2.5. Bringing the data into QGIS
Prev 2. An example of regional web resources: Massachusetts, USA digital data 

2.5. Bringing the data into QGIS

Now that you have downloaded and/or converted the data, you need to input it into QGIS.

  1. Open QGIS

  2. Define the projection of the project or data frame:

    1. In the top menu, go to settings > project properties > projection.

    2. Click "Enable on the fly projection".

    3. Go to Projected Coordinate Systems > Lambert Conformal Conic > NAD83/Massachusetts Mainland (in meters). Click OK.

      Figure 2: Setting Data Frame Properties

  3. Add the vector layer bndry.shp from the main QGIS interface.

  4. Right click on the layer in the table of contents and click on properties to bring up the properties of the layer.

    1. Click the "general" tab > Spatial Reference System > Change:

      Figure 3: Setting Coordinate System

      Figure 4: Setting Datum

  5. Add the other vector layer (zoning), right click > properties.

    1. Click the "general" tab: define projection as you just did for the town boundaries.

    2. Change the name to "ZONING".

    3. Click the tab "symbology" and change the display to transparent, yellow outlined polygons:

      Figure 5: Changing polygon display

    4. Click the "labels" tab, and select "ZONECODE" as the field containing label. Be sure to check the display labels box.

      Figure 6: Labelling zoning polygons

    5. This is what the codes mean (extracted from the file "zn8by.dbf")

      Figure 7: Table with codes descriptions

  6. Add the raster layer (orthophoto quad).

    1. Change the name of the layer to CAMPUS.

      Figure 8: Changing raster display

  7. In the table of contents, arrange the order of the different layers.

    1. Your project display looks more or less like this, right? If it does, you have completed these procedures correctly.

      Figure 9: This is the project display so far

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2.4. Uncompressing the data Home