[Community] newby advice?

[Bill Janssen]

Hi, I've just joined the list, and wondered where I should start.

I've got about 20,000 street addresses. I'd like to plot various
subsets of them on static maps of the US.

After reading around a bit, it seems like the standard way to do this is
to (1) set up a local clone of geocoder.us, to translate the addresses
to lat/long, (2) generate map images using either mapscript (or
shapely?), and put the markers for my addresses in as a layer, or just
draw them on top.

It's #2 that I'm still a bit confused about. Can someone point me to
some good tutorials on this?

Bill

[Eric Wolf]

Do you have a static list of addresses or will it be constantly changing?

If it's static, try uploading your data to Google Fusion Tables or
GeoCommons. You may find that will accomplish most of what you want.
Fusion Tables can even be setup for changing lists. Both solutions
will do the geocoding and let you play around with finding your
subsets of data and even embed the maps in web content. GeoCommons has
much better cartographic design.

I don't think you need to be writing python code to do this.

-Eric

-=--=---=----=----=---=--=-=--=---=----=---=--=-=-
Eric B. Wolf ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? 720-334-7734

Post by Bill Janssen
Hi, I've just joined the list, and wondered where I should start.
I've got about 20,000 street addresses. ?I'd like to plot various
subsets of them on static maps of the US.
After reading around a bit, it seems like the standard way to do this is
to (1) set up a local clone of geocoder.us, to translate the addresses
to lat/long, (2) generate map images using either mapscript (or
shapely?), and put the markers for my addresses in as a layer, or just
draw them on top.
It's #2 that I'm still a bit confused about. ?Can someone point me to
some good tutorials on this?
Bill
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Community mailing list
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http://lists.gispython.org/mailman/listinfo/community

[Bill Janssen]

Post by Eric Wolf
Do you have a static list of addresses or will it be constantly changing?
If it's static, try uploading your data to Google Fusion Tables or
GeoCommons. You may find that will accomplish most of what you want.
Fusion Tables can even be setup for changing lists. Both solutions
will do the geocoding and let you play around with finding your
subsets of data and even embed the maps in web content. GeoCommons has
much better cartographic design.
I don't think you need to be writing python code to do this.

Thanks for the pointers! But:

A. That's no fun!

B. Unfortunately, I have contract restrictions which prohibit me from
uploading the addresses to somebody else's site.

Bill

[Eric Wolf]

Bill,

I hope your contract includes the price of an arcgis license because
it sounds like you need a local database to geocode against. I think
an arcgis license actually provides the cheapest such databases. Other
solutions involve at least sending the addresses one at a time to a
remote site where the database exists.

Google Fusion Tables allow for protected data (I.e. Data that only you can see).

-Eric

Post by Bill Janssen

Post by Eric Wolf
Do you have a static list of addresses or will it be constantly changing?
If it's static, try uploading your data to Google Fusion Tables or
GeoCommons. You may find that will accomplish most of what you want.
Fusion Tables can even be setup for changing lists. Both solutions
will do the geocoding and let you play around with finding your
subsets of data and even embed the maps in web content. GeoCommons has
much better cartographic design.
I don't think you need to be writing python code to do this.

A. That's no fun!
B. Unfortunately, I have contract restrictions which prohibit me from
uploading the addresses to somebody else's site.
Bill
_______________________________________________
Community mailing list
Community at lists.gispython.org
http://lists.gispython.org/mailman/listinfo/community

[Bill Janssen]

Post by Eric Wolf
Bill,
I hope your contract includes the price of an arcgis license because
it sounds like you need a local database to geocode against. I think
an arcgis license actually provides the cheapest such databases.

Eric, thanks for the pointer. I was thinking of using
https://github.com/geocommons/geocoder along with the TIGER/Line
databases (my addresses are all U.S.). Not a good idea?

Post by Eric Wolf
Google Fusion Tables allow for protected data (I.e. Data that only you can see).

Thanks, I'll check it out.

Bill

[Eric Wolf]

Bill,

I hadn't looked that closely at GeoCommon's Geocoder. It's nice that
they provided clear instructions on using it with TIGER. You may have
pretty good results. I'd still be tempted towards canned solutions
since you just want to geocode a bunch of addresses, not build a
geocoder engine.

