• Open Source tags:
• family

Just a quick non-technical blog post.

My wife and I would like to introduce Harrison Mark Woodrow. The newest edition to our family.

Nothing has ever come close to how nervous I was yesterday morning, not knowing if Stace would finally be induced and we would have our little man. It was a long 13 hour labour but at 11:53pm (DST) 14/02/12 in Tweed Hospital, Australia little Harrison was born with all his cuteness.

All I can say is thank science for all the handy painkillers that have been created/made/found. That Epidural is one handy analgesia. Seeing my wife in so much pain before the Epidural was one of the hardest things I have ever had to the deal with.  Ripping my heart out, hard.

Both Harrison and Mum are doing well.

Just a quick non-technical blog post.

My wife and I would like to introduce Harrison Mark Woodrow. The newest edition to our family.

Nothing has ever come close to how nervous I was yesterday morning, not knowing if Stace would finally be induced and we would have our little man. It was a long 13 hour labour but at 11:53pm (DST) 14/02/12 in Tweed Hospital, Australia little Harrison was born with all his cuteness.

All I can say is thank science for all the handy painkillers that have been created/made/found. That Epidural is one handy analgesia. Seeing my wife in so much pain before the Epidural was one of the hardest things I have ever had to the deal with.  Ripping my heart out, hard.

Both Harrison and Mum are doing well.

• Open Source tags:
• family

Just a quick non-technical blog post.

My wife and I would like to introduce Harrison Mark Woodrow. The newest edition to our family.

Nothing has ever come close to how nervous I was yesterday morning, not knowing if Stace would finally be induced and we would have our little man. It was a long 13 hour labour but at 11:53pm (DST) 14/02/12 in Tweed Hospital, Australia little Harrison was born with all his cuteness.

All I can say is thank science for all the handy painkillers that have been created/made/found. That Epidural is one handy analgesia. Seeing my wife in so much pain before the Epidural was one of the hardest things I have ever had to the deal with.  Ripping my heart out, hard.

Both Harrison and Mum are doing well.

Recently I have started reading two books, well one book and one collection of stories, on open source software and interaction design. This is all in an attempt to suck a little less at working on software, open source in particular i.e become a better person, programmer, and open source contributor.

The Books

About Face 3

The first book I started reading was About Face 3: The Essentials of Interaction Design. In my opinion this is a must read for anyone building software, or at least those who work with the UI and users.

One design principle the book covers is not leaking the Implementation Model into the UI. The Implementation Model is when the UI is designed around how the code works in the background, rather then the users mental model of the task. Most users don’t understand complex structures, or nested hierarchy, but yet we see it a lot within UI design due to it fitting the code design and the programmers view of the world perfectly well. Try explaining the branching, merging, and rebasing model of a Git tree to a non programmer and you will see what I mean.

That one design principle alone echoes strong with me, as lets be honest, most programmers are not UI designers and tend to do a pretty bad job at it, even me. When working on a feature the UI tends to be the last thing that is thought of and is just a quick interface for the code underneath.

Loss of orientation is another big thing. And what is the quickest way to get lost in a program? Dialog boxes! They popup, get in your face, most of the time have to be dismissed before you can see the results. Generally just a bad idea and people tend to get lost quick once you have more then one on the screen.

Those two principles alone are not going to make you a good UI designer but at least they give you something to ask yourself when working on a UI:

• Do I really need that button. Can’t I just do it for the user.
• Is there a reason this needs to be shown as a nested tree. Why not just a flat list. Can I do the same action with a different control.
• Do I really need a another dialog here. (This applies to annoying the user when something happens e.g non-fatal warnings or errors)

Open Advice

The second (free) book was brought to my attention by Brian on my Google+ feed, entitled Open Advice. Open Adivice is a collection of stories from people with differencing experience working on open source projects telling their stories on what they learnt and what they wish they had known when they started. The book aims to cover the answers to “”What would you have liked to know when you started contributing?”, which it does quite well.

