[Qgis-user] Question on default file formats

[Alex Mandel]

It's more elaborate than that. Not all applications in the toolbox can
read Spatialite yet either (e.g. SAGA). So the intermediate is something
all the tools can use. At some point the toolbox might get developed to
were any ogr data source can be used for the intermediates, but it isn't
there yet. I ran into this issue with Postgis a couple of years ago, and
the whole point of using Postgis was to escape the limitations of the
shapefile (particularly file size).

In some ways if you use Spatialite or Postgis you don't actually need a
lot of the basic tools as those can all be done with SQL via the DB
Manager or QSpatialite.

As for Geopackage, keep in mind it's an exchange format. Even with 2.8
I've had no issues reading GPKG files in, though I've been creating them
with ogr2ogr on the command line to convert whole databases at a time
between Spatialite and other formats.

Shapefile still remains the lowest common denominator. I agree other
formats should be suggested first by the save dialog since shp can cause
data loss (date/time, field names, etc).

Thanks,
Alex


On 07/28/2015 09:04 AM, Árni Geirsson wrote:
> Thanks for the answer Jim. I understand that the shapefiles are lingua
> franca but to me that would imply that they should be used when exchange
> with other applications is needed - which is not always. But I had not
> realized that I might be constraining the set of available tools if I use
> SpatiaLite. Does this mean that if I have my date in SpatiaLite, many of
> the tools in the Processing toolbox would not be available to me?
> 
> Arni
> 
> 
> Árni Geirsson
> *Alta ehf* // +354 582 5000 // +354 897 9549
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> 
> On Tue, Jul 28, 2015 at 3:54 PM, James Keener <jim at jimkeener.com> wrote:
> 
>> More tools support it. Spatialite wasn't supported in esri until very
>> recently and other tools may not support anything but shape files. It's
>> become a lingual franca, and like English: it's terrible, but works well
>> enough.
>>
>> Jim
>>
>> On July 28, 2015 11:38:24 AM AST, "Árni Geirsson" <arni at alta.is> wrote:
>>
>>> Hello
>>> I find it interesting that the ancient shapefile format is (or at least
>>> appears to be) the default file format for QGIS when SpatiaLite seems to be
>>> a much more capable format. I have been using mostly shapefiles and when
>>> using for example the tools under the vector menu, intermediate results are
>>> saved as shapefiles, leading to a big pile of files after a short session
>>> of vector processing. Now, I have discovered that by using the processing
>>> tools the intermediates can be temporary files (still shapefiles, just
>>> hidden away in a temporary folder). After saving a temporary file as a
>>> SpatiaLite file, I can enter field names longer than 10 characters but I
>>> can not add a text field that accommodates more than 255 characters.
>>> So my question is: Why is the shapefile format the default?
>>>
>>> I have also noticed that with 2.10 I can save in Geopackage format. Does
>>> that mean that support for this format has improved?
>>>
>>> Any insights are highly appreciated.
>>>
>>> Arni Geirsson
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>>
>>> Qgis-user mailing list
>>> Qgis-user at lists.osgeo.org
>>> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/qgis-user
>>>
>>>
>> --
>> Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.
>>
> 
> 
> 
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