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New Course: Google Tools for GIS Applications

I am pleased to announce a new course titled “Google Tools for GIS Applications“. This course is an overview of Google Cloud Platform tools, analytical tools, and mapping API’s that may be of interest to geospatial professionals.  The course is broad rather than deep.  My goal is to show you how to get started with many different products with an emphasis on geospatial applications.  In many cases there are existing courses that cover the details but with little information on geospatial applications and this course is intended to fill in those gaps.

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What can GeoPandas do for you?

GeoPandas is a Python package that extends the very popular Pandas package with the ability to read, analyze, and visualize geospatial data.  Like Pandas, GeoPandas is generally used within a Jupyter notebook which provides a powerful framework for documenting your analysis workflow.  Over the past few years I have moved increasingly towards using GeoPandas for any analysis project as I have found it to have many advantages over traditional desktop GIS approaches. (See my blogpost Geospatial Data Science vs GIS for more information)

Some basic knowledge of Python is required to use GeoPandas however you do not need to be an expert programmer to take advantage of GeoPandas. Python provides the syntax necessary to call GeoPandas methods but most GeoPandas code will be very simple and easy to read and understand.  As such it is a great way to learn to use Python. Continue reading “What can GeoPandas do for you?”

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New Course: Geospatial Data Science with Python: GeoPandas

Get started with the latest Geospatial Data Science tools and  learn what all the hype is about.  This approach provides a stark contrast to traditional desktop GIS analysis methods.  In this course we use Jupyter Notebooks to provide an interactive python coding environment, and GeoPandas to read, store, analyze, and visualize our data. Continue reading “New Course: Geospatial Data Science with Python: GeoPandas”

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New Course: QGIS Plugin Development with Python

QGIS plugins allow you to extend the QGIS toolset to fit your own specific needs, or to develop general purpose tools that solve common problems that others may be facing.  Although you can do quite a lot with Python in QGIS without developing a plugin (see Automating QGIS 3.xx with Python), plugins allow you to develop beautiful graphical user interfaces using PyQt5, and make your solutions easily available to other people.

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New Course: Survey of python for GIS applications

Thanks for your interest in my new course on Python for GIS applications. This course is intended to provide a broad overview of the python programming language and the python ecosystem, especially for geospatial applications. The goal is to provide you with an understanding of how all the pieces work together and provide a starting point from which you can explore specific packages on your own. Continue reading “New Course: Survey of python for GIS applications”

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Do I need to know how to code to be a GIS professional?

The short answer is no. But it will help you more than you can imagine. The GIS world doesn’t need everyone to be coders. Most GIS software is sufficiently complex that one could easily spend their entire careers working with one program and never use all of it, let alone have to improve on it.  It would certainly be possible to specialize in a specific aspect of GIS or a specific type of analysis and never learn to write your own code.  If the thought of programming sends tremors of fear down your spine, fear not. You will always be needed. Continue reading “Do I need to know how to code to be a GIS professional?”