It’s not heavy reading, but the story telling works well to bring home some of the things that everyone working on open source. Some of the stories cover things like; getting your first patch rejected; having a bad first IRC experience; writing good documentation; how to be a better community.

The book covers a range of topics so it’s a good read for everyone, regardless of your experience or knowledge area.

Those who don’t know history are destined to repeat it

Summary

So they are my two books for the start of 2012, hopefully they are a good read for you. I think in order to be good at anything you should strive, every year, to suck a little less at everything you do, even just a little bit. My role model in the software world is Scott Hanselman, generally a pretty cool dude, and has echoed a lot on his podcast this notion of learning sometime new every year to just get a little better at what you do, to become a better person and programmer.

So even if your not into learning or reading a lot, just reading these two books I can almost guarantee you will come out a better person for it.

• Open Source

Recently I have started reading two books, well one book and one collection of stories, on open source software and interaction design. This is all in an attempt to suck a little less at working on software, open source in particular i.e become a better person, programmer, and open source contributor.

The Books

About Face 3

The first book I started reading was About Face 3: The Essentials of Interaction Design. In my opinion this is a must read for anyone building software, or at least those who work with the UI and users.

One design principle the book covers is not leaking the Implementation Model into the UI. The Implementation Model is when the UI is designed around how the code works in the background, rather then the users mental model of the task. Most users don't understand complex structures, or nested hierarchy, but yet we see it a lot within UI design due to it fitting the code design and the programmers view of the world perfectly well. Try explaining the branching, merging, and rebasing model of a Git tree to a non programmer and you will see what I mean.

That one design principle alone echoes strong with me, as lets be honest, most programmers are not UI designers and tend to do a pretty bad job at it, even me. When working on a feature the UI tends to be the last thing that is thought of and is just a quick interface for the code underneath.

Loss of orientation is another big thing. And what is the quickest way to get lost in a program? Dialog boxes! They popup, get in your face, most of the time have to be dismissed before you can see the results. Generally just a bad idea and people tend to get lost quick once you have more then one on the screen.

Those two principles alone are not going to make you a good UI designer but at least they give you something to ask yourself when working on a UI:

• Do I really need that button. Can't I just do it for the user.

• Is there a reason this needs to be shown as a nested tree. Why not just a flat list. Can I do the same action with a different control.

• Do I really need a another dialog here. (This applies to annoying the user when something happens e.g non-fatal warnings or errors)

Open Advice

The second (free) book was brought to my attention by Brian on my Google+ feed, entitled Open Advice. Open Adivice is a collection of stories from people with differencing experience working on open source projects telling their stories on what they learnt and what they wish they had known when they started. The book aims to cover the answers to ""What would you have liked to know when you started contributing?", which it does quite well.

It's not heavy reading, but the story telling works well to bring home some of the things that everyone working on open source. Some of the stories cover things like; getting your first patch rejected; having a bad first IRC experience; writing good documentation; how to be a better community.

The book covers a range of topics so it's a good read for everyone, regardless of your experience or knowledge area.

Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it

Summary

So they are my two books for the start of 2012, hopefully they are a good read for you. I think in order to be good at anything you should strive, every year, to suck a little less at everything you do, even just a little bit. My role model in the software world is Scott Hanselman, generally a pretty cool dude, and has echoed a lot on his podcast this notion of learning sometime new every year to just get a little better at what you do, to become a better person and programmer.

So even if your not into learning or reading a lot, just reading these two books I can almost guarantee you will come out a better person for it.

• Open Source

Recently I have started reading two books, well one book and one collection of stories, on open source software and interaction design. This is all in an attempt to suck a little less at working on software, open source in particular i.e become a better person, programmer, and open source contributor.

The Books

About Face 3

The first book I started reading was About Face 3: The Essentials of Interaction Design. In my opinion this is a must read for anyone building software, or at least those who work with the UI and users.

