Learning guide 01 - Plan your field visit

From Wikiagro.com

In this learning guide, you will learn to plan your field visit with GeoAgro GIS. You will first download your customer folder from the NCPDB. Then, you will locate your plan area and gather information, including downloading available GIS data. This will enable you to study the area and define relevant spots, which you'll be able to upload to your GPS device.

Contents 1 Webcasts 1.1 Exercise 01 – Retrieving customer folder from NCPDB 1.2 Exercise 02 – Setting up your farm boundaries from NCPDB 1.3 Exercise 03 – Gathering GIS Data 1.4 Exercise 04 – Gathering GIS Data 2 Exercises 2.1 Where to Do the Exercises 2.2 Exercise 01 – Retrieving customer folder from NCPDB 2.2.1 Download and install GeoAgro Cplanner 2.2.2 Log in Cplanner using USDA e-authentication 2.2.3 Search for customer folders 2.2.4 Download a customer folder in read only mode 2.3 Exercise 02 – Setting up your farm boundaries from NCPDB 2.3.1 Exporting tract .XML files from NCPDB 2.3.2 Starting GeoAgro GIS 2.3.3 Importing tract .XML files into GeoAgro GIS 2.3.4 Exporting the .XML data to an ESRI shapefile 2.4 Exercise 03 – Gathering GIS Data 2.4.1 Locate and pan over your planning area 2.4.2 Check offline data availability 2.4.3 Retrieve soil data 2.4.4 Download WMS maps 2.4.5 Import an aerial image 2.4.6 Related Articles 2.5 Exercise 04 – Defining spots to visit 2.5.1 Creating a Vector Layer 2.5.2 Mark your spots 2.5.3 Import Points to GPS Device 2.5.4 Related Articles

Webcasts

Exercise 01 – Retrieving customer folder from NCPDB

Exercise 02 – Setting up your farm boundaries from NCPDB

Exercise 03 – Gathering GIS Data

Exercise 04 – Gathering GIS Data

Exercises

Where to Do the Exercises

The first step to complete the exercises in this tutorial is to set up the computer you will be working on. If you completed our Getting Started Course, your system and datasets are ready to go through this learning guide. You will be able to use our GeoAgro GIS trial version for 2 months. From now on, you are ready to begin with any learning guide you wish.

Exercise 01 – Retrieving customer folder from NCPDB

In this exercise you will learn to use Cplanner to log in the National Conservation Planning Database (NCPDB), search for customer folders, download a particular customer folder in read only mode, and finally check out the folder for editing.

Note:

You need to have a Technical Service Provider Eauthentication level 2 user & pwd, and be authorized to access your customer’s folder’s data. This requires two steps: Getting a USDA account – learn more Getting access to customer’s folders – learn more For this tutorial sample farm, you can use TSP training credentials provided by GeoAgro, to have access to the NRCS training database.

Download and install GeoAgro Cplanner

Click on this link to download the installer and unzip it.

Go to the folder where you unzipped the installer and double click on "Setup.exe" to start the installer.

The “Cplanner Setup Wizard” will start automatically. Select “Next” in the window below.

Before the installation of the program, you need to accept the two product licence agreements by clicking on “I Agree”.

In the "Choose components" window, click on both checkboxes and click on "Next".

In "Choose Install Location", click on "Install" to install to the default folder and wait for the installation to complete.

Once it's completed, click on "Close" to close the Setup Wizard.

Log in Cplanner using USDA e-authentication

Start CPlanner (Go to the start menu or double click on the CPlanner icon in your desktop).

Log in with your e-authentication user and password data and click on “Login”.

Search for customer folders

The initial screen will show you your conservation plans. Select “Palm Beach County” and click on “Go Search”.

This will bring the list of Conservation folders available for your user in Palm Beach County.

The conservation plans shown on the left panel are obtained directly from NRCS Servers. The status bar on the lower side of the screen informs you of the status of your operations.

Download a customer folder in read only mode

Move over to the left panel and click on the “Geoagro----test_001” customer folder to select it. Click on “Read Only Copy” to download a read-only copy.

You'll notice the folder you downloaded is now shown on the right panel, which contains the customer folders that are available locally (in your computer). The pink colour means it's in read-only mode.

Exercise 02 – Setting up your farm boundaries from NCPDB

In this exercise you will learn how to use Cplanner and GeoAgro GIS to download farm boundary data from the NCPDB, and import it into GeoAgro GIS.

Exporting tract .XML files from NCPDB

On the right panel, click on the downloaded folder to select it and click on “Open folder” to open it. Cplanner will open the Customer folder window.

You are now in the “Conservation Plans” tab. Go to the “Export to” menu and click in export to “XML”. A “Save file...” window will pop up. Save your file to your local disk in the default location.
Now browse to the folder you used to save the file. It is usually “C:\Documents and Settings\[YOUR USERNAME]\Local Settings\Application Data\GeoAgro\Conservation Planner”, where “YOUR USERNAME” is the username you use to log in your Microsoft Windows session. You will notice that CPlanner generates a file called “Session_Meta_Data_Dev001-------IA001.xml” and a folder called “SessionExportData”. Inside this folder there is a .xml file (Dev001-------IA001.xml) that is the correct one. Now we are going to import the available NRCS Land Units into the GIS. Please, make sure you use the file inside the folder.

Starting GeoAgro GIS

If the program is closed at the begining of this exercise, please look for the GeoAgro GIS icon at your desktop and run it by double clicking on it.

