An additional remark about the new way of handling thematic layers: When using GeoJSON files one would only see layers that were actually available. The new setup, all orgunit levels are listed. I think this is as it should be, but there is no way to tell whether there actually are any coordinates in the db for a specific level, and if you then select it, the module hangs. We may need to think of a way to indicate whether there are in fact any map data available (of course, it may also be the case that we have coordinates for only some facilities, so that a layer is partially available).
Knut (PS. They level selection box comes out as a bit too small for me in Chrome) On Sat, Oct 30, 2010 at 7:48 PM, Knut Staring <[email protected]> wrote: > The latest improvement of the GIS module means we now have the ability > to make maps for a limited area of a country (e.g. a province) but > also select what level that should be visible for this area (e.g. > districts or subdistricts). This means that having polygon coordinates > in the orgunit table now provides more functionality than the previous > method of fetching separate GeoJSON file layers for each level from > the file system, which now seems redundant. I think it therefore may > be time to remove the functionality which supports these "external" > files, since the process of converting the common shapefile format to > GeoJSON and uploading is very similar to converting to GML and > uploading. > > This means that people will no longer have make the somewhat confusing > choise of a mode for thematic layers ("GeoJSON or database"), and we > can remove the functionality of visually matching polygons to orgunits > in the database. However, we should keep the ability to add > non-thematic layers as GeoJSON files for overlays (e.g. roads, rivers, > cities, airports). Such additional layers (as well as background > layers) can also be added as WMS using a local Geoserver or external > services. > > Also, there are questions as to maintenance of orgunit polygons as > administrative boundaries change. And perhaps most importantly, it > would be very nice to be able to create the orgunit hierarchy based on > shapefiles, rather than having to ensure the hierarchy is already in > DHIS2 and matches the shapefile names (see below). I think we should > encourage the use of a "Parent" column in the DBF file, and add the > ability to recognize this column in the GML import. Alternatively, I > suppose we could describe a good method to create the hierarchy in > Excel based on a collection of DBF files. > > In order to link with other data, it would also be good if the > OpenHealthMapper interface would also be able to specify thematic maps > from a service like Geoserver, but that may be a larger effort. > > The documentation also needs to be updated to reflect the new import > method. Below is a description of the current process importing from > shape files. Though this is not something people do very often, we > should probably aim to simplify it over the medium term. > > 1. First you need to make sure that all the orgunits for which you are > adding polygons are in DHIS2, and that there is a field in each .dbf > file which has this name. The spelling must be identical for DHIS2 to > be able to match, so change any deviant spellings. > > 2. You then need to use the free tool ogr2ogr to convert your > shapefiles into GML format. On Linux you can just do apt-get install > ogr2ogr. > For Windows, you should download FWTools, http://fwtools.maptools.org/ > > 3. Now open a command window and navigate to the folder with the > shapefiles, and issue the following command (replace "output" and > "input" with the actual names): > ogr2ogr -F GML output.gml input.shp > > 4. The column in the .dbf file with the orgunit name will have been > converted to an XML element inside the GML file. Open the GML file in > a text editor (e.g. Notepad++) and do a search/replace to make sure > this element is called exactly ogr:Name (case sensitive), e.g. > > <ogr:Name>Badjia</ogr:Name> > > 5. Import the GML file into DHIS through the regular import interface > (no need to zip it) > > 6. In the GIS module, make sure the Administrator - Map Source setting > is set to DHIS database. > > In the Polygon Layer screen, you can then select the orgunit from the > tree which appears by clicking on the Parent orgunit field. > -- Cheers, Knut Staring _______________________________________________ Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~dhis2-devs Post to : [email protected] Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~dhis2-devs More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
