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Load Your Own Data

CartoScope allows you to load and explore your own spatial transcriptomics datasets directly from an external URL (such as AWS S3, HTTP, or Zenodo) without uploading them to the public CartoStore catalog.

Interface

1. Start External Data Loading

Click the +URL button in the top-right header bar of the Dataset Catalog to launch the Load a Dataset by URL dialog.

Load External Dataset Dialog

2. Single Sample Loading Mode

To launch a single-sample session, select the Single Dataset tab and paste a direct URL to an individual dataset folder or its catalog.yaml file:

Single Dataset Dialog Features

  • Input URL Field: Paste the catalog.yaml URL of your dataset, or its folder URL and let CartoScope automatically detect catalog.yaml.
  • Preview Checkbox: Check Preview before loading to open the Preview Datasets & Sessions dialog and inspect metadata, organism, tissue, and available layer definitions.
  • Supported Schemes: AWS S3 (s3://...), HTTP/HTTPS (http://...), and Zenodo (https://zenodo.org/...).

3. Multi-Sample Loading Mode

To launch a multi-sample session, select the Multiple Datasets tab and paste a URL to a multi-sample experiment folder or a multi-catalog.yaml file:

Multiple Datasets Dialog Features

  • Input URL Field: Paste your multi-sample study folder URL or direct multi-catalog.yaml URL (CartoScope automatically detects multi-catalog.yaml inside folder paths).
  • Automatic Parsing: CartoScope parses all participating sample catalog URLs (samples), session title, and shared spatial factor models (factors) defined in multi-catalog.yaml.
  • Multi-Sample Setup Launcher: Upon loading, opens the Preview Datasets & Sessions dialog to configure grid layout dimensions (N × M), review sample slots, and launch the multi-sample map workspace.
  • Supported Schemes: AWS S3 (s3://...) and HTTP/HTTPS (http://...).

4. Load & Validation Workflow

Click Load to proceed.

Load Workflow Steps

  1. URL Connectivity Check: CartoScope verifies HTTP/S3 network connectivity and CORS access headers.
  2. Schema Parsing: Validates required id, name, tiles, countsUrl, and layer parameters in catalog.yaml or multi-catalog.yaml.
  3. Session Initialization: Launches either the single dataset map canvas or opens the Preview Datasets & Sessions dialog for multi-tile navigation.

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