Drawing Site Plan with DraftSight a FREE Alternative to AutoCAD

There are many low budget or free Computer-Aided Design (CAD) software alternatives to Autodesk's AutoCAD out there and DraftSight is one of the best alternatives I have used.

Using the free version, you could plot or draw a professional survey plan just as you would do in AutoCAD. In this blog post, I will demonstrate how you will do just that using the free DraftSight CAD software. So, download the DraftSight here and follow the instructions below to activate it.

Instruction 1: Download the software from the link above and launch it to install

Instruction 2: Select Free option and click the next button as seen above.

Instruction 3: Accept the terms in the license agreement and install

The difference between "Geocoding" and "Geolocation"

These two terms are often confused by users in of spatial data. Here is a quick explanation to help clarify the difference between the two. Both of these terms are consistently been misuse by people within the geospatial community.

Address: "Abuja International Conference Centre, Herbert Macaulay Way, Abuja, Nigeria"
Coordinates (in 3D): "Latitude: 9.0438014, Longitude: 7.4919024, Sea level: 503m"

Looking at the landmark address above and its corresponding coordinates in three-dimension (3D), we could say:-

Geocoding - means to 'Convert addresses to geographic coordinates, or the reverse'. While  Geolocation - means to 'Return the precise location of a device based on Wi-Fi or cell towers'.

More elaburate explanation from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:-

Geocoding is the computational process of transforming a physical address description to a location on the Earth's surface (spatial representation in numerical coordinates). Reverse geocoding, on the other hand, converts geographic coordinates to a description of a location, usually the name of a place or an addressable location. Geocoding relies on a computer representation of address points, the street / road network, together with postal and administrative boundaries.

Geolocation is the identification or estimation of the real-world geographic location of an object, such as a radar source, mobile phone, or Internet-connected computer terminal. In its simplest form geolocation involves the generation of a set of geographic coordinates and is closely related to the use of positioning systems, but its usefulness is enhanced by the use of these coordinates to determine a meaningful location, such as a street address.

Installed Python Libraries on QGIS Vs Anaconda

As some one who uses Python for Geospatial development, I was tempted to know what modules are installed on QGIS python environment compared to that of Anaconda python.

On the console of the two platforms, I executed this: help('modules') and I got the following out puts.


QGIS:

