General Issues

Problem Explanation/Workaround

Web Soil Survey doesn’t 

work if you have popups 

blocked. 

Web Soil Survey opens various content in a separate browser window (a popup): 

• The Home Page opens the Web Soil Survey application in a separate browser 

window. 

• By default, the Portable Document Format (PDF) files created by the Printable 

Version control and by Checkout on the Shopping Cart tab are opened in a 

separate browser window.

• By default, Web Soil Survey opens external links in a separate browser window. 

• By default, Web Soil Survey opens the Data Available Status Map Portable 

Document Format (PDF) file in a separate browser window.

In order for this to work, you must allow the Web Soil Survey site 

(websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov) to open popup windows. 

You may have popup blocking enabled in your browser, and you may have other popupblocking programs installed, either as browser add-ons, or as separate applications. Popup 

are often blocked by more than one application — in this case, you must configure all of 

them to allow the Web Soil Survey site (websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov) to open popup 

windows. 

In the Google Chrome browser, if popups are blocked, you will see the “blocked pop-up 

alert” icon at the right end of the address bar. This icon looks like a window with a red X 

marked on it as shown below. 
Click this icon, and you will see the following dialog:

Select “Always allow pop-ups from websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov” and press Done.

If you cannot configure your software to allow popups, proceed as follows:

1. Since the Home Page always opens Web Soil Survey in a separate window, instead 

of starting it from the home page, access the Web Soil Survey application directly 

with the following 

link:https://websoilsurvey.sc.egov.usda.gov/app/WebSoilSurvey.aspx.

2. On the Web Soil Survey application page, click the Preferences link in the 

Navigation bar.

3. Uncheck “Open Links and PDF files in External Windows”.

4. Click the Save Preferences button.

Multiple instances of the 

same browser type (e.g., 

Internet Explorer, 

Chrome, Firefox, Safari) 

can’t run WSS at the 

same time.

Web Soil Survey maintains a session between the server and your browser. Multiple 

instances of the same browser type will share the session.

Workaround: If you wish to run simultaneous WSS sessions, use different browser types.

Errors or slow 

performance with large 

Soil Survey Areas

WSS allows you to set an entire Soil Survey Area as your Area of Interest (AOI). Some 

Soil Survey Areas contain a very large amount of data. This can cause slow performance 

and sometimes errors - most often when drawing maps or creating Portable Document 

Format (PDF) documents.

Workaround: Use the map AOI tools to define an AOI for a smaller area within the Soil 

Survey Area.
Application terminates 

with the message 

“Session data has 

become unavailable. 

Your session has been 

terminated.”

Web Soil Survey maintains a session between the server and your browser. In certain 

cases, your browser will be redirected to a different instance of the Web Soil Survey server 

from the one on which you established your session. This other server instance does not 

have access to your session data, and cannot do anything but terminate your session. This 

usually happens when your ISP changes your system’s apparent IP address. For example, 

America Online is known to change users’ IP addresses frequently, for security reasons. 

No workaround.

In Firefox, when first 

starting Web Soil 

Survey, you may see the 

message, “Your Web 

Soil Survey session has 

expired.”

In Firefox and other Gecko-based browsers, session cookies are shared among all browser 

windows. This means that every Gecko browser window open at the same time is 

associated with the same Web Soil Survey session. It also means that if you do not logout 

from Web Soil Survey, and simply let your session time out, the next time you start Web 

Soil Survey, the application will notify you that your previous session has expired.

By contrast, in Internet Explorer session cookies are only shared among browser windows 

started from the same browser window (using the File menu and then choosing New 

Window, for example). Thus when you start Web Soil Survey in a new Internet Explorer 

browser window, it will be assigned a new session cookie.

Workaround: When you are done with Web Soil Survey, click the Logout link in the 

navigation bar. Or if you do see the “Your Web Soil Survey session has expired” message, 

simply refresh the browser to start over.

In Firefox, when saving 

any Preferences and 

exiting the browser, 

when you re-enter the 

FireFox browser, the 

Preferences revert back 

to the default values.

Workaround: Close all Firefox browser sessions and restart Web Soil Survey in a new 

Firefox instance.

Area of Interest and Quick Navigation

Problem Explanation/Workaround

Sometimes a Web Soil Survey 

(WSS) Uniform Resource Locator 

(URL) in the Link bib cannot be 

saved as a Favorite in Internet 

Explorer.

Normally, in Internet Explorer, you can right-click the Uniform Resource Locator 

(URL) in the Link bib and save it as a Favorite by clicking “Add to Favorites...”.

If the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) is too long, when you click Add from 

the Add to Favorites dialog, you may see the error “The name you have entered 

for the favorite is too long.” If this happens, just replace the URL in the “Name:” 

text input with a suitable title for the Favorite.

