00:00.41 archpodnet Welcome back to the arche tech podcast episode 85 and we're talking with Ed Gonzalez tenant about getting started with qgis so you've got q Js installed on your system where do you go next right? I mean obviously you want to manipulate some data that you're going to bring in or something like that. But as a pro. Q Js user and somebody who teaches this are you are there any I guess settings or configurations that you would recommend before someone even decides to bring data into q Js any like plugins they need to download or something like that that would help out with how this just works. 00:34.65 Ed So you know this this is probably a good I don't know as good a point as any to plug my my archgi I um sorry my qgis for archeology. Ah Youtube it's like a playlist. So if you go to http://youtube.com/anthroyeti 00:47.38 archpodnet And. 00:53.41 archpodnet Um, ah, nice. 00:54.77 Ed That's my alter ego. Um I have a whole. It's like None videos right now. Um, that is basically it walks you through it assumes. No gis experience and it walks people through getting up and running with. Qgis specifically with the intention of doing I mean honestly like 90% or more of cultural resource management work that was really the point for me was to create a series of tutorials and quite frankly, there's probably something there that most people in crm might never use as well. Like um. 01:21.64 archpodnet Oh. 01:32.50 Ed You know people don't get to work with lidar as much as they may want to but I have several videos about working with lidar. Um, so yeah there you know there are a couple ah things that I recommend sort of straight out of the. 01:36.34 archpodnet Um, nice. 01:49.65 Ed You know, straight after installing it. Um, there's a you know qgis you expand it by adding plugins right? So if you're in an Esri Mindset you get the extensions right? And if you know you're talking dollars and cents extensions can often cost more than the the. Base esri software does so in qgis ecosystem or world. We're talking plugins and there are paid plugins. You know there are people who develop plugins that charge for them. But the vast majority of plugins are are freely developed and available for anyone. 02:09.31 archpodnet Yeah. 02:17.52 archpodnet Another. 02:27.92 Ed And so when you're in qgis. Um, you know there's ah it's a series of dropdown menus. Most people who've used Esri products particularly arcgis pro with its like ribbon interface like all Microsoft ah products now. Um, you're going to feel pretty at home in qgis. 02:42.13 archpodnet Ah, yeah. 02:46.63 Ed Right? And so you know if you want to access those plugins. Um, there's going to be a drop down menu and that dropdown menu is ah um, you know, um what? what? Ah, what's word I'm looking for um, creatively named plugins. 03:03.16 archpodnet Um, um, correct. But. 03:06.25 Ed I was trying to make that more addict right? Um, but yeah, you know it's it's It's obvious you you click it and it'll be like manage and install plugins and then you can go in there and you're going to see like a bewildering array of plugins I mean hundreds of them but some of the ones that I recommend right out of the. 03:19.12 archpodnet Um, yeah. 03:26.16 Ed Ah, the gate would be like ah quick map services right? So people who use Esri are familiar with putting base maps in their gis you know and Esri has a whole series. Of base maps right? and again like there's a topo and a terrain and satellite which is like an aerial and national geographic right? The ones a lot of people have used um other people you know anytime you've you've you've gone to maps http://google.com. Um, those are base maps. The cool thing. Is when you install this and it's one of the first videos it's in 1 of the none videos that I put up there. Um, you get access to dozens of base maps. You actually get access to all the Esri base maps. 04:03.51 archpodnet Um, you know guys. 04:12.97 Ed All the Google base maps and like a couple dozen or more other ones Openstreetmap and so forth and I will be honest and again you know I hope nobody from esri comes after me or no ezri users get upset. But. I have found the esribae maps load far faster in qgis than they do even in Esri products themselves so you know and it's really neat to watch that to add that plugin once you've done it. You understand how this works. 04:32.79 archpodnet Okay. 04:43.65 archpodnet Other. 04:45.90 Ed I Mean it's sort of like you open a window in qgis and it's like shopping for extensions except they're free. Um, and so any active plugin that's being maintained. 04:53.33 archpodnet Um, nice. 04:59.95 Ed By a member of you know the user community and that's not necessarily the core developers of Qgis. You know this includes just I don't know like random people but it also includes like archaeologists I mean there are archeologists. Who are actively creating plugins for qgis. So if you want to do things like V fit Analysis. You're going to probably download a plugin that was actually written and is maintained by an archeologist. 05:18.20 archpodnet Nice. 05:28.21 archpodnet There you go there you go I will so I will pause and say if anybody from Esri is listening to this. We are actively taking sponsorship and we'll be glad to advertise for you. So there you go just in case. 05:37.90 Ed Well and I cannot stress. Yeah I cannot stress the importance of supporting this podcast to you as we know? Um I can't stress honestly like all my students you know everywhere I've taught everywhere I've worked right? I've done both I've worked in crn professionally and I've taught. Ah, universities everywhere you you need to really I think it's important to be conversant in both Esri and and something else I think ah students who want to be particularly well-positioned to do like geospatial archeology as either a researcher or a professional. 06:05.45 archpodnet Um, yeah. 06:15.84 Ed They should really be exploring both of those of these software ecosystems because um, you know for me personally I'm in a research environment I have if I'm honest I have the luxury that I can be fully open source and you know most of the time. 06:19.49 archpodnet May have. 06:30.43 archpodnet Right. 