Auto-removal of duplicate vertices
When uploading Geo data to TRACT, your file is validated against a set of geometric rules to ensure your plot data is accurate and compliant. One of these rules relates to consecutive duplicate vertices — coordinates that appear more than once in sequence within a plot's geometry.
What are consecutive duplicate vertices?
A polygon is defined by a series of coordinates (vertices) that trace its boundary. Consecutive duplicate vertices occur when the same coordinate appears twice or more in a row within that sequence. This is a cosmetic issue (i.e. it does not change the shape or meaning of the polygon) but it can cause imports to fail validation and may trigger errors in downstream data pipelines.
What does TRACT do about them?
When TRACT detects consecutive duplicate vertices in a plot geometry during a Geo data upload, it will automatically remove the duplicate coordinates before the plot is saved. You do not need to clean your file manually before uploading.
This behaviour applies to Geo data uploads only. It has no effect on Master or Traceability file imports.
Will my plot data be changed?
Plot boundaries are not altered by the removal of consecutive duplicate vertices. Your deforestation risk analysis and any other downstream processing will produce the same results as if the duplicates had never been present.
However, TRACT does trim coordinate values to 6 decimal places during import. This means the stored coordinates may differ very slightly from those in your original file. At 6 decimal places, coordinate precision is approximately 0.1 metres, which has no practical effect on plot area calculations or risk analysis. If you export your plots after uploading, you may notice these small differences in the coordinate values.
What about other geometric issues?
Automatic cleaning only applies to consecutive duplicate vertices. All other geometric validation rules remain in effect. Imports containing self-intersections, invalid rings, or plots that do not meet area thresholds will still fail and must be corrected manually before re-uploading.
Why does this matter for compliance?
The removal of consecutive duplicate vertices is a written requirement of the EU TRACES regulation. TRACT applies this cleaning automatically so that your plot data remains compliant without placing the burden of geometric correction on you.
Coordinate Trimming to 6 Decimal Places
What is coordinate trimming?
Every point in a plot boundary is defined by a coordinate - a pair of latitude and longitude values. Coordinates can be stored at varying levels of precision, expressed as the number of digits after the decimal point. TRACT trims all coordinates to 6 decimal places during Geo data import.
Why does TRACT trim coordinates?
Six decimal places corresponds to approximately 0.11 metres at the equator - well within the positional accuracy required for plot-level analysis and regulatory compliance.
TRACT mirrors the trimming behaviour that EU TRACES applies when it ingests GeoJSON data. TRACES does this to reduce file size and streamline downstream processing. Rather than leaving this step to TRACES, TRACT applies the same trimming upstream, during import, for an important reason: reducing coordinate precision can cause previously distinct vertices to collapse together, introducing geometric defects (such as duplicated vertices, self-intersections, or zero-length segments) that were not present in your original file.
If those defects only surfaced at the point of TRACES submission, you would need to return to the start of the workflow and resubmit. By applying the trimming in TRACT first, we can detect and repair any resulting issues before submission, against the same geometry TRACES will ultimately see.
Will my plot data be changed?
The coordinates stored by TRACT may differ very slightly from those in your original file if your source data contains more than 6 decimal places of precision. This applies to Geo data uploads only and has no effect on Master or Traceability file imports.
At 6 decimal places, any differences are at most 0.11 metres. This has no practical effect on plot area calculations, deforestation risk scores, or any other analysis carried out within TRACT.
Will I notice this if I export my data?
If you export your plots after uploading, the coordinate values in your export may differ slightly from your original file. This is expected behaviour resulting from the trimming described above, not an error.