WeedMap pro users - Can weed points and polygons be extracted for use in other GIS clients?

Question

Are there any users out there of the WeedMap Pro product? I know a lot of local councils in Australia use this for weed management.

I am involved with a regional weeds committee involving a number of councils. Each council is putting forward their weeds infestation layers to produce a region wide map, however the councils are using WeedMap pro and apparently they cannot extract their data for use outside of WeedMap. This doesn't sound right? You would think there has to be some way of extracting the spatial representations of these infestations!

I have been in contact with the WeedMap people (because we are actually looking at the product ourselves - its quite cool, but this kind of issue annoys me!) and they said the product uses a SQL server 2005 and stores the geometry as text, not a db specific spatial data type. Also that they don't allow direct access to the database due to security.

Is there anyone out there using WeedMap pro that knows a way around this? Even if all I end up with is a list of coordinates for points, and polygon centroids that would be acceptable.

Thanks

Ando

Answer 1

Thanks for the question. There are many WeedMap Pro users who have all the access to their data that they want. A key feature of the architecture of WeedMap Pro is to support open access to all elements of the data.

It is really designed to centralise all the data in a robust database from concurrent users so that it can be leveraged in any way that an organisation wants. The users design the database and at the end of the day it is their data. Perhaps you are asking the wrong type of user? As it leverages SQL Server - of course the data is open and available.

The design of WeedMap Pro came from consultation with the Local Government Weeds Officers as well as their GIS and IT staff. Secure links and permissions protect information from those who are unauthorised, but outside of that the reporting and other data base integration models can be used to regularly gain access to all the data in the WeedMap Pro management system.

It is a really great product with over 17 years of user satisfaction to commend it. What else do you need to know?

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Just quickly, regarding your statement: " Even if all I end up with is a list of coordinates for points, and polygon centroids that would be acceptable."

Answer: This is too easily achieved with a quick custom report from WeedMap Pro with a save as Excel format too.

The WeedMap Pro development team would build you an export or a live link to suit your specific GIS requirements if you ask them.

Answer 2

It wouldn't matter really, as you can extract the data as text or anything else, in SQL Server.

I would request a DB dump, of their SQL Server 'Weed' data and access the geography there. You could also simply request their data as an insert file and go from there.

I would imagine, givne the ease of getting data from SQL Server, that the councils are either having a skill shortage or don't want you to get the data; either issue will be problematic for you, so I would suggest you liase withthem in order to get the data; offer assistance, offer alternative solutions, offer to do the work, if you are that desperate for it. I have even sent a DB query to people before and asked them to wrap the results up in a text file and disseminated the data from there. I hate the word, but I think you'll need to be proactive to get this data.