One design principle the book covers is not leaking the Implementation Model into the UI. The Implementation Model is when the UI is designed around how the code works in the background, rather then the users mental model of the task. Most users don't understand complex structures, or nested hierarchy, but yet we see it a lot within UI design due to it fitting the code design and the programmers view of the world perfectly well. Try explaining the branching, merging, and rebasing model of a Git tree to a non programmer and you will see what I mean.

That one design principle alone echoes strong with me, as lets be honest, most programmers are not UI designers and tend to do a pretty bad job at it, even me. When working on a feature the UI tends to be the last thing that is thought of and is just a quick interface for the code underneath.

Loss of orientation is another big thing. And what is the quickest way to get lost in a program? Dialog boxes! They popup, get in your face, most of the time have to be dismissed before you can see the results. Generally just a bad idea and people tend to get lost quick once you have more then one on the screen.

Those two principles alone are not going to make you a good UI designer but at least they give you something to ask yourself when working on a UI:

• Do I really need that button. Can't I just do it for the user.

• Is there a reason this needs to be shown as a nested tree. Why not just a flat list. Can I do the same action with a different control.

• Do I really need a another dialog here. (This applies to annoying the user when something happens e.g non-fatal warnings or errors)

Open Advice

The second (free) book was brought to my attention by Brian on my Google+ feed, entitled Open Advice. Open Adivice is a collection of stories from people with differencing experience working on open source projects telling their stories on what they learnt and what they wish they had known when they started. The book aims to cover the answers to ""What would you have liked to know when you started contributing?", which it does quite well.

It's not heavy reading, but the story telling works well to bring home some of the things that everyone working on open source. Some of the stories cover things like; getting your first patch rejected; having a bad first IRC experience; writing good documentation; how to be a better community.

The book covers a range of topics so it's a good read for everyone, regardless of your experience or knowledge area.

Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it

Summary

So they are my two books for the start of 2012, hopefully they are a good read for you. I think in order to be good at anything you should strive, every year, to suck a little less at everything you do, even just a little bit. My role model in the software world is Scott Hanselman, generally a pretty cool dude, and has echoed a lot on his podcast this notion of learning sometime new every year to just get a little better at what you do, to become a better person and programmer.

So even if your not into learning or reading a lot, just reading these two books I can almost guarantee you will come out a better person for it.

Recently I have started reading two books, well one book and one collection of stories, on open source software and interaction design. This is all in an attempt to suck a little less at working on software, open source in particular i.e become a better person, programmer, and open source contributor.

The Books

About Face 3

The first book I started reading was About Face 3: The Essentials of Interaction Design. In my opinion this is a must read for anyone building software, or at least those who work with the UI and users.

One design principle the book covers is not leaking the Implementation Model into the UI. The Implementation Model is when the UI is designed around how the code works in the background, rather then the users mental model of the task. Most users don't understand complex structures, or nested hierarchy, but yet we see it a lot within UI design due to it fitting the code design and the programmers view of the world perfectly well. Try explaining the branching, merging, and rebasing model of a Git tree to a non programmer and you will see what I mean.

That one design principle alone echoes strong with me, as lets be honest, most programmers are not UI designers and tend to do a pretty bad job at it, even me. When working on a feature the UI tends to be the last thing that is thought of and is just a quick interface for the code underneath.

Loss of orientation is another big thing. And what is the quickest way to get lost in a program? Dialog boxes! They popup, get in your face, most of the time have to be dismissed before you can see the results. Generally just a bad idea and people tend to get lost quick once you have more then one on the screen.

Those two principles alone are not going to make you a good UI designer but at least they give you something to ask yourself when working on a UI:

• Do I really need that button. Can't I just do it for the user.

• Is there a reason this needs to be shown as a nested tree. Why not just a flat list. Can I do the same action with a different control.

