[Xastir] Using Mapbox maps on Xastir

[Hal Mueller]

Mapbox provides tiled raster layers in a Web Mercator projection, using the same tile X/Y/zoom reference system that Google Maps, Bing Maps, Apple Maps, Yahoo Maps, and standard TMS/WMS systems use. 

AFAICT there is no clean way to point Xastir at a standard tile server like Mapbox provides. It can't read MBtiles format either (which would be an output option for you). 

Your map is rendering tiles fetched with patterns like this:
https://a.tiles.mapbox.com/v4/sparks.m5kmpi20/10/288/402@2x.png?access_token=pk.eyJ1Ijoic3BhcmtzIiwiYSI6ImZoamk1dmMifQ.WS_WgruA82kmVWgZP_GgcQ <https://a.tiles.mapbox.com/v4/sparks.m5kmpi20/10/288/402@2x.png?access_token=pk.eyJ1Ijoic3BhcmtzIiwiYSI6ImZoamk1dmMifQ.WS_WgruA82kmVWgZP_GgcQ>

Note the 10/288/402 at 2x.png. That’s the image description: X/Y of 288/402 (or maybe it’s Y/X), at zoom level 10. That 10/288/402 is the same place on earth, at the same zoom level, for all of the WMS servers I mentioned above. Zoom level 0 is the entire world; zoom level 18 shows you where my backyard planter boxes are. So if you could retrieve all of the relevant tiles, for all of the relevant zoom levels, and then reassemble them into one image for each zoom level, you could use those images in Xastir. The @2x means that I want retina tiles, twice the resolution, for use on retina displays like newer iPhones and Mac laptops.

I haven’t looked in a while, but I think Mapbox Studio has a suitable export option. I don’t remember how to point Mapbox Studio at your Mapbox map, though. https://www.mapbox.com/blog/high-res-prints-from-mapbox-studio/ <https://www.mapbox.com/blog/high-res-prints-from-mapbox-studio/> should give you a start.

There’s also a promising question/answer/link at http://gis.stackexchange.com/questions/73946/automatically-download-and-merge-webmap-tiles-into-one-big-image <http://gis.stackexchange.com/questions/73946/automatically-download-and-merge-webmap-tiles-into-one-big-image>.

What you want is the inverse of the OGR/GDAL utility gdal2tiles (see http://www.gdal.org/gdal2tiles.html <http://www.gdal.org/gdal2tiles.html>). I don’t know whether it exists, though, or what it’s called. gdal_merge could do the job, but generating the required world files would be a ton of tedious work.

73 
Hal
N3YX

> On May 12, 2015, at 12:23 PM, Eric H. Christensen <eric at christensenplace.us> wrote:
> 
> I've got an event this weekend where amateur radio will be providing the main communications support.  I've created a map[0] in Mapbox to show all the information about the route and rest stops along the way.  Here's what I'm curious about: can I use this in Xastir as I will be tracking several stations on APRS along the way?
> 
> Mapbox offers an API[1] as well as the ability to download a GeoJSON and KML file.  I'm just not up on what Xastir can do cartography-wise.  What are my options, here?
> 
> 73,
> Eric W4OTN/3
> 
> [0] https://a.tiles.mapbox.com/v4/sparks.m5kmpi20/page.html?access_token=pk.eyJ1Ijoic3BhcmtzIiwiYSI6ImZoamk1dmMifQ.WS_WgruA82kmVWgZP_GgcQ#10/35.4517/-79.2320
> [1] https://www.mapbox.com/developers/api/
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