[Xastir] Making better looking maps

[Stephen - K1LNX]

Thanks for all the replies so far guys. I'd be lieing if I pretended to
actually understand this whole mapping thing lol, but like anything else I
just need to dig my heels into it. I have some MapInfo map data as well that
I may try playing with, I'll report my results back on both when I get a
chance.

One question to the dev's. Is it possible to integrate google maps into
Xastir? The only two pitfalls I see with that are potential TOS violations,
and the fact that the end user may need an API key, not sure how you could
get the data either, maybe libcurl or something to that effect? I'm not a
coder, so maybe it's more complicated than that.....

73's
Stephen
K1LNX

On 8/13/07, Lee Bengston <lee.bengston at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> On 8/10/07, Stephen - K1LNX <k1lnx at k1lnx.net > wrote:
> >
> > That looks pretty good and gives me an idea of what to start with.
> >
> > I do have one question on the downloaded Tiger data. When I unzipped
> > Tennessee for example, it created two directories, Polygons and
> > Polylines.
> > In the corresponding directories I see (I'll use my home county as an
> > example):
> >
> > /usr/local/share/xastir/maps/static_maps/TN/Polygons
> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1352805 2007-05-08 15:06 Carter_County.dbf
> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1276956 2007-05-08 15:06 Carter_County.shp
> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root   25156 2007-05-08 15:06 Carter_County.shx
> >
> > /usr/local/share/xastir/maps/static_maps/TN/Polylines
> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root  2534921 2007-05-08 15:04 Carter_County.dbf
> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root      143 2007-05-08 15:04 Carter_County.prj
> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root  1709364 2007-05-08 15:04 Carter_County.shp
> > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root   104580 2007-05-08 15:04 Carter_County.shx
> >
> > What is the difference between the Polygons and Polylines directory, if
> > any?
> > What file or files do I edit to start customizing colors, line widths,
> > etc?
> >
>
> Polylines make up the linear data - roads, borders, etc.
> Polygons are the bodies of water, parks, golf courses, etc.
>
> The files to edit are actually the dbfawk files in the
> /usr/local/share/xastir/config directory as opposed to the files in the maps
> directories.  See HowTo:DBFAWK<http://www.xastir.org/wiki/index.php/HowTo:DBFAWK>in the Xastir Wiki.  As to which dbfawk files correlate to the Tiger 2006_SE
> maps, I haven't had a chance to dig in and figure that out yet.  There's one
> file named tgr2shppoly_2006.dbfawk, but since it's possible to download
> either Tiger2006 or Tiger2006_SE maps, I don't know which map set uses it
> based on just the file name.  Also I was expecting separate dbfawk files for
> the polylines and polygons, but I can't tell from the naming if that is the
> case.  Anyway, I'm thinking using dbfinfo on the dbf files for the polylines
> and polygons will help figure out what patterns match up with which existing
> dbfawk files.  If someone on the list knows which dbfawk file(s)
> applies/apply to the Tiger2006_SE maps, that would speed things up.
>
> Lee - K5DAT
> Murphy, TX
>



-- 
Stephen Brown - ARS K1LNX
Johnson City, TN EM86uh