• Do I really need a another dialog here. (This applies to annoying the user when something happens e.g non-fatal warnings or errors)

Open Advice

The second (free) book was brought to my attention by Brian on my Google+ feed, entitled Open Advice. Open Adivice is a collection of stories from people with differencing experience working on open source projects telling their stories on what they learnt and what they wish they had known when they started. The book aims to cover the answers to ""What would you have liked to know when you started contributing?", which it does quite well.

It's not heavy reading, but the story telling works well to bring home some of the things that everyone working on open source. Some of the stories cover things like; getting your first patch rejected; having a bad first IRC experience; writing good documentation; how to be a better community.

The book covers a range of topics so it's a good read for everyone, regardless of your experience or knowledge area.

Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it

Summary

So they are my two books for the start of 2012, hopefully they are a good read for you. I think in order to be good at anything you should strive, every year, to suck a little less at everything you do, even just a little bit. My role model in the software world is Scott Hanselman, generally a pretty cool dude, and has echoed a lot on his podcast this notion of learning sometime new every year to just get a little better at what you do, to become a better person and programmer.

So even if your not into learning or reading a lot, just reading these two books I can almost guarantee you will come out a better person for it.

Gary Sherman has just published a new Python plugin for QGIS that I think people will find very handy, I know I will.  The plugin allows you to run Python scripts inside QGIS for tasks that don’t really require, or warrant, a whole plugin.

Go check out Gray’s post about the new plugin at http://spatialgalaxy.net/2012/01/29/script-runner-a-plugin-to-run-python-scripts-in-qgis/

The new plugin can be installed via the Plugin Installer using the “runner” or “script”.  The Plugin Installer is another one of my favorite plugins for QGIS, being able to push out a new plugin and know that everyone can get it is a good feeling :)

• Open Source
• qgis tags:
• FOSSGIS
• gis
• Open Source
• osgeo
• plugin
• python
• qgis
• Quantum GIS

Gary Sherman has just published a new Python plugin for QGIS that I think people will find very handy, I know I will.  The plugin allows you to run Python scripts inside QGIS for tasks that don't really require, or warrant, a whole plugin.

Go check out Gray's post about the new plugin at http://spatialgalaxy.net/2012/01/29/script-runner-a-plugin-to-run-python-scripts-in-qgis/

The new plugin can be installed via the Plugin Installer using the "runner" or "script".  The Plugin Installer is another one of my favorite plugins for QGIS, being able to push out a new plugin and know that everyone can get it is a good feeling :)

• Open Source
• qgis tags:
• FOSSGIS
• gis
• Open Source
• osgeo
• plugin
• python
• qgis
• Quantum GIS

Gary Sherman has just published a new Python plugin for QGIS that I think people will find very handy, I know I will.  The plugin allows you to run Python scripts inside QGIS for tasks that don't really require, or warrant, a whole plugin.

Go check out Gray's post about the new plugin at http://spatialgalaxy.net/2012/01/29/script-runner-a-plugin-to-run-python-scripts-in-qgis/

The new plugin can be installed via the Plugin Installer using the "runner" or "script".  The Plugin Installer is another one of my favorite plugins for QGIS, being able to push out a new plugin and know that everyone can get it is a good feeling :)

Gary Sherman has just published a new Python plugin for QGIS that I think people will find very handy, I know I will.  The plugin allows you to run Python scripts inside QGIS for tasks that don't really require, or warrant, a whole plugin.

Go check out Gray's post about the new plugin at http://spatialgalaxy.net/2012/01/29/script-runner-a-plugin-to-run-python-scripts-in-qgis/

The new plugin can be installed via the Plugin Installer using the "runner" or "script".  The Plugin Installer is another one of my favorite plugins for QGIS, being able to push out a new plugin and know that everyone can get it is a good feeling :)

The rule based rendering in QGIS has just got a make over to improve in some of the old usability issues it used to have.  Most of the improvements are UI related. If you would like to try them out you will need to grab a copy of the latest dev build (qgis-dev in OSGeo4W)

Main improvements include:

• Nested rules.  If the parent rule evaluates to false none of the child rules are applied. This replaces the priority system in the old dialog.

