Introduction

Module Goals

• Learn the basics of QGIS as a GIS software tool
• Convert spreadsheet data to a map
• Style the map to convey more information

Course requirements

Knowledge of Data Fundamentals, a course which covers the basics of data, and how to work with a spreadsheet.

And the following:

• The QGIS software (that you can download here)
• The OpenLayers plugin (installation instructions in the next lesson)
• Your dataset as a spreadsheet document, with latitude/longitude or easting/northing values. You can use this example dataset

📂 Slide deck

Introduction

According to GIS folklore, the story of GIS begins in the world of maps. A map is a simplified and conventional visual representation of real things from the real world.

The acronym GIS stands for Geographical Information System. Just as the name suggests, a GIS is a computer system which allows you to work with geographical information – just like you would use a word processor to type a document or a spreadsheet to do numerical calculations and make graphs to visualize your data.

Sometimes you have data in a spreadsheet and it has geographical information. This could be:

• names of places (countries, cities, villages),
• addresses,
• zip codes,
• geographic coordinates (in the form of latitude and longitude),
• cartesian coordinates.

Learn more about coordinates: Coordinate systems, map projections and geographic transformations

GIS allows you to create, manipulate and visualize data with a location attribute. There are several GIS applications but we will focus on QGIS. A GIS deals with two types of geographical information:

• Vector data

This is made up of either points (for instance a restaurant location), lines (for instance a road) or enclosed areas/polygons (like a forested area). The location of these features are defined by x,y coordinates and sometimes z, for 3-D features.

• Raster data

These are usually images defined by tiny squares of varying color, called pixels. This type of geographical data is important for storing map information as digital images.

If you ever wanted to visualise a dataset using a map, and explore the mapped data, this course if for you. This module will be an introduction to using QGIS to work with spreadsheet data.