And as Sean said, this isn't really the forum for this kind of discussion.

-Eric

-=--=---=----=----=---=--=-=--=---=----=---=--=-=-
Eric B. Wolf ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? 720-334-7734

Post by Eric Wolf
Bill,
I hope your contract includes the price of an arcgis license because
it sounds like you need a local database to geocode against. I think
an arcgis license actually provides the cheapest such databases.

Eric, thanks for the pointer. ?I was thinking of using
https://github.com/geocommons/geocoder along with the TIGER/Line
databases (my addresses are all U.S.). ?Not a good idea?

Post by Eric Wolf
Google Fusion Tables allow for protected data (I.e. Data that only you can see).

Thanks, I'll check it out.
Bill
_______________________________________________
Community mailing list
Community at lists.gispython.org
http://lists.gispython.org/mailman/listinfo/community

[Sean Gillies]

Post by Bill Janssen
Hi, I've just joined the list, and wondered where I should start.
I've got about 20,000 street addresses. ?I'd like to plot various
subsets of them on static maps of the US.
After reading around a bit, it seems like the standard way to do this is
to (1) set up a local clone of geocoder.us, to translate the addresses
to lat/long, (2) generate map images using either mapscript (or
shapely?), and put the markers for my addresses in as a layer, or just
draw them on top.
It's #2 that I'm still a bit confused about. ?Can someone point me to
some good tutorials on this?
Bill

Hi Bill,

"Where to start?" is an interesting question. Anymore, I'd say
StackOverflow is the place to start. There's a GIS Stack Exchange, but
it's much less useful, IMO. This list is just about discussing the
development and use of owslib, rtree, shapely, and friends, and some
related Zope and Plone packages.

On your #2: Shapely is only concerned with computational geometry, it
doesn't make map images. Mapscript is an archaic and complicated way
to make maps, I recommend instead that you write your geocoded
positions to some standard format and then try a bunch of different
applications: Mapnik, MapBox, MapServer's shp2img program.

Cheers,

[Bill Janssen]

This list is just about discussing the development and use of owslib,
rtree, shapely, and friends, and some related Zope and Plone packages.

Sean, thanks. On gispython.org, I see a blog post

http://gispython.org/2009/10/unofficial-python-gis-sig-launched-2/

saying "Informal Python GIS SIG launched". Could you point me to
that SIG and its mailing lists (if this isn't it)?

On your #2: Shapely is only concerned with computational geometry, it
doesn't make map images. Mapscript is an archaic and complicated way
to make maps, I recommend instead that you write your geocoded
positions to some standard format

OK. What would be a good standard format to start with?

and then try a bunch of different
applications: Mapnik, MapBox, MapServer's shp2img program.

Mapnik looks great (aside from relying on scons to build), especially
this:

http://trac.mapnik.org/wiki/XMLGettingStarted#WorldPopulationXML

which looks like it could be adapted to my problem.

Bill

[Sean Gillies]

This list is just about discussing the development and use of owslib,
rtree, shapely, and friends, and some related Zope and Plone packages.

Sean, thanks. ?On gispython.org, I see a blog post
http://gispython.org/2009/10/unofficial-python-gis-sig-launched-2/
saying "Informal Python GIS SIG launched". ?Could you point me to
that SIG and its mailing lists (if this isn't it)?

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/python-gis-sig

Traffic there has just about ceased. Stack Overflow, I'm telling you ;)

On your #2: Shapely is only concerned with computational geometry, it
doesn't make map images. Mapscript is an archaic and complicated way
to make maps, I recommend instead that you write your geocoded
positions to some standard format

OK. ?What would be a good standard format to start with?'

The venerable shapefile can't be beat, though more and more
applications are beginning to support rendering from JSON formats.

and then try a bunch of different
applications: Mapnik, MapBox, MapServer's shp2img program.

Mapnik looks great (aside from relying on scons to build), especially
http://trac.mapnik.org/wiki/XMLGettingStarted#WorldPopulationXML
which looks like it could be adapted to my problem.
Bill

I'm dissatisfied wtih scons too, but Mapnik sure does make pretty
maps. I overheard a developer talking about binaries coming soon for
more platforms.

Cheers,