[Xastir] Complete set of TIGER 2006 SE shapefiles now available!

[Tom Russo]

On Mon, May 21, 2007 at 12:33:25PM -0400, we recorded a bogon-computron collision of the <bickley at baybroadband.net> flavor, containing:
> You guys have been really patient in answering several questions form this
> rank newcomer to Linux and Xastir.  Am I good for another one?
> 
> What are the benefits of these new offerings versus what was already out
> there?  Why would I want to use these versus the Online tigermap.geo option?
> A Google search was no help..

The online tiger maps require that you be on line to use them.  The shapefiles
can be stored locally and used when you're mobile.

The online tiger maps are in sinusoidal projection and are in fact incorrectly
displayed in Xastir, which assumes that the map it grabs is a nice 
rectangle in lat/lon.  This mismatch between reality and assumption is most
obvious if you try to zoom far out and overlay accurate vector layers.  At
very close zooms this distortion is not quite so obvious, but it's always there.

Finally, these files are vector layers, and that means you can mix and match 
them with other types layers from other sources to create more customized
map displays --- you could, for example, overlay them on top of aerial 
photos, and all of the photos would show through with the vectors laid on top.  
The online tiger maps are all raster layers, and can only be
used as a single base layer.  It is not possible to use the online tiger
maps and the online aerial photos at the same time.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: xastir-bounces at xastir.org [mailto:xastir-bounces at xastir.org] On Behalf
> Of Tom Russo
> Sent: Monday, May 21, 2007 10:34 AM
> To: xastir at xastir.org
> Subject: [Xastir] Complete set of TIGER 2006 SE shapefiles now available!
> 
> 
> Thanks to the efforts of Jason Winningham and his cluster of linux
> workstations, the entire set of TIGER/Line 2006 Second Edition files have
> been converted to shapefile format --- both polyline and polygon
> conversions.  
> 
> Thanks to Gerry Creager, these are available for download now at 
> ftp://aprs.tamu.edu/pub/TIGER_2006_SE/
> 
> The script that I providede to Jason lays out the converted files somewhat 
> differently from the older conversions.  Each state has a zipfile which will
> 
> create a directory tree for that state,
> e.g.:
> 
>    NM/
>    NM/Polylines
>    NM/Polygons
> 
> In each of the Poly* directories will be shapefiles named by whatever the
> TIGER/Line file had as the title in the metadata file for each 
> county/parish/whatever in that state.
> 
> I set it up to save the states this way to make tweaking the map properties
> a bit easier --- you can set common map properties like min/max zoom level
> by selecting whole directories, whereas the older 2003 conversions required
> that you click all the individual "_Poly" shapefiles to set polygon
> properties, then unselect them, and click all the unqualified shapefiles to
> set polyline properties.  I find the new layout a bit more usable.  Your
> milage may vary. If you hate this, you can do a mass rename to the old
> style, renaming all the files in the Polygons directory to have "_Poly" and
> moving them into a 
> flattened directory.
> 
> Thank you, Jason and Gerry.
> 
> -- 
> Tom Russo    KM5VY   SAR502   DM64ux          http://www.swcp.com/~russo/
> Tijeras, NM  QRPL#1592 K2#398  SOC#236 AHTB#1
> http://kevan.org/brain.cgi?DDTNM "And, isn't sanity really just a one-trick
> pony anyway? I mean all you get is  one trick, rational thinking, but when
> you're good and crazy, oooh, oooh,  oooh, the sky is the limit!"  --- The
> Tick _______________________________________________
> Xastir mailing list
> Xastir at xastir.org http://lists.xastir.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xastir
> 

-- 
Tom Russo    KM5VY   SAR502   DM64ux          http://www.swcp.com/~russo/
Tijeras, NM  QRPL#1592 K2#398  SOC#236 AHTB#1 http://kevan.org/brain.cgi?DDTNM
"And, isn't sanity really just a one-trick pony anyway? I mean all you get is
 one trick, rational thinking, but when you're good and crazy, oooh, oooh,
 oooh, the sky is the limit!"  --- The Tick