MetaSearch	console	mkgraticule	sre_parse
PyQt5	contextlib	mmap	ssl
__future__	copy	mmapfile	sspi
_ast	copyreg	mmsystem	sspicon
_asyncio	crypt	mock	stat
_bisect	csv	modulefinder	statistics
_blake2	ctypes	msilib	string
_bootlocale	curses	msvcrt	stringprep
_bz2	cycler	multiprocessing	struct
_codecs	datetime	nbformat	subprocess
_codecs_cn	dateutil	netbios	sunau
_codecs_hk	db_manager	netrc	symbol
_codecs_iso2022	dbi	networkx	symtable
_codecs_jp	dbm	nntplib	sys
_codecs_kr	dde	nose2	sysconfig
_codecs_tw	decimal	nt	tabnanny
_collections	decorator	ntpath	tarfile
_collections_abc	difflib	ntsecuritycon	telnetlib
_compat_pickle	dis	nturl2path	tempfile
_compression	distutils	numbers	textwrap
_csv	doctest	numpy	this
_ctypes	dummy_threading	odbc	threading
_datetime	easy_install	ogr	time
_decimal	email	ogrmerge	timeit
_dummy_thread	encodings	opcode	timer
_elementtree	ensurepip	operator	token
_functools	enum	optparse	tokenize
_hashlib	epsg_tr	os	trace
_heapq	errno	osgeo	traceback
_imp	esri2wkt	osr	tracemalloc
_io	exifread	owslib	traitlets
_json	expressions	parser	tty
_locale	faulthandler	past	turtle
_lsprof	filecmp	pathlib	types
_lzma	fileinput	pbr	typing
_markupbase	fnmatch	pct2rgb	unicodedata
_md5	formatter	pdb	unittest
_msi	fractions	perfmon	urllib
_multibytecodec	ftplib	pickle	urllib3
_multiprocessing	functools	pickletools	uu
_opcode	future	pip	uuid
_operator	gc	pipes	venv
_osx_support	gcps2vec	pkg_resources	warnings
_overlapped	gcps2wld	pkgutil	wave
_pickle	gdal	platform	weakref
_pydecimal	gdal2tiles	plistlib	webbrowser
_pyio	gdal2xyz	plotly	win2kras
_random	gdal_auth	poplib	win32api
_sha1	gdal_calc	posixpath	win32clipboard
_sha256	gdal_edit	pprint	win32com
_sha3	gdal_fillnodata	processing	win32con
_sha512	gdal_merge	profile	win32console
_signal	gdal_pansharpen	pstats	win32cred
_sitebuiltins	gdal_polygonize	psycopg2	win32crypt
_socket	gdal_proximity	pty	win32cryptcon
_sqlite3	gdal_retile	py_compile	win32event
_sre	gdal_sieve	pyclbr	win32evtlog
_ssl	gdalchksum	pydoc	win32evtlogutil
_stat	gdalcompare	pydoc_data	win32file
_string	gdalconst	pyexpat	win32gui
_strptime	gdalident	pygments	win32gui_struct
_struct	gdalimport	pylab	win32help
_symtable	gdalmove	pyodbc	win32inet
_thread	gdalnumeric	pyparsing	win32inetcon
_threading_local	genericpath	pyplugin_installer	win32job
_tracemalloc	getopt	pyproj	win32lz
_warnings	getpass	pythoncom	win32net
_weakref	gettext	pytz	win32netcon
_weakrefset	glob	pywin	win32pdh
_win32sysloader	gnm	pywin32_testutil	win32pdhquery
_winapi	gzip	pywintypes	win32pdhutil
_winxptheme	hashlib	qgis	win32pipe
abc	heapq	queue	win32print
adodbapi	hmac	quopri	win32process
afxres	html	random	win32profile
aifc	http	rasutil	win32ras
antigravity	httplib2	re	win32rcparser
argparse	idna	regcheck	win32security
array	imaplib	regutil	win32service
ast	imghdr	reprlib	win32serviceutil
asynchat	imp	requests	win32timezone
asyncio	importlib	rgb2pct	win32trace
asyncore	inspect	rlcompleter	win32traceutil
atexit	io	runpy	win32transaction
audioop	ipaddress	sched	win32ts
base64	ipython_genutils	scipy	win32ui
bdb	isapi	secrets	win32uiole
binascii	itertools	select	win32verstamp
binhex	jinja2	selectors	win32wnet
bisect	json	servicemanager	winerror
builtins	jsonschema	setuptools	winioctlcon
bz2	jupyter	shapely	winnt
cProfile	jupyter_core	shelve	winperf
calendar	keyword	shlex	winreg
certifi	lib2to3	shutil	winsound
cgi	libfuturize	signal	winxpgui
cgitb	libpasteurize	simplejson	winxptheme
chardet	linecache	sip	wsgiref
chunk	locale	sipconfig	xdrlib
cmath	logging	sipdistutils	xlrd
cmd	lzma	site	xlwt
code	macpath	six	xml
codecs	macurl2path	smtpd	xmlrpc
codeop	mailbox	smtplib	xxsubtype
collections	mailcap	sndhdr	yaml
colorsys	markupsafe	socket	zipapp
commctrl	marshal	socketserver	zipfile
compileall	math	sqlite3	zipimport
concurrent	matplotlib	sre_compile	zlib
configparser	mimetypes	sre_constants

Accessing JSON nested object with python

This blog post highlights the key components to look at when parsing a JSON file with deep level of nested objects and variables.

First thing first, is to load in the file using: with statement...

The nested/child objects can then be accessed like this...
obj1['obj1a']['obj1a_1']['obj1a_2']['obj1a_3']...,
obj2['obj2a']['obj2a_1']['obj2a_2']['obj2a_3']...,
obj3['obj3a']['obj3a_1']['obj3a_2']['obj3a_3']... etc

Take this example, where we have a JSON object with parent object "requests" which contains "0" which also contains "responseCode" which also contains more children (in this case 3 children as seen above). Another child object at the same level with "responseCode" is "testPassFailCounts" which contains 217 more children.

That JSON structure is nested as follow:- requests >> 0 >> responseCode >> ... >> ... >> ... etc. Use a JSON viewer or reader such as JSON Editor Online to visualize the structural arrangement of your specific JSON file.

Now, to access any level of nested child in python follow this code snippet:-

import json

with open('name_of_file.json', encoding='utf-8') as f:
    data = json.load(f)
    
responseCode = data['requests'][0]['responseCode']
testPassFailCounts = data['requests'][0]['testPassFailCounts']

len(responseCode) # will return 3
len(testPassFailCounts) # will return 217

That is it!
Happy coding.

