[GRASS-user] Geodatabase and GRASS GIS - how to get the data out of a geodatabase

[William Kyngesburye]

Markus,

I was trying to get mdbtools working on OSX this weekend (yet another  
attempt), and thought your R method might be an alternative.  But that  
also requires mdb-tools - that's where mdb-tables tool is found.

Agustin: If I remember right, you're on OSX?  If so, you are out of  
luck, I have yet to find or compile a working MDB library for OSX.

On Aug 9, 2009, at 9:45 AM, Agustin Diez Castillo wrote:

> I've tried the R solution w/o success, see below
>
> On Aug 9, 2009, at 8:35 AM, Markus Neteler wrote:
>
>> On Sun, Aug 9, 2009 at 3:23 AM, stephen sefick<ssefick at gmail.com>  
>> wrote:
>>> I have a GIS database that is in .mdb format (microsoft access).  I
>>> have found mdb tools through my debian package manager, but now I
>>> don't know how to get the data out of the the database and into  
>>> GRASS.
>>>  There are x and y coordinates and other things in the database.  Is
>>> there a tutorial on how to get the data into GRASS from this  
>>> database?
>>
>> I see two ways:
>>
>> 1) via unixODBC
>> For Linux, you need "unixODBC" to be installed (your preferred  
>> distribution
>> most likely contains this package). As done, get also the MDB Tools,
>> compile it with unixodbc support enabled if not already done.
>> Then follow instructions at http://www.gdal.org/ogr/drv_pgeo.html
>>
>> 2) via R
>>
>> R
>> install.packages('Hmisc', dependencies=TRUE)
>> library(Hmisc)
>> # Read all tables in the Microsoft Access database blabla.mdb
>> #   perhaps better change to Locale in which the .mdb file was
>> #   generated to avoid that accented table column names are
>> #   getting lost.file first
>> d <- mdb.get('/path/to/blabla.mdb')
>> contents(d)
>> for(z in 1:length(d)) print(attributes(d)$names[z])
>>
> d <- mdb.get('/path/to/blabla.mdb')
> returns to me with
> sh: mdb-tables: command not found

-----
William Kyngesburye <kyngchaos*at*kyngchaos*dot*com>
http://www.kyngchaos.com/

"Mon Dieu! but they are all alike.  Cheating, murdering, lying,  
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deign to possess - money to purchase the effeminate pleasures of  
weaklings.  And yet withal bound down by silly customs that make them  
slaves to their unhappy lot while firm in the belief that they be the  
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