the rows in between get filled

You don't have to survey every row. As soon as you have both ends of two rows — your first and last — Archer fills in the rows between them, spacing them evenly, and keeps refining the fill every time you add a post. The filled-in rows appear on the map as grey Auto-Fill Points and dotted Predicted Rows; your own posts are green Assigned Points, and complete rows draw solid green.

Where each filled row starts and ends comes from the outline your posts make, so if the block's edge isn't straight, mark the posts along it and the row ends follow. If a row has a gap — a power pole, a frost fan, a road — Archer spots it from the outline too and marks a light-red Suggested Break for you to confirm; see Mapping row breaks.

While the fill can't run yet, the status bar tells you why in plain words — for example "Auto-fill needs two rows with both ends — currently 1." — so if the block isn't filling in, read the sub-line.

Confirming the outline and publishing

Above the Add Point button sits a one-line status bar with the block's state on the left, a sub-line underneath, and the next action as a button on the right. Tapping anywhere on the bar opens the review dialog.

While you're mapping, the bar reads Mapping — 12 rows · 2.40 ha and the sub-line names the first thing in the way (a missing row end, an unassigned post, or simply keep going). The button reads Complete outline… until your posts close into a usable outline: at least six posts across at least three rows, in order round the block. Tapping it before then shows "Keep mapping — the outline needs posts on more rows". Add both ends of a middle row (step 7).
When the outline is ready, the bar reads Ready to confirm outline and the button turns green: Confirm outline. Tap it. The review dialog — Confirm outline for <block name> — shows a preview of the shape, the row and area figures, and anything worth a look (for example "2 points off-grid (max 0.6 m, row 4)" or "Row 9 looks short"). Anything that still blocks the fill is listed under To confirm the outline:. Press and hold Hold to confirm outline to run the fill for real.
Once confirmed, the bar reads Complete and the button becomes Review and publish. Tap it for the final check — Publish <block name>, with ● Ready to publish (or ● Not ready yet and the reasons under To publish this block:) the block's Rows, Row spacing, Area and Row breaks marked, then a red "Have you marked all the internal row breaks?" (Heading and Origin are under a collapsed Details). Press and hold Hold to publish to make the block live.

💡 The area changes slightly after publishing. The mapping screen and its dialogs show an estimate measured from the first row to the last. Once published, the block's area counts a full row spacing for every row, the same figure the portal uses, so it reads a little higher (for example 1.00 ha while mapping, 1.04 ha on a 24-row block). The published figure is the one to use.

Both holds take half a second, so nothing is confirmed by a stray tap. Keep mapping closes either dialog and changes nothing. If a post hasn't been attached to any row, the sub-line reads N unassigned point(s) — tap that line and the map cycles through them one at a time (Unassigned 1 of 3) so you can open each and sort it out.

Filling in block details

You can set these any time from the block:

Name and Variety — via Edit Block Details (tap the block title in the wizard, or edit later — see Editing block details).
Plant spacing and Plants per bay — these are planting settings. They're inherited from the vineyard by default and can be overridden per block. On the block detail screen each value shows a chip indicating its source (Block, Inherited, or Not set).

Block status and releasing

A freshly mapped block is a draft until it's published. Publishing from the review dialog (Hold to publish) releases it straight away, so it becomes the live version your team works against, with no separate release step (if the block already had a released version, that one becomes Deprecated); you can also manage versions later from the block detail screen's Version History. See Block versioning for details.

The ⋮ button at the top right of the mapping screen holds the tools you'll reach for occasionally:

Add feature — jump straight into feature capture when you pass a gate or water point mid-survey. Your in-progress block is safe, and you return to it untouched. See Field features.
Help — a quick in-app refresher.
GPS Settings — switch GPS source or check your receiver. You can also open it by tapping the GPS status bar.
Reset Row Numbers — clears every post's row assignment so you can start the numbering over (it keeps the posts themselves).
Undo auto-fill — appears once the outline is confirmed. Removes the generated posts; every post you marked stays.
Rebuild from walk — recalculates everything derived from your posts, keeping your posts and any row ends you've locked. The recovery tool when the fill has gone wrong.

Tips and gotchas

Stand still for a couple of seconds before adding each point so the fix settles, especially on the X8-M1.
Points too close together are rejected. Archer enforces a minimum distance (30 cm) between surveyed points — if you're too close the button reads "Too close (Xcm)" and won't fire. It also stays quiet while you're still standing on the post you just dropped.
Wait for RTK Fixed. If the status bar drops to Float ±50cm, pause and let it re-lock before adding more points.
The wizard auto-saves as you go. Backing out keeps the in-progress block as a draft — it appears at the top of the vineyard's Blocks list so it's easy to find again.
Only the two end rows get numbers. If you find yourself typing a row number on a middle row, stop — that's a sign something upstream (usually a first or last row) isn't set. See Fixing mapping mistakes.
Rows must be roughly parallel. Rows that diverge by more than ±5° block the fill — mark an extra row or two where the geometry bends. Tapered or irregular blocks have their own page: Mapping tricky blocks.
Made a mistake? Wrong row numbers, stray points, and blocked completion all have quick fixes — see Fixing mapping mistakes.