• Disable symbol for rules. Rules with no symbol only act as a check for the child rules e.g nothing is rendered for the rule but child rules still are (unless also disabled).

• Drag and Drop rules (multi-selection is supported).  Rules can be dragged onto other rules in order to nest them and set up a rendering hierarchy.

• Inline editing of rule labels, expressions, scales

• Overall tweaks to the dialog

As you can see in the screenshot, the rules are now organized in a tree which clearly expresses which rules should be applied and when.

In the example above, all the rules under the *Sealed *rule will only be applied if that rule is true. The old system would have you managing all rules in one big list and dealing with priorities in order to get the rules to apply right, the new dialog is a major improvement.

And the results! As you can see below, QGIS will only render the colored squares if the *Sealed *rule is true otherwise it just shows a green line.

The work was sponsored by Ville de Morges, Switzerland and developed by Martin Dobias.  Thanks to both of them for these improvements.

More info:

• See Martin's notes for a more detailed breakdown, and maybe some future stuff to come, of the improvements  http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/qgis-developer/2012-January/017909.html

Note: As this is a brand new feature there might be some bugs, or things that don't quite work as expected. If you do find something don't hesitate to file a bug report at hub.qgis.org so it can be fixed, or at least known about.

The rule based rendering in QGIS has just got a make over to improve in some of the old usability issues it used to have.  Most of the improvements are UI related. If you would like to try them out you will need to grab a copy of the latest dev build (qgis-dev in OSGeo4W)

Main improvements include:

• Nested rules.  If the parent rule evaluates to false none of the child rules are applied. This replaces the priority system in the old dialog.
• Disable symbol for rules. Rules with no symbol only act as a check for the child rules e.g nothing is rendered for the rule but child rules still are (unless also disabled).
• Drag and Drop rules (multi-selection is supported).  Rules can be dragged onto other rules in order to nest them and set up a rendering hierarchy.
• Inline editing of rule labels, expressions, scales
• Overall tweaks to the dialog

The new rule dialog

As you can see in the screenshot, the rules are now organized in a tree which clearly expresses which rules should be applied and when.

In the example above, all the rules under the Sealed rule will only be applied if that rule is true. The old system would have you managing all rules in one big list and dealing with priorities in order to get the rules to apply right, the new dialog is a major improvement.

And the results! As you can see below, QGIS will only render the colored squares if the Sealed rule is true otherwise it just shows a green line.

The rules applied

The work was sponsored by Ville de Morges, Switzerland and developed by Martin Dobias.  Thanks to both of them for these improvements.

More info:

• See Martin’s notes for a more detailed breakdown, and maybe some future stuff to come, of the improvements  http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/qgis-developer/2012-January/017909.html

Note: As this is a brand new feature there might be some bugs, or things that don’t quite work as expected. If you do find something don’t hesitate to file a bug report at hub.qgis.org so it can be fixed, or at least known about.

• Open Source
• qgis tags:
• FOSSGIS
• gis
• map-rendering
• mapping
• Open Source
• osgeo
• qgis
• Quantum GIS
• styling

The rule based rendering in QGIS has just got a make over to improve in some of the old usability issues it used to have.  Most of the improvements are UI related. If you would like to try them out you will need to grab a copy of the latest dev build (qgis-dev in OSGeo4W)

Main improvements include:

• Nested rules.  If the parent rule evaluates to false none of the child rules are applied. This replaces the priority system in the old dialog.

• Disable symbol for rules. Rules with no symbol only act as a check for the child rules e.g nothing is rendered for the rule but child rules still are (unless also disabled).

• Drag and Drop rules (multi-selection is supported).  Rules can be dragged onto other rules in order to nest them and set up a rendering hierarchy.

