[Qgis-us-user] Is QGIS right for me?

[Ian Feinhandler]

Hello, and thank you in advance for any replies.
Background: I am a college professor looking for software to do some basic map-making - primarily for use in the classroom, but also for my own research. My college has moved to using free, open-access textbooks, and the maps are often out of date, and of poor quality compared to those found in expensive textbooks. I want to produce maps that contain current data, and that are easy for students to interpret. I took GIS classes in graduate school, but that was 20 years ago. I do not have a huge amount of time to learn new software. 

Intended Use: I want to take open-access data from sources like the U.N. Human Development Report, the World Bank, etc. and map the data by country, or by geographic units within a country (state, county, etc.). The open-access data is typically available in Microsoft Excel, which is the format I prefer to download, as I am quite comfortable doing basic data-analysis in Excel, and producing tables and graphs in Excel for displaying the data. 

Key Question: Can I upload an Excel file to QGIS? 

Very Simple Example: I have an Excel file with country names in column 1, and their GDP in column 2, and their rank in column 3. I want to make a map of the world that presents each country by GDP, using five different shades of a color (e.g. the darker the color, the higher the GDP). I assume that there are shapefiles that list countries with a "country code" (e.g. Afghanistan = 1, Albania = 2, or something like that). If I had a fourth column in my Excel file that was "country code" would I be able to upload the Excel file to QGIS and quickly produce a simple map? 

Online Compatible? It would be pretty cool if I could post the maps online, and have them be interactive, so that a student could click on a country and see the specific data (e.g. GDP, as mentioned above). This would be a nice feature, but not a necessary one.

Thank you very much for taking the time to read through this long post, and for any advice. 

Ian
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