06:34.96 Ed Like 90% of what happens in a crm um outfit can be done in qgis but you know if you know how to do it and you have the extensions and Esri is there and we all know what deadlines mean they mean something completely different in a professional capacity than they often do in an academic setting. Um, you you can't sort of you know like but I'm just going to experiment with this for six months until it works you. You have to have it done and I think the the students who are conversant in both ecosystems are are very well positioned so you know again, yeah, Esri or as their users are listening. We're talking about qgis because it's cool. But I think you become a particularly powerful user if you're if you're familiar you know with both. 07:19.11 archpodnet Yeah, for sure helps to divers diversify in anything that you're doing to be honest, yeah all right? So any other you you started with the one and I'm I'm writing these down in our show notes in case, anybody's following along in those. 07:24.57 Ed Absolutely, That's the maker mentality I think. 07:36.95 archpodnet Um, any other plugins. You would recommend people download right? off the bat or just maybe some of your favorites. 07:40.44 Ed Well I would say one of my so I have yeah a number of ones that I I use from time to time. Um, honestly, a lot of times if you're you know, looking at these plugins and you want something to happen like I want a view shed analysis Right. You're going to see and even if you type in view shed into like the plugin Search. You're going to see something called Visibility analysis and that is something that's actually being maintained by an archeologist and gives you a lot of those spatial. 08:06.28 archpodnet Okay. 08:17.61 Ed Analyst functions that you're familiar with in Esri. Um, and in fact I can see here I'm looking at it I pulled it up on my my machine I can see that it was last updated April of this year right? So it's it's being maintained. Um and I've used this and you know other. 08:19.64 archpodnet Okay, nice. 08:28.30 archpodnet Wow, That's impressive. 08:37.70 Ed But would other ones be There is a um I think the ah the abbreviation it's scp. But it's the semi-automatic classification plugin right? The name you you have no idea what it would mean? Um, but yeah. 08:51.26 archpodnet But that's a catchy title. 08:55.88 Ed Um, but it's ah yeah, that's the name of my next band semiautomatic classification plugin are you ready to rock? No um um I mean are you ready to rock sentinel None and 3 images and landsat images then you know. 09:00.40 archpodnet Are. 09:11.30 archpodnet Um, my god. 09:15.00 Ed Um, and that's what it is. It's it's a plugin that allows you to you know, create your logins on you know, like the European Union websites for the sentinel imagery um or earth explorer websites for the us landsat data right. Um, we' at lsat nine has been launched. We're starting to see data from that. So if you're working in an area where doing and um, what is ndvi so natural difference. Oh I think end natural difference vegetation index I might be messing that up. 09:43.51 archpodnet Um, I don't yeah. 09:51.71 Ed But um, you know, basically if you want to look at vegetation and how it's changed and with some of this data. It now goes back 50 years um you know I'm working in it with the US forest service in the Ocala national forest and we're very interested to see how. 09:59.89 archpodnet Ah. 10:09.77 Ed None has changed part of that is it allows us to look at human activity right? like timber cuts but it also lets us look at like how are things changing from year to year. You know the climate's changing. Um and we can see that reflected in vegetation. So this plugin. 10:16.10 archpodnet No. 10:27.33 archpodnet Nice. 10:29.69 Ed Ah, scp if you go you know or search for it in the plugin. It's semiautomatic classification. It. It's really cool. It literally allows you to set an area then you can preview satellite images from all of these different satellite. Um, you know different satellites that are circling the globe doing. Various forms of typically multispectral imagery and you can use it to do all sorts of cool stuff. Um, it can literally if you're not familiar with satellite imagery. It comes in Bands. You combine those bands in different ways to produce things like you know. The the sort of real color image. What it looks like a photograph but you can do infrared you can do these other sorts of Vegetation Indexes. Um, and you know a lot of archaeologists have used this around the world to look at Land use environment. So human environment interaction and so forth. 11:09.27 archpodnet Oh yeah. 11:25.80 Ed And that's there and you can literally say hey I want to download these X number of images for this area and I want you to automatically create real-world colors and infrared and every and it just spits it out and adds it to qgis automatically. 11:45.12 archpodnet That's really cool. 11:45.31 Ed And and then the other one I would say the other one I I suggest people use is it's this little plugin called quegi is to web like None like literally the number None qgis 2 web all None word and that literally lets you take. Whatever map document you have open and just export it to a directory and then you can upload that directory to like your web host and if you don't have a web host you can do it to github and then it literally turns your map document. Into an interactive online map that you can share with anybody anywhere and you know it's really cool and so like for public outreach I mean you know archeologists we have to be careful about what we share of course but the ability to share a map with. 12:24.61 archpodnet Nice that is really sweet. 12:35.14 archpodnet Sure. 12:41.13 Ed Anyone for free. That's interactive I think is really powerful I mean you try to do that with Esri and you're talking about math credits and you know constant licensing you know, paying for those credits and so forth. Um. 12:51.46 archpodnet No. 12:57.44 Ed And again, if you're in an academic setting or you're in a setting that has a relationship with Esri or you have plenty of money that's fine, but you know I'm always thinking about like the local history. You know history society or the small group or the group that's like we can't we can't commit to paying an annual fee for anything. 13:15.94 archpodnet Sure. 13:17.43 Ed Um, these are the sorts of tools that I think come into play in those situations. 13:23.50 archpodnet That's really cool all right? Well we're going to move on with some steps to go from here now that you've got your base maps and your plugins and you're ready to go. We're going to see what the next step is and I'm guessing it's bringing in your own data and we'll talk about that on the other side of the break back in a minute.