Really Useful QGIS Plugins

foreign hi everybody you probably already know about plugins little add-ons for qgis that give it additional capabilities there are a lot of my favorite qgis plugins lists out there so here's my contribution since I'm not a scientist and don't use qgis for data analysis my list focuses on plugins useful for creating Maps here goes quick map services this plugin lets you quickly add an osm base map to a qgis project and chances are you already have it shows up on the web menu it's possible to add other base Maps besides osm to this plugin but the process is complicated and not worth the trouble although other plugins offer more features this one is worth having only because it's a quick way to get a base map for downloading osm data here's the initial screen and here's a zoomed in view of Atlanta quick osm this plugin lets you quickly download osm data directly from the map canvas it shows up on the vector menu don't waste your time trying to get osm data directly from their website use this instead enter the key and value for the data you need click run query and you're all set I'll enter Highway for the key and Motorway for the value set canvas extent and click run here's what I get there are other osm plugins out there but this one is easy to use and always works here's a tip instead of trying to guess the different keys and values for osm data see the open street map Wiki hmcgis this plugin gives you quick access to a really large selection of Base Maps it has its own menu here I'll add some of the base Maps pretty much any base map you'd want to use is included it also includes some other useful options including links to open data sets for U.S states in world countries plus some file utilities map Tyler this plugin shows up in the file browser and is part of a family of mapping products many are geared toward creating online Maps it gives you a range of Base maps and they're different in one big way most export as Vector images this lets you quickly create a good looking map by adding your data changing the CRS if needed and exporting the map to illustrator here's the basic base map of downtown Atlanta and now the bright map unfortunately there's no option to export the base map without labels but these can be removed in illustrator you can also create custom maps directly on the website these maps are free for non-commercial use but you'll need to pay for commercial uses generalizer this is a useful plugin for simplifying its smoothing paths it shows up on the vector menu it can reduce the number of points in your file or smooth angled lines such as roads into curves it offers a lot of options and can be a little intimidating but there are some basic rules to follow one general rule with this plugin is that the default settings produce no useful difference either in the point count or appearance you'll have to adjust the settings to see any result here are some additional tips simplifying only if you want to reduce the number of points in a shapefile without changing its appearance use Douglas pucker and set the threshold to .01 to start then try higher or lower values smoothing only to smooth paths use McMaster distance or snakes simplifying and smoothing use Douglas pucker first then snakes a final note if you're going to be bringing your map into illustrator use illustrator's simplify tool instead it works better and produces visibly Superior smoothing join multiple lines this simple but useful plugin lets you select the segments of a path such as a road and connect them into a single segment it shows up on the vector menu just select the segments and run the plugin qgis-23js this plugin lets you visualize data in 3D it shows up on the web menu if you have buildings with height data this plugin will extrude them see my create true height buildings in qgis video for more about using this plugin qgis2 web this plugin lets you quickly and fairly easily export an interactive web map not surprisingly it shows up on the web menu there are some videos that go into detail about using this opentopography Dem downloader this handy plugin lets you download raster data from open topography directly from the map canvas it shows up on the raster menu you can select from all of the formats available at the open toppo website and only the data needed for your map area will be downloaded this takes the guesswork out of defining the area on the opentabo website's map you'll need an API key from open topography which is free since I installed this I've rarely had a reason to go to the open topple website check out my designer's guide to creating great maps at the mapguy.net guide and download two free chapters that's it for now see you next time

Channel: Jess Zimmerman

Views: 9,480

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Id: 2fs9ow3f6-4

Length: 6min 18sec (378 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 10 2023