Session 4:

• Concepts: Metadata

• Clipping layers and coordinates

• Finalizing maps

• Priority setting

Managing Spatial Data

• Metadata

– Provides information about a certain item's content.

– For example, an image may include metadata that describes how large the picture is, the color depth, the image resolution, when the image was created, and other data.

– This can help you determine what spatial data may be more relevant or accurate for your project

Geographic Coordinate

System(GCS)

• Open Geospatial Consortium's Well-

Known Text Format (OGC WKT)

example: the Proj4 format and

• .prj file format created by ESRI

• What are we using?

Most common GCS=WGS84

• Uses the WGS84 spheroid, WGS84 as a

datum, and latitude and longitude as a

coordinate system.

• WGS84 is used by the Global Positioning

System of satellites by individual GPS

units and online mapping applications.

• Often called THE Geographic Coordinate

System because so common

Go to notepad

• Browse your shapefiles in windows

explorer

• Open moz_adm0.prj

• Choose notepad to view

What we see in .prj file

There is much more here!

…. the short answer is that for “small

areas” like one country, Mozambique,

we are ok with the system we are using

now, i.e. shapefiles and coordinate

systems used in this training.

…the long answer is too long to fit on this

slide BUT its important to check

metadata if you are importing shapefiles

from different sources.

Clipping a province

• Now we will select a province to clip

First we click on the

moz_adm1 layer

Always first click on layer from which you

want to clip:

• for province layer, click on adm1

• for district layer, click on adm2, etc

Select each

administrative district

with control key

Highlight MOZ_adm2

where the district

features are

Or use the attribute table to

highlight districts then clip

Clipping province with

coordinate data

Select features

with control key

You can also clip using

attribute table

• Similarly as done with the districts you

can look at the PCODE or province

code, in this case, to see that you are

highlighting all the hospitals of a

province. Be sure to click on the top of

the column (PCODE) to sort the column

first before you highlight. Then proceed

as before to clip the hospitals for the

province.

Here we see that Tete is

represented by PCODE=5

Adding real hospital symbols

Now add symbols for postes

and centros

• Can you find a clinic symbol?

Now on to raster layers…

• First we need to go back to our plugins

and look for google street maps

• Then we need to see our data

superimposed upon the google map

layer

Yikes! What

happened to our

map?

Now a test!

• Will our Niassa match the country

boundaries of Google?

• What do you think?

Now our biggest test

• We add Niassa hospitals!

• Will they be next to Lichinga and

Cuamba as represented by Google?

• What do you think?

Export the map as image

• QGIS export happens in the print dialog

box. You can save your map as an

image or PDF

• Go to the File menu and select New

Print Composer.

• You can bypass this step by simply

saving as control+prtscrn and pasting to

powerpoint or a word document.

Len De Groot, UC Berkeley School of Journalism QGIS basics for journalists

http://multimedia.journalism.berkeley.edu/tutorials/qgis-basics-journalists/

Export as image or as pdf

Len De Groot, UC Berkeley School of Journalism QGIS basics for journalists

http://multimedia.journalism.berkeley.edu/tutorials/qgis-basics-journalists/

Resources:

• Frank Donnelly, Geospatial Data

Librarian, Baruch College CUNY

http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/geoportal/p

racticum/gis_prac_intro.html

• Len De Groot, UC Berkeley School of

Journalism QGIS basics for

journalists

• http://multimedia.journalism.berkeley.ed

u/tutorials/qgis-basics-journalists/

Prioritizing: where to begin?

Prioritization

• What would you prioritize to map first for

your project?

• How would you decide this?

Before you start, here are

some questions to ask

yourself

• What data are you tracking?

• What would like to map using QGIS?

What would you like to see

mapped for your project?

• How many layers would you need?

• What type of layers would you need?

– Provincial/State level?

– District level?

– Health facilities?

• Would you need to map distance?

• What other data would you need to

map?

End Session and Entire

Training:

Thank you!