• Inline editing of rule labels, expressions, scales

• Overall tweaks to the dialog

As you can see in the screenshot, the rules are now organized in a tree which clearly expresses which rules should be applied and when.

In the example above, all the rules under the Sealed rule will only be applied if that rule is true. The old system would have you managing all rules in one big list and dealing with priorities in order to get the rules to apply right, the new dialog is a major improvement.

And the results! As you can see below, QGIS will only render the colored squares if the Sealed rule is true otherwise it just shows a green line.

The work was sponsored by Ville de Morges, Switzerland and developed by Martin Dobias.  Thanks to both of them for these improvements.

More info:

• See Martin's notes for a more detailed breakdown, and maybe some future stuff to come, of the improvements  http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/qgis-developer/2012-January/017909.html

Note: As this is a brand new feature there might be some bugs, or things that don't quite work as expected. If you do find something don't hesitate to file a bug report at hub.qgis.org so it can be fixed, or at least known about.

The rule based rendering in QGIS has just got a make over to improve in some of the old usability issues it used to have.  Most of the improvements are UI related. If you would like to try them out you will need to grab a copy of the latest dev build (qgis-dev in OSGeo4W)

Main improvements include:

• Nested rules.  If the parent rule evaluates to false none of the child rules are applied. This replaces the priority system in the old dialog.

• Disable symbol for rules. Rules with no symbol only act as a check for the child rules e.g nothing is rendered for the rule but child rules still are (unless also disabled).

• Drag and Drop rules (multi-selection is supported).  Rules can be dragged onto other rules in order to nest them and set up a rendering hierarchy.

• Inline editing of rule labels, expressions, scales

• Overall tweaks to the dialog

As you can see in the screenshot, the rules are now organized in a tree which clearly expresses which rules should be applied and when.

In the example above, all the rules under the *Sealed *rule will only be applied if that rule is true. The old system would have you managing all rules in one big list and dealing with priorities in order to get the rules to apply right, the new dialog is a major improvement.

And the results! As you can see below, QGIS will only render the colored squares if the *Sealed *rule is true otherwise it just shows a green line.

The work was sponsored by Ville de Morges, Switzerland and developed by Martin Dobias.  Thanks to both of them for these improvements.

More info:

• See Martin's notes for a more detailed breakdown, and maybe some future stuff to come, of the improvements  http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/qgis-developer/2012-January/017909.html

Note: As this is a brand new feature there might be some bugs, or things that don't quite work as expected. If you do find something don't hesitate to file a bug report at hub.qgis.org so it can be fixed, or at least known about.

• Open Source
• qgis tags:
• FOSSGIS
• gis
• map-rendering
• mapping
• Open Source
• osgeo
• qgis
• Quantum GIS
• styling

The rule based rendering in QGIS has just got a make over to improve in some of the old usability issues it used to have.  Most of the improvements are UI related. If you would like to try them out you will need to grab a copy of the latest dev build (qgis-dev in OSGeo4W)

Main improvements include:

• Nested rules.  If the parent rule evaluates to false none of the child rules are applied. This replaces the priority system in the old dialog.

• Disable symbol for rules. Rules with no symbol only act as a check for the child rules e.g nothing is rendered for the rule but child rules still are (unless also disabled).

• Drag and Drop rules (multi-selection is supported).  Rules can be dragged onto other rules in order to nest them and set up a rendering hierarchy.

• Inline editing of rule labels, expressions, scales

• Overall tweaks to the dialog

As you can see in the screenshot, the rules are now organized in a tree which clearly expresses which rules should be applied and when.

In the example above, all the rules under the Sealed rule will only be applied if that rule is true. The old system would have you managing all rules in one big list and dealing with priorities in order to get the rules to apply right, the new dialog is a major improvement.

And the results! As you can see below, QGIS will only render the colored squares if the Sealed rule is true otherwise it just shows a green line.

The work was sponsored by Ville de Morges, Switzerland and developed by Martin Dobias.  Thanks to both of them for these improvements.