TkInter Open select file dialog windows from CMD

Are you writting a script for non tech savvy people that will require them to supply some file path like this: C:\Users\PC Name\Desktop\folder1\folder2\folder3\file-name.csv

As you already guess, many non-tech savvy individuals wont be able to type in such kind of file path to use you script. A work around this is to provide a Graphical User Interface (GUI) to the script, where is easier and user friendly to work with.

Here below is a simple solution using default GUI library that comes with python. This script gets an input file from user interactively via GUI, instead of using the CMD. It is written for both python 2 and 3:-

try:
    # for Python2
    from Tkinter import *   ## notice capitalized T in Tkinter
    from tkFileDialog import askopenfilename

    Tk().withdraw()
    polyfile1 = askopenfilename(title="Select original line file:", filetypes = (("comma-separated value (CSV) files","*.csv"),("all files","*.*"))) # show an "Open" dialog box and return the path to the selected file

    # Using the file...
    print ('Do something with the file in Py2', polyfile1)


except ImportError:
    # for Python3
    from tkinter import *   ## notice lowercase 't' in tkinter here
    from tkinter import filedialog

    Tk().withdraw()
    polyfile1 = filedialog.askopenfilename(title="Select original line file:", filetypes = (("CSV files","*.csv"),("all files","*.*"))) # show an "Open" dialog box and return the path to the selected file

    # Using the file...
    print ('Do something with the file in Py3', polyfile1)

Running the script above should open the select file window as seen below.

That is enjoy the script.

How to Upload CSV file of Projected Local Coordinates onto ArcGIS Online

The cloud/web based version of ESRI ArcMap (ArcGIS Online) has come to stay. However, unlike the desktop version (ArcMap) that support many local coordinates systems, ArcGIS Online currently supports geographic coordinates in WGS84 but hardly reads local projected coordinates such as Nigeria Minna Datum UTM Zone 32N, StatePlane coordinates NAD 1983 (e.g StatePlane_Illinois_East epsg: 102671), Hong Kon 1980 Grid System, etc

If you try to upload such CSV file that have projected coordinates on "ArcGIS Online", you will encounter this error that says: "The layer was not created because no locations could be found. Make sure your data has valid location information".

The is because the coordinates in the CSV file are projected in UTM Zone 32 - Minna Datum (used in Nigeria region - EPSG: 26332).

Note: If you getting this required screen error: Location fields not fully specified. Then it means you did not select the correct location fields from the CSV file.

So, be sure to select the correct fields, that is Eastings for Longitude and Northings for Latitude.

If you are getting this error that says: "The layer was not created because no locations could be found. Make sure your data has valid location information", then you have to do one of the following to successfully upload you CSV data file.

Solution 1: Convert the projected coordinates to Geographical coordinates (that is convert from easting & northing to longitude & latitude).

Solution 2: Convert the CSV file itself to GeoJSON. The reason why this GeoJSON work even though the coordinates are still in projected form is because of the attribute or object in the GeoJSON file that defines the correct coordinates system that the coordinates represented.

The Basics of Map making With QGIS, GIMP and Inkscape

Making a modern print ready map will require one or both of the following, namely:
1) Scientific analysis
2) Art and design

In other words, the maps you see are both products of scientific charts as well as works of art and design.

GIS software such as QGIS does the science part better, illustration software such as GIMP and Inkscape handles the art part better.

If you are making a map to accurately/precisely visualize some variables based on scale, then you probably need a scientific map done with the QGIS/ArcGIS. If on the other hand, your map is simply to illustrate some variables not accurately/precisely to scale, then an illustration software like GIMP/Adobe Photoshop for raster editing or Inkscape/Adobe Illustrator for vector editing should be enough to get the job done.

With that said, it is a common practice these days to combine both the scientific and art & design software to finish a map layout. That is you will accurately prepare your map to scale in a scientific software and then complete the aesthetic layout using illustration software. Let's take a look at how this can be done below.

QGIS can handle the majority of vector and raster operations and most of the cartographic work. However, from a cartographic perspective, Inkscape and GIMP are primarily used to finish maps created within a GIS. Inkscape handles vector maps, while GIMP is best suited for raster maps. People often use GIMP to fine-tune coloration of a map. Inkscape is often used to add, for example, custom arrows to maps or add shadows to lines and polygons.

