If you have been using QGIS for ages, you surely know what the fTools plugin is. For a long time, it was practically the only tool for performing vector geoprocessing operations. With the advent of Processing, the need for fTools significantly decreased because most of the fTools algorithms were also available in Processing. And today, the fTools era is over.
All fTools algorithms that were missing from Processing have been implemented. The fTools plugin has been removed. Processing has been “taught” to create menu entries and bind algorithms to them. This means that the “Vector” menu has not disappeared, and you will find all the tools in their usual places. The only difference is that instead of custom fTools dialogs, you will see automatically generated Processing dialogs.
Months of hard work and sleepless nights; tight deadlines; numerous discussions, arguments, and compromises, all these are finally behind us. We have done it! My first book — QGIS By Example — is ready and will soon be available in printed and electronic forms at Packt Publishing.
QGIS By Example
Today I would like to express my gratitude to Werner Macho and Nyall Dawson for their reviews and invaluable comments. I would also like to thank the publisher in general and its editorial team in particular for their advice and assistance, patience and understanding. My biggest thanks go to my co-author, Daria Svidzinska, for her support and invaluable contribution to the book. I am also immensely grateful to all my friends and family for their support and encouragement.
The results of the project selection for GSoC 2015 have been announced. This year, the requirements for the projects were stricter and the number of slots was much smaller. Therefore, the fact that QGIS has been selected is even more gratifying. Marcus Santos will work on multithreading support in Processing, and Victor Olaya and I will be his mentors.
When viewing TMS layers in QGIS, as well as in any other GIS, the background map may be blurred if the current map scale does not match the scale of the tiles. The reason for this is a feature of TMS, namely the use of a fixed set of so-called “zoom levels”: tiles are generated only for certain scales defined by the data provider.
So to get a sharp image, you should only use the scales that correspond to the zoom levels of the selected TMS service. For OpenStreetMap, the formula for calculating the scale for each zoom level can be found on this page, and a similar approach can be used for other services.
Some time ago I added a special widget to QGIS to select a map scale from a given set. Later, it became possible to edit this list and define a set of scales on a global level as well as on a project level. So if your project uses TMS layers, you can create your own list of scales and switch between them. At the same time, you still have the option of using any intermediate scale values.
Another option is to install the Tile Map Scale plugin. This plugin allows you to easily connect popular TMS layers (remember about ToS!). It also monitors map scale changes and automatically sets the nearest correct TMS scale. Note that you will not be able to use intermediate scale values in this case.
Finally, QGIS has a built-in widget for changing the scale according to the layer’s scale list. It can be found in “View → Panels → Tile scale” or from the toolbar context menu.
When displaying spatial information, it is desirable to have a “context” — some additional data to help you navigate and make the information more readable. This can include administrative boundaries, hydrology, road networks, etc. Such additional layers are called “basemaps”. The term “basemap” is often used to refer exclusively to services such as Google Maps, BING Maps, OpenStreetMap and so on, but this is not correct.
So what is a basemap? It is a background layer (such as a digital elevation model or topographic map) on which thematic layers are overlaid. The basemap is often used for geographic reference and may include elements of the geodetic network. Very often, aerial or satellite imagery is used as a basemap.
At the same time, the widespread use of different map services as basemaps is explained by their accessibility: all that is needed to use them is an Internet connection and minimal GIS skills, whereas the use of other types of data may require some preparatory work, such as georeferencing.
Let’s see how we can use different map services in QGIS.
Imagine you could order books. Do you want a book about QGIS? If so, what level of knowledge do you think the reader should have and what topics should the book cover? Any other suggestions?
I have released a new version of the Photo2Shape plugin. This is a QGIS plugin that allows you to create a point vector layer from a set of geotagged photos.
Users now have the ability to recursively process directories and the option to append data to an existing file. The code has also been refactored, and instead of EXIF.py the more convenient and reliable exifread is now used.
I’m pretty sure that the heterogeneity of the Processing plugin’s graphical interface is not something that many people (if any) pay attention to. And it is very likely that the code responsible for the generation of the interface has never been seen by anyone other than the developers. Since everything works as expected, everyone is happy with it. And it does not matter what the windows or buttons look like. Let alone the code. In fact, both are important. A unified interface looks professional, is more convenient and pleasant to use, while clean, well-structured code is easier to maintain and extend.
My first thought was to do a crowdfunding campaign like Matthias, but then I changed my mind. So now I am slowly fixing it in my spare time. I’m hoping to get this done in time for the 2.8 release, which will be a long-term supported release.
The release of QGIS 2.6 “Brighton” has been announced. This release contains many new features, bugfixes and improvements.
The detailed changelog can be found here. For normal users, it is better to use the visual changelog. The most important and interesting changes are listed below:
implemented support for expression (virtual) fields
actions can now have an associated icon
more expression functions and variables have been added, including $currentfeature and $atlasfeature to get the current feature in different contexts, attribute() and getFeature() to get the attribute value of a feature or a feature with matching attribute, respectively
layer tree overhaul: new API, visibility groups, legend filter and more
syntax highlighting in all code editors (Python, expressions, HTML and CSS)
added support for custom colour palettes
new colour picker dialogue with a wide range of features
Processing Modeler overhaul
online repository for Processing models and scrips
item panel in Print Composer for quick access to all composer items
many properties of various composer items have been made data-defined
support for multiple overview maps for a composer map element
and much more
The source code and binary packages for Windows, Debian, and Ubuntu are available for download. Packages for other distributions and operating systems will appear as they are prepared by the maintainers.
The 12th QGIS developers meeting, which took place in Essen (Germany), has ended.
In my previous posts (day 1, day 2, and day 3), I have already covered the main points, and now I will go into a little more detail about the most interesting results.
Certification
Four types of certificates are planned: QGIS User, QGIS Professional, QGIS Trainer, and QGIS Developer. Also, PSC will issue so-called “grandfather” certificates. The TAO online platform will be used for assessments.
New geometry class
A complete update of the QgsGeometry class, which is responsible for the spatial component of objects, is planned:
support for an extended set of geometric primitives
support for Z (altitude) and M (measurement) values
support for curves
new extensible architecture
an extensive set of unit-tests
The first batch of changes has already been implemented, and new functionality is expected to be included in the QGIS 2.7 code base. The work was supported by the Canton of Solothurn.
Other topics
In fact, there were many more interesting and active discussions, and some topics appeared on the agenda spontaneously (for example, support for SAGA and OTB in Processing on Debian builds). In addition to broad discussions, there were also “narrow” discussions where specialized problems were solved (such as downloading data from the Portuguese iGeo portal), and participants periodically organized into groups to solve problems together and/or find and fix bugs.
Also during the meeting:
we discussed changes to the release schedule: it is proposed to maintain the LTS release with a 1 year lifecycle
support for Python plugins for the QGIS Server was proposed and partially implemented. This way, one can significantly expand the functionality of the server without the need to make changes to its code
we discussed the prospects of fTools (vector data) and GDALTools (raster data) plug-ins and their possible replacement with Processing
PSC completed process of the trademark registration and developed guidelines for its use
we started work on integrating contextual help into the documentation
lots of bugs were fixed
documentation was updated
Many thanks to the organizers and LinuxHotel staff for their hospitality.