If the URL is even longer, nothing will happen when you click the “Add to 

Favorites...” menu item. This is a bug in Internet Explorer.
Workaround:

1. Right-click the URL and click “Copy Shortcut”.

2. From the Favorites menu at the top of the browser, click “Add to 

Favorites...”. Give the Favorite a suitable name. Click Add. This will add 

a favorite for the default Web Soil Survey URL.

3. From the Favorites menu, right-click the Favorite you just added, and 

click “Properties”.

4. In the Web Document tab, in the “URL:” text input, paste the URL you 

saved in the first step. Click OK.

If you save a Web Soil Survey 

Uniform Resource Locator (URL) 

(with AOI, location, etc.) as a 

hyperlink in a Microsoft Word 

document, clicking the link opens 

Web Soil Survey in a browser, 

but ignores the parameters.

This is caused by an unfortunate interaction between Microsoft Word (or other 

Microsoft Office applications), the web browser, and the Web Soil Survey 

application. When you open Web Soil Survey with a Uniform Resource Locator 

(URL) containing AOI, location, etc., Web Soil Survey interprets the Uniform 

Resource Locator (URL) query parameters on the server, and then redirects to the 

normal Web Soil Survey URL. Microsoft Office applications such as Word, 

Excel, and PowerPoint follow this redirection, and only then invoke the default 

browser to display the link. But the browser starts Web Soil Survey in a new 

session, and the session in which the query parameters were set is no longer 

available.

Workaround: Instead of clicking the hyperlink, copy and paste it into your 

browser’s address bar.

In Safari on Windows, if you 

paste a Web Soil Survey URL 

into the address field, using the 

Paste context menu item, Safari 

ignores the URL.

This is a bug in Safari on Windows. This is not a problem in Safari on Macintosh. 

Workarounds:

1. Paste using CTRL-V (instead of the Paste context menu item), then press 

Return.

2. Paste (using the Paste context menu item or CTRL-V), then type a space 

after the URL in the address field, then press Return.

Navigate by Hydrologic Unit 

does not work in areas outside the 

contiguous United States.

No workaround.
Navigating to Alaska gives an 

“Invalid location” error.

Because of problems with the 180 degree West Longitude line, some choices for 

State and County in the Quick Navigation State and County form result in 

“Invalid location” errors.

In particular, the following do not work correctly: 

• the state of Alaska

• Aleutians West County, Alaska 

See also the known problem “Errors crossing the 180 degree West Longitude 

line” at the following link: Errors crossing the 180 degree West Longitude line.

For Aleutians West County, Alaska, because it spans the 180 degree West 

Longitude line, No workaround.

Quick Navigation to the Bureau 

of Land Management then 

choosing Alaska and then 

choosing Anchorage gives a 

“Cannot navigate beyond 

longitude 180 degree or -180 

degree” error.

The Anchorage BLM office covers an area from the Aleutian Islands to far 

southeast Alaska, which is an invalid extent for Web Soil Survey, as currently 

implemented. No workaround.

Interactive Map

Problem Explanation/Workaround

Errors crossing the 

180 degree West 

Longitude line.

You will see “Invalid location” errors when you zoom out too far, or when you zoom to a 

location that crosses the 180 degree West Longitude line, for example, Aleutians West County, 

Alaska. No workaround.
Map has missing 

imagery and 

shows “no 

camera” picture 

instead. 

No imagery is available at this location. No workaround.

Poor 

“Topographic 

Map” image 

quality at large 

scales.

The “Topographic Map” background layer is best suited for display at scales of 1:18,000 and 

smaller. If you use a larger scale (i.e., choose a larger scale or zoom in too far) the layer appears 

blurry. Workaround: Choose different layers in the Legend to provide similar information.

Map Legend 

“View Layer 

Descriptions” and 

“Edit Layer 

Properties” don't 

work in USDA 

CCE Firefox.

These features do not work in Firefox for USDA employees. This is because the Firefox 

"Disable or replace context menus" option is disabled on USDA systems. The Web Soil Survey 

context menu is there, but it's underneath the Firefox context menu. Workaround: Use Internet 

Explorer or Chrome.

Soil Data Explorer

Problem Explanation/Workaround

When AOI is in multiple soil 

survey areas, one of which has no 

soil maps, Crop Yield ratings may 

result in the error “Cannot 

generate a map.”

Workaround: Create an AOI for the area within each of the soil survey areas 

separately.
When your AOI is in a soil survey 

area that has no soil maps, if you 

change your map unit selection, 

ratings you’ve already run will 

not take into account your 

changed map unit selection.