More info:

• See Martin's notes for a more detailed breakdown, and maybe some future stuff to come, of the improvements  http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/qgis-developer/2012-January/017909.html

Note: As this is a brand new feature there might be some bugs, or things that don't quite work as expected. If you do find something don't hesitate to file a bug report at hub.qgis.org so it can be fixed, or at least known about.

Good news!

Support for MS SQL Server 2008 in QGIS is coming soon.   A native QGIS provider for MS SQL Server is currently being worked on to make using, managing, and editing SQL Server data in QGIS just as easy as PostGIS.

The work is being sponsored by the Australian company Digital Mapping Solutions. So a very big thanks to them for this great feature!

There is no ETA on when it will be added to the main QGIS build, but the provider is currently in testing stage and hopefully will be in there soon.

So if you have been itching to try SQL Server data in QGIS, hang in there as a good solution is just around the corner.

P.S The other blog posts on this topic I used ogr, this method will still work fine after the native provider is added, however the native driver will add a nicer interface including integration into the QBrowser, better optimization for the QGIS code, and hopefully same feel as the PostGIS experience.

• Open Source
• qgis tags:
• digital mapping solutions
• FOSSGIS
• gis
• ms sql server
• MS SQL Server 2008
• MS SQL Spatial
• ogr
• Open Source
• qgis
• Quantum GIS

Good news!

Support for MS SQL Server 2008 in QGIS is coming soon.   A native QGIS provider for MS SQL Server is currently being worked on to make using, managing, and editing SQL Server data in QGIS just as easy as PostGIS.

The work is being sponsored by the Australian company Digital Mapping Solutions. So a very big thanks to them for this great feature!

There is no ETA on when it will be added to the main QGIS build, but the provider is currently in testing stage and hopefully will be in there soon.

So if you have been itching to try SQL Server data in QGIS, hang in there as a good solution is just around the corner.

P.S The other blog posts on this topic I used ogr, this method will still work fine after the native provider is added, however the native driver will add a nicer interface including integration into the QBrowser, better optimization for the QGIS code, and hopefully same feel as the PostGIS experience.

• Open Source
• qgis tags:
• digital mapping solutions
• FOSSGIS
• gis
• ms sql server
• MS SQL Server 2008
• MS SQL Spatial
• ogr
• Open Source
• qgis
• Quantum GIS

Good news!

Support for MS SQL Server 2008 in QGIS is coming soon.   A native QGIS provider for MS SQL Server is currently being worked on to make using, managing, and editing SQL Server data in QGIS just as easy as PostGIS.

The work is being sponsored by the Australian company Digital Mapping Solutions. So a very big thanks to them for this great feature!

There is no ETA on when it will be added to the main QGIS build, but the provider is currently in testing stage and hopefully will be in there soon.

So if you have been itching to try SQL Server data in QGIS, hang in there as a good solution is just around the corner.

P.S The other blog posts on this topic I used ogr, this method will still work fine after the native provider is added, however the native driver will add a nicer interface including integration into the QBrowser, better optimization for the QGIS code, and hopefully same feel as the PostGIS experience.

Good news!

Support for MS SQL Server 2008 in QGIS is coming soon.   A native QGIS provider for MS SQL Server is currently being worked on to make using, managing, and editing SQL Server data in QGIS just as easy as PostGIS.

The work is being sponsored by the Australian company Digital Mapping Solutions. So a very big thanks to them for this great feature!

There is no ETA on when it will be added to the main QGIS build, but the provider is currently in testing stage and hopefully will be in there soon.

So if you have been itching to try SQL Server data in QGIS, hang in there as a good solution is just around the corner.

P.S The other blog posts on this topic I used ogr, this method will still work fine after the native provider is added, however the native driver will add a nicer interface including integration into the QBrowser, better optimization for the QGIS code, and hopefully same feel as the PostGIS experience.