NIWA (National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research in New Zealand) has
released a free mapping tool for anyone to download and use with NIWA (or
other) data. See: https://www.niwa.co.nz/software/quantum-map for information,
user guides, to provide feedback and to download a Windows installer for the
application.
Quantum Map is a simplified version of the popular Quantum GIS application,
with the more complicated analytical capabilities removed, creating an easy to
use desktop mapping application. Both Quantum Map and Quantum GIS are Open
Source applications, available as free downloads for anyone to use.
Quantum Map includes a custom NIWA tool which provides direct access to map
data that NIWA is making available using open Web Services. This means that
just like your
browser can open a web page, Quantum Map can open layers of map data provided
over the internet and plot them directly on your screen. Such datasets include
climate and hydrometric stations, freshwater biodiversity data, Bay of Islands
survey data, etc. NIWA has an ongoing programme to make more of its datasets
available using this approach. To enable field or offline use, the tool allows
you to store the web data locally on your computer to use as desired, and to
update such local versions as requitred.
Unlike web portals, Quantum Map can be used offline and to display local
datasets, which can be added to the map just like the web based layers. This
approach allows users with private or confidential data to visualise their data
along with NIWA and other data, without sending the sensitive data anywhere but
their own PC, or providing anyone else with access to the data.
NIWA will be continuing to make more data available via these services, and
will be further enhancing
Quantum Map to provide more functionality for users to access and work with
the data.
For those who already have their own GIS or mapping applications, these can
generally already support the Web Services uses, so the data can be used in
your existing desktop or web mapping applications. A growing list of the
available datasets (not just from NIWA) is
at https://www.niwa.co.nz/ei/feeds/report
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