For example, create the AOI, select the map units you are interested in (in the 

AOI Properties panel), then run a Crop Yield rating. In Basic Options, you can 

select from the crops that are relevant to the map units you have selected. If you 

later change your map unit selection, the Crop Yield rating form will not update 

and show the crops relevant to your new list of map units. Workaround: Create 

your AOI again, and select the map units you need in the first place, or select all 

map units.

Using Internet Explorer, Spanish 

Soil Report names are displayed 

incorrectly.

Workaround: This is a problem with Internet Explorer. One workaround is to 

use a different browser (such as Chrome or Firefox).

Another workaround is to refresh Internet Explorer (F5 key). This works for the 

report names and the reports themselves, but not for the report description (“View 

Description”).

Printable Maps and Reports

Problem Explanation/Workaround

The browser starts up Adobe 

Reader, but the Portable 

Document Format (PDF) 

document is not visible.

In some cases, Printable Version or Checkout on the Shopping Cart tab creates 

a Portable Document Format (PDF), and opens it in Adobe Reader in a browser 

window, but the document is not visible. Workaround: Refresh the browser 

window containing the Adobe Reader.

Labels are omitted, appear to be 

garbled, or appear to be missing 

characters (and the created maps 

are at scale of 1:50,000 or 

greater).

In extremely rare cases labels may be incorrectly shown in “Printable Version” or 

“Custom Soil Resource Reports” maps: labels for a few mapunit and rating 

polygons are either incomplete (for example, “ADE” is drawn in place of the 

correct “ABCDEF”), overstruck (think of writing an “A” and then writing an “X” 

over it) or completely missing. During testing the problem was only seen in a 

small region of NV708 (Great Basin National Park, Nevada). This problem will 

continue to be researched; if you encounter it please report the “Link”, printed 

scale (or “Fit to Page”), and sheet size (“A”, “B”, etc.) to the Soils Hotline (send 

email to the following email address: soilshotline@usda.gov); your assistance 

will be greatly appreciated. Workaround: Re-create the document (by again 

clicking on “Printable Version” and “View” OR “Shopping Cart (Free)”, “Check 

Out”, “Get Now”/“Download Later” and “OK” as appropriate). Examine the 

resultant document for accuracy; you may need to repeat these steps several 

times.
The printable map doesn’t show 

what was in the interactive map.

Sometimes not all the map layers that are visible in the interactive map are visible 

in the printable map. For example, Water Features lines, Transportation lines, or 

Federal Land boundaries may appear in one but not the other. The display of 

certain map layers is controlled by the map scale. Differences in the two maps 

may occur when the printable map is generated at a different scale than the 

interactive map. Workaround: Choose a particular scale for maps when creating 

a Printable Version or a Custom Report.

Poor “Topographic Map” image 

quality at large scales.

The “Topographic Map” background layer is best suited for display at scales of 

1:18,000 and smaller. If you use a larger scale (i.e., choose a larger scale or too 

large a sheet) the layer appears blurry. Workaround: For “Automatic” scale, use 

a smaller sheet size, choose a smaller pre-defined scale or choose different layers 

to include in the output document.

Custom Soil Resource Report size 

estimates are inaccurate.

The estimates shown for custom report size on the Shopping Cart tab may be as 

much as 20% different than the actual size of the report. Workaround: Don’t 

take these estimates too seriously.

Widows and Orphans in Portable 

Document Format (PDF) Files.

In the Printable Version and Custom Soil Resource Report Portable Document 

Format (PDF) files, the page breaks aren’t always where a human editor would 

have put them. Sometimes these documents will contain a “widow,” the last line 

of a paragraph printed alone at the top of a page, or an “orphan,” a subheading or 

the first line of a paragraph printed alone at the bottom of a page. No 

workaround.

Custom Soil Resource Report 

“Get now” takes a long time.

When using “Get now” on the Shopping Cart tab, it may take several minutes 

(perhaps as long as 20) to create a Custom Resource Report. A message 

“Generating custom soil resource report...” is displayed while the report is being 

created. Workaround: Wait for “Get now” to complete or use the “Download 

Later” option. “Download Later” will allow you to continue using Web Soil 

Survey and receive an email when your report is ready to download.

Printable documents such as 

Portable Document Format (PDF) 

ones may not open in Chrome.

This is dependent on correct Chrome property settings. Workaround: Set the 

following Chrome properties:

1. Enable Chrome PDF Viewer

2. Disable Adobe Reader

3. Enable pop-ups
Link

Problem Explanation/Workaround

Link “location” changes. If a URL is copied from the Link feature then pasted into a new browser, the 

“location” value may change slightly. Workaround: None. Observed changes 

are very small relative to the mapping scale of soils data (1:12,000 to 1:24,000). 

Observed changes have been equivalent to roughly 10 meters on the ground.