Book Image

Learning QGIS 2.0

By : Anita Graser
Book Image

Learning QGIS 2.0

By: Anita Graser

Overview of this book

QGIS is a user friendly open source geographic information system (GIS) that runs on Linux, Unix, Mac OSX, and Windows. The popularity of open source geographic information systems and QGIS in particular has been growing rapidly over the last few years. More and more companies and institutions are adopting QGIS and even switching to QGIS as their main GIS. Learning QGIS 2.0 is a practical, hands-on guide that provides you with clear, step-by-step exercises that will help you to apply your GIS knowledge to QGIS. Containing a number of clear, practical exercises, this book will introduce you to working with QGIS, quickly and painlessly. If you want to take advantage of the wide range of functionalities that QGIS offers, then this is the book for you. This book takes you from installing and configuring QGIS, through handling spatial data to creating great maps. You will learn how to load and visualize existing spatial data and how to create data from scratch. You will perform common geoprocessing and spatial analysis tasks and automate them. We will cover how to achieve great cartographic output and print maps. You will learn everything you need to know to handle spatial data management, processing, and visualization tasks in QGIS.
Table of Contents (12 chapters)

Automated geoprocessing with the graphical modeler


Using the graphical modeler, we can turn whole geoprocessing and analysis workflows into automated models. To create a model, we go to Analysis | Graphical modeler to open the modeler where we can select from different Inputs and Algorithms for our model.

Let's create a model that automates the creation of hexagonal heatmaps! By double-clicking on the Vector layer entry in the Inputs list, we can add an input field for the point layer. It's a good idea to use descriptive parameter names so we can recognize which input is first and which is later in the model. It is also useful to restrict the Shape type field where appropriate. In our example, we restrict the input to Point. This will enable Processing to prefilter the available layers and present us only with layers of the correct type. The second input we need is a Number field to specify the desired hexagonal cell size. The tool will look like the following screenshot:

After adding the...