Higher Education Profiling using Open Source GIS - A Primer on OpenStreetMap Data, Mapnik & OpenLayers

Higher Education Profiling using Open Source GISA Primer on OpenStreetMap Data, Mapnik & OpenLayers
Oliver O’Brien & Alex Singleton
Department of Geography
University College London

Contents
The Problem
Requirements
The Solution
OpenStreetMap Data
Mapnik
OpenLayers
Data Sources
Putting it all Together
The Completed Atlas

The Problem: Presenting the Data
A large amount of education-related spatial information available from various governmental bodies but not in a readily accessible graphical form (i.e. maps) for non-technical users.
Dept. for Schools, Children and Families
Communities and Local Government
Higher Education Funding Council for England
Higher Education Statistics Agency
Office for National Statistics
“Widening participation” initiatives require effective ways to view such data, to make decisions on target schools and areas.

Requirements I. Straightforward
Standalone GISes
Hard to use (Haklay, 2009a)
Often expensive
Require delivery of data to the client

Web GISes
Slow
Unattractive
Difficult and/or expensive to build
May require delivery of vector data to the client

“Slippy Maps”
Simple to use
Very popular
Simple to build
Powerful API (e.g. Google Maps API)

Requirements II. Accessible
Software installation
Requires time and skill
Constrained by platform
Plug-ins
Generally require a fast computer
Still some platform issues
A solution without installation or plug-ins is most accessible
HTML, CSS, AJAX
PNG images

Requirements III. Self Contained
No dependencies on third parties with constraints
Ordnance Survey “tile limits”
The “derived data” problem, Google and Ordnance Survey
Can’t put Ordnance Survey derived data on a Google Maps “mashup”
Government departments often provide data that has been geolocated from Ordnance Survey mapping (e.g. using National Grid References)
Ordnance Survey is being very active at protecting use of its data at the moment

Requirements III. Self Contained
Full control over what’s on the map
Google’s colour scheme and branding can be distracting

The Solution: An Education Atlas
Static tiles of choropleth maps
Minimal computer requirements
Scalable
Mapnik
Makes “beautiful” raster maps
OpenStreetMap data
Easily available data source to create background maps
Full control over what is included
OpenLayers
Provides the “slippy map” interface familiar to users
Self-contained

Using OpenStreetMap Data
For a background map to provide context
Will include roads, town names, coastlines
We don’t want all the data – just what we need
Ways to obtain the data
Directly from osm.org as XML, requires converting
Shapefiles produced by CloudMade or Geofabrik
Data quality and completeness
Improving rapidly (Haklay, 2009b)
Now pretty good for England (Reed, 2009)
Can always obtain a very up-to-date dataset
www.openstreetmap.org

Using Mapnik
“Mapnik is a Free Toolkit for developing mapping applications. Above all Mapnik is about making beautiful maps.” – mapnik.org
Data Sources
Shapefiles
PostGIS databases
Direct from OpenStreetMap
Tiles
Can be configured to systemically create square tiles at different zoom levels for the whole country
www.mapnik.org

Using Mapnik
Stylesheets for the cartography
e.g. minor rivers and canals
<Rule>
<Filter>[waterway]='river'
or [waterway]='canal'</Filter>
<MaxScaleDenominator>80000
</MaxScaleDenominator>
<LineSymbolizer>
<CssParameter name="stroke">#88c
<CssParameter name="stroke-width">3
<CssParameter name="stroke-linejoin”>round
<CssParameter name="stroke-linecap">round
</LineSymbolizer>
<TextSymbolizername="name"
face_name="DejaVu Sans Book" size="10"
fill="#666" halo_radius="1"
placement="line" min_distance="200"/>
</Rule>

Using OpenLayers
A way to display maps on a website
Just a simple web browser is needed
Accepts “layers” from many sources
Google Maps
Microsoft Bing, Virtual Earth, Yahoo
ArcGIS 9.3 Mapping Services
Ordnance Survey OpenSpace
More powerful (but more complex) than the popular Google Maps API
www.openlayers.org

Other Data Sources
New Popular Edition Postcoding
Government Data
Combined with UKBORDERS boundary data, to create choropleths of each educational metric
Includes the National Pupil Database with postcode, for Key Stage 4 (GCSE) and Key Stage 5 (A-Level)

Putting it all Together: Tile Generation
OpenStreetMap API
Stylesheet
Geofabrik Shapefiles
Mapnik
PostGIS
Database
Other .gov.uk
Tiles
Shapefiles
UKBORDERS
mySQL
Database
DSCF.gov.uk

Putting it all Together: The Website
Web Browsers
OpenLayers
Tiles
mySQL
Database
The layers in OpenLayers
Top: Schools (pins)
Middle: Network (B&W)
NPEMap Postcodes
Bottom: Choropleth (colours)

The Completed AtlasIDACI in Hampstead vs. Willesden, London

The Completed AtlasA-Level French Popularity in S.E. England

Putting it all Together: The Completed AtlasA-Level Geography Popularity in England

The Completed AtlasOutput Area Classification in Manchester

The Completed AtlasIDACI in Manchester

The Completed AtlasGCSE Performance in Manchester

Problems
No spatial data for independent schools or further education colleges – hence no A-Level metrics for Manchester
Tiling process is quite slow and requires ~1GB of storage space for each choropleth set
Next Steps
Bring in higher education flow data
Incorporate individual school metrics

Further Information
http://ollie.blogs.splintdev.geog.ucl.ac.uk/
References
Haklay, 2009a: Neo and Paleo GIS – is the difference in the usability culture? http://povesham.wordpress.com/category/gis-usability/
Haklay, 2009b: OpenStreetMap and OS Master Map – Beyond good enough http://povesham.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/openstreetmap-and-ordnance-survey-master-map-–-beyond-good-enough/
Reed, 2009: More on OSM Coverage http://tlatet.blogspot.com/2009/08/more-on-osm-coverage.html

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Higher Education Profiling using Open Source GIS - A Primer on OpenStreetMap Data, Mapnik & OpenLayers

by Oliver O'Brien on Aug 27, 2009

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Higher Education Profiling using Open Source GIS - A Primer on OpenStreetMap Data, Mapnik & OpenLayers — Presentation Transcript