You can also run it by using the Windows^® Start menu.

Importing tract .XML files into GeoAgro GIS

First, click on the “Fields (NRCS)” layer to make active.

Then, click on the “Edit layer’s object” from the “Edition Panel” and select the option “Import data from CPlanner”. A window will pop up asking you for the location of the .xml file you want to import. Select the “Session_Meta_Data_Dev001-------IA001.xml” file that you recently exported from CPlanner and click on “Open”. Double-click on the “Fields (NRCS)” layer to zoom to land units you just imported.

Exporting the .XML data to an ESRI shapefile

You may export any layer, including your USDA xmls imports, to an ESRI shapefile. To do this, open the export menu in the right panel, then click on the option "Export layers"

Select the layer you want to export. In this case, you'll export the "Fields (NRCS)" layer. Click on the corresponding checkbox, then click on "Accept"

Select the destination for your shapefile

Once the export has been succesfully completed, you'll see the following message.

Click on "Open destination folder" to find your exported shapefile

Exercise 03 – Gathering GIS Data

In this demo you will see how you can plan your field visit with GeoAgro GIS. You will learn how to how to check your available GIS data, and to retrieve additional layers from the internet.

Locate and pan over your planning area

The first step is to locate your planing area in the GeoAgro GIS map. If you haven't done so yet, double click on the “Fields (NRCS)” data layer in the reference panel in the left to zoom to it.

Check offline data availability

At this point you will have seen that some layers appear o disappear depending on the zoom. This is predefined to improve performance, but if you are close enough to your planning area (for example, a scale below 1:15000) you will be able to see all of the available layers. To find out whether they're turned on or not, look at the small “eye” icon besides the layer name, in the References panel. If the eye is coloured, the layer is visible; otherwise it's invisible. To make a layer visible, click on the eye icon and tick the checkbox.

Retrieve soil data

We will now download soil data for our planning area. Select the “Soils” layer.

GeoAgro GIS retrieves soils data from the USDA through web feature services or WFS. Click on the “WFS” tool to begin. In the Importing window, click on the star button to see which servers are available. Now, select “NRCS Soils NAD84 Geographic”. The “Layer” dropdown menu shows which layers in the service are available for download. Select “MapUnitPolyExtended”.

Click on “OK” and wait for the download to complete. If the downloading bar does not show any progress, it might be due to the WFS server not responding. Cancel your download and try again. You should now be able to see the downloaded data.

Download WMS maps

You will now download DRG topography imagery from the USDA WMS servers. Click on “USDA DRG (Topo)” and tick the checkbox.

Click on “Update the WMS servers”. Wait for the data to download. You will see the downloaded imagery for the area.

You will now make it available for you to use it offline. Select the layer and click on the “Save current WMS image” tool.

Enter the name of the layer. Click on “Accept”.

Make “USDA DRG (Topo)” invisible by unticking the checkbox and make “Offline WMS” visible, again by clicking the checkbox.

Other available WMS layers are:

.Wetlands USDA NAIP Imagery USGS Imagery USGS DRG (Topo)

Import an aerial image

You may also import any images as long as they are georeferenced correctly. In this example we will import an aerial image. Click on the "Add new layer" button.

The "Add new layer" wizard will pop up. Select "Image", then click on "Next"

Choose a name and a layer group for your new layer.

Browse for your image, then click on "Finish" to complete importing.

Turn on the layer to see your import

Related Articles

Find objects
How to Get Imagery and Topography Data Online

Exercise 04 – Defining spots to visit

In this exercise you will learn to locate relevant spots that you should visit when you go to the field . Then you will learn how to mark them and upload them to your GPS device.

Creating a Vector Layer

The first step is to create a vector layer named GPS points which will contain the spots you selected. Click on the ‘Add New Layer’ button in the Edit menu: A dialog box will open. Select ‘Vector Layer’ as shown below and click on ‘Next’.

Fill in the form as shown below. Then click on Finish.

The new layer should be listed in the References panel under the new Field visit group:

Mark your spots

In this exercise, you will mark the two northern corners of the woods you will be working at.

Select the layer you just created (GPS Points)

Click on the “Edit layer objects” tool to open the Editing menu

Click on “Add a new object”.

Click on the northwestern corner to add your first spot

Proceed the same way to add the northeastern corner. By the end, your map should look like this:

Import Points to GPS Device

The first step is to assign an identifier to each point in the GPS points layer. Go to the GPS points layer and select all objects. Then go to the Edit Menu and click on 'Edit Selected Object Data'.

A data table will open. Complete the “Point” column with correlative numbers:

Next, go to the upper left-hand tab and click on GPS. This will display the window for the GPS Module of Geoagro GIS.

Go to the Tools menu and click on the 'Import from GIS Module' button.

Select the “GPS Points” layer in the dialog box. Click on Accept.

In the next dialog box, associate the Identifier field of the target layer with the Sampling field of the source layer. Click on Accept.

The points in the “GPS Points” layer have been imported to the map.

Click on the ‘Connect to GPS Device' button.

After connecting to the GPS, click on the ‘Export Objects to GPS Device' button.

Thus, the georeferenced points with their corresponding identifiers are stored in the GPS device and ready to be set out on site.

Related Articles

Create vector layer
Add new object
GPS Module
Import from GIS module into GPS module
Upload objects to the GPS device