[GRASS5] help with recalcitrant vector area

[Michael Barton]

I am completely at a loss.

I am simply trying to use countries of Europe that I imported from an 
ESRI shapefile. They imported more or less OK overall and seemingly 
fine for the countries of the Iberian peninsula that I want to see as 
areas. BUT only one of these shows up as an area--Portugal.

When I go into v.digit I am unable to turn Spain into an area. I place 
the centroid  point, but when I try to set a boundary line (area edge), 
it says 'no line can be found'. I've tried labeling and unlabeling 
lines. When they are labeled, I can indeed select a line that forms 
part of the boundary of Spain, but it still won't make an area. 
("failed to create area") All the nodes are snapped. I can't find a 
single break in the lines--even at high zoom levels.

I've run v.support, v.spaghetti, v.build.polylines endlessly with no 
luck. I've snapped nodes at various tolerances, auto-labeled all lines 
and removed all labels. I imported the file into GRASS 5.7. Behold 
Spain is a vector area. But when I export it back to GRASS 5.3, it 
turns back into a line.  Argh!!!

What am I missing (besides my sanity).

Michael Barton
______________________________
Michael Barton, Professor & Curator
Department of Anthropology
Arizona State University
Tempe, AZ  85287-2402
USA

voice: 480-965-6262; fax: 480-965-7671
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