Basic Steps for making maps with QGIS, GIMP and Inkscape:-
1) Get the data
2) Load the data into QGIS
3) Symbolise and style the map according to the information the map wants to communicate
4) Prepare and compose it for printing
5) Export it as image for further fine-tuning in GIMP or export is as SVG file for fine-tuning in Inkscape

Note: If you need to have the map in print-ready magazines, brochures, posters, newsletters or other forms of page layouts and typographic quality text and images, then you will need use a desktop publishing application such as Scribus/Microsoft Publisher/Adobe Indesign or Pagemaker.

Conclusion
You should always bear in mind that QGIS understand all the science of map making which includes various GIS, Geodesic and Cartographic processes. GIMP, Inkscape and Scribus are there to support you in archiving a quality print/publish ready info-graphic maps.

3 sure ways to Land your first GIS and Mapping Job - as a freelancer, contractor, or small business owner

Dear reader,

To effectively Build your career in this industry, you need a solid educational background by taking classes in geography, surveying, geodesy, cartography, GIS, spatial analysis, database management, web technologies, and programming. A common problem with GIS/digital map learning and related institutions is that they never guide you on how/where to find good paying jobs after they have impacted the necessary skills on you.

"It is one thing to acquire the skills and it is a different ball game to make money from your mapping skills".

Many classes in the formal education tend to focus more on the theoretical concepts, so I strongly encourage you to look on to acquiring production skills afterward. Learning platforms such Udemy, Lynda, Udacity, PluralSight, Boundless etc tend to have more practical and real-world production oriented courses. Take your time master those once that suit your career before jumping in the labor market.

In this post, I will open up your eyes to three ways to get your first GIS and Mapping Job. I assured you of your first GIS and Mapping Job or some passive income in three months time before settling on a permanent job, if you follow the advice below diligently... Let's do it.

Here are the three ways to land your first GIS and Mapping Job:-

1- Search and apply for opening in Government and Private sectors:
Note here, you should be able to accept or tolerate delay, problems, or suffering without becoming annoyed or anxious (it requires your maximum level patience).

There are many GIS entry-level jobs and internships often targeted at recent graduates. Many Government sectors at local, state or federal level have GIS/Mapping needs and this varies from one country to another. You will have to refer to your specific country to see what government organizations fits into your skills.

To give you some ideas, there are many different government industries that have GIS and mapping departments some of them include: health, agriculture, transportation, construction, real estate, mining, communication, disaster management, research institutes etc. Watch out for opening in some of these areas and push in when you find one.

On the other hand, there are privately run startups or companies you can work with. If you take away the big names, it is sometimes difficult to know what other options exist that you can apply to. Here I will show you how the search for them.

• Conferences, meet-ups and workshops
• Geospatial Magazines and other publications
• GIS Forums
• Subscribe to newsletters

As an example, below is newsletter from Geomares Publishing. Just that one newsletter alone, you already have access to so many potential employers of your GIS and mapping skills. There are all sort of information including job postings there to keep your eyes on for possible job openings.

The newsletter ofter covers the areas which include "Marine Product Updates, Geomatics Product Updates, GIM International Newsletter, Hydro International Newsletter, Offers and Promotions, Geomatics World Newsletter and GIS Professional Newsletter".

This is just one, there are many more magazine out there to subscribe to and get tones of current and relevant information in the GIS and Geospatial domain. Here is a list below, remember to search within your locality for local alternatives.

• GIS Professional Magazine
• GIM International Magazine
• Coordinates Magazine
• The Geospatial World Magazine
• Direction Magazine
• Geoconnexion
• Geospatial Solutions
• GIS Resources
• LIDAR Magazine

Most of these magazines are published few a times annually, but when they do get published be rest assure of finding ample of information including job listings and potential companies in the industry that could hire you.

I strongly encourage you subscribe at least to the soft copies if you can't afford the hard/printed copies and watch out for job openings.

QGIS 'Add Delimited Text Layer' with Special (Chinese Language) characters

Add Delimited Text Layer in QGIS isn't new. In fact it is the easiest way to import a list of coordinate points in .CSV file into QGIS as a map layer.

What is new here is that the CSV file has some columns with Chinese characters. And such characters are not well read in CSV file formats. For example here below is how the original data looks in excel .xlsx format.

After saving it as .csv for import into QGIS via "Add Delimited Text Layer" menu, it looks this below. Obviously this is not what is expected in the CSV file.

Excel (.xlsx) is not recognized in QGIS "Add Delimited Text Layer", so we can't use the excel file directly. We have to find a way for the CSV file to read the characters correctly or we look into using another file format such as the text file.

Map - Evolution of Nigerian States