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QGIS Quickstart

Quantum GIS (QGIS) is a user friendly Desktop GIS client which lets you visualize, manage, edit, analyse data and compose printable maps.

This Quick Start describes how to:

  • update an existing QGIS project
  • create a new QGIS project with a simple vector layer

Edit QGIS project

  1. Click Desktop ‣ Desktop GIS ‣ Quantum GIS.

  2. Choose File ‣ Open Project... from the menu bar.

  3. Select QGIS-NaturalEarth-Example.qgs and press Open.

    • You should see a world map.
  4. Check 10m_populated_places_simple in the Layers tree

    • Populated places are now displayed:

      ../../_images/qgis.png
  5. Double click 10m_rivers_lake_centerlines in the Layers tree.

  6. Change the color in Outline Options to a different blue tone.

  7. Press OK.

    • Rivers are now rendered in a new color.

Create a new QGIS project

  1. Choose File ‣ New Project.
  2. Click Layer ‣ Add Vector Layer....
  3. Browse to dataset /home/user/data/natural_earth/10m_admin_0_countries.shp.
  4. Press Open.
    • You should see all world countries.

What Next?

Tutorials for more advanced features of QGIS are collected as OSGeo-Live QGIS tutorials.

To learn more about QGIS, a starting point is the Documentation page on the QGIS homepage.

OSGeo-Live contains a A Gentle Introduction to GIS and the QGIS User Guide.

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