[mch2021-terrain] Helping at team terrain

[Bart de Waal]

Hi Rowan,

It's actually pretty common. You assume the world is flat and use some 
2d projection relevant to your area. In the Netherlands (excluding far 
away islands), pretty much everyone uses "Rijksdriehookcoordinaten". 
This is EPSG:28992, or EPSG:7415 with heights.

For example, the map we have from another festival on the terrain is (I 
believe) a giant Autocad (DXF) file.

The reason it's easier is because CAD programs are designed for drawing. 
For example, if you want to draw a tent of 4mx4m, and then move it, and 
rotate it, it is possible in QGIS. But as far as I can tell you need to 
go to the advanced digitizing menu, which is hard to find for a 
beginner. There are no keyboard shortcuts for these operations unless 
you set them yourself.

By contrast, a CAD program is made for these kind of drawing tasks. You 
load in an outline of the terrain, and all the filling in is just drawing.

I think there are probably some advantages to QGIS. I think it's easier 
to keep track of and track objects (I think you can tag them, for 
example). In CAD it's much more just a drawing, with the meaning coming 
from the layer it's in.

ARCGIS is a non-starter due to the cost (especially as we want Linux 
support) and the fact that we want anyone to be able to use the files.

Best Regards,

Bart

On 8/27/24 10:07 AM, rowan8k wrote:
> Hi Bart!
>
> No problem, thanks for replying now!
> I will make sure to be there at the next online meeting.
>
> I'm intrigued by the decision to use a 2D CAD program for the map as 
> it by default does not have any geographic referencing, which to be 
> fair is not crucial, but makes life a lot easier in my opinion.
> In this case we are designing new areas, but we are doing it within 
> the boundaries and limitations of an existing area, so having a 
> reference of the existing area would be really helpful, which is 
> almost default in QGIS.
> To be fair, I don't have much experience designing new areas in QGIS, 
> mostly doing data analysis and visualizing results, but I cannot 
> imagine how a 2D CAD program would be easier for mapping than QGIS.
> So, I would love to be included in the technical infrastructure talks 
> so I can understand better what your previous process was and I can 
> answer any questions about using QGIS you might have.
>
>
> Best,
>
> Rowan
> On Tuesday, August 27th, 2024 at 01:05, Bart de Waal <bart at tuduft.nl> 
> wrote:
>>
>> Hi Rowan,
>>
>> Sorry for the late reply.
>>
>> We are happy to have your help! Feel free to join the user mailing 
>> list, IRC channel, and to join our meetings. The meetings are on the 
>> wiki: https://wiki.why2025.org/Team:Terrain
>>
>> You can also join the orga-meetings if you are interested in helping 
>> out with WHY2025 from any team. https://wiki.why2025.org/Meetings
>>
>> In previous editions, the map was made using a 2d CAD program 
>> (Confusingly called Qcad) and a bunch of custom scripts.
>>
>> We haven't really decided if we want to keep the old infrastructure 
>> or change it around. Specifically, although you can do mapping in 
>> Qgis, it doesn't seem to be designed for designing new areas (but 
>> rather for documenting existing places). If you have more experience 
>> with QGIS and disagree with this statement, we would love to discuss 
>> with you.
>>
>> The other problem with QGIS is that it's data format doesn't seem to 
>> be very suitable for storing in git. I've found kart 
>> (https://kartproject.org/) as a possible solution, but I haven't 
>> found time to try using it yet. If you have opinions on this subject 
>> I'm also very interested.
>>
>> Sorry for not informing you in time to join the most recent meeting. 
>> We are hoping to have a discussion on the techincal infrastructure 
>> soon, and I think Redlizard will be inviting you.
>>
>> Kind Regards,
>>
>> Bart / "Uglyhack"
>>
>>
>> On 8/10/24 2:03 PM, rowan8k wrote:
>>>
>>> Hey all!
>>>
>>> Some of you probably know me already, but otherwise I'm rowan8k, see 
>>> https://wiki.why2025.org/User:Rowan8k
>>> I'd be happy to help out with team terrain if my help would still be 
>>> useful :)
>>> I have extensive academic experience with GIS, so I know my way 
>>> around QGIS and ArcGIS to do GIS analysis and map making.
>>> Also, I made this open GIS course if you want to get started with it 
>>> yourself: https://github.com/rowan8k/fundamentals-of-gis
>>>
>>> Shall I join the upcoming meeting to see if I can help out somewhere?
>>>
>>>
>>> Best,
>>>
>>> Rowan
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Terrain mailing list
>>> Terrain at lists.why2025.org
>>> https://lists.why2025.org/mailman/listinfo/terrain
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.why2025.org/pipermail/terrain/attachments/20240827/7377baca/attachment.html>