What free programs should every GIS user have installed?

Question

I'm not necessarily referring to ESRI extensions or open-source products, but others that increase your productivity and ability to handle GIS tasks.

For example, Notepad++ for writing code snippets or editing XMLs. Paint.NET for quick graphic editing.

Answer 1

• Google Earth, for viewing and creating KMZ/KML files
• Trimble Sketchup, for creating 3D models
• PointVue LE, Fusion/LDV, LAStools, for viewing LAS (LiDAR) files in 3D
• PyScripter, for Python scripting
• ArcGIS Diagrammer, for designing geodatabases and modifying schemas (ESRI XML workspace documents)
• Visual Studio Express (C# or VB.NET), for .NET development
• SharpDevelop, alternative IDE to Visual Studio for .NET development -- also handy for converting between VB.NET and C#
• TortoiseSVN, TortoiseCVS, TortoiseGit, or TortoiseHg for version control on Windows
• Oracle SQL Developer, for poking around the back end of ArcSDE, running queries, etc.
• PrimoPDF, for printing/appending to PDFs
• LightShot, for quickly taking and uploading screenshots, or GreenShot which is similar but quite a bit more powerful/customizable (thanks @Mike Toews for mentioning it in one of the comments).
• VLC media player, for desktop video recording and video playback
• MSI Afterburner, for 3D video recording
• VirtualDub, for basic non-linear video editing
• XnView, GIMP, Paint.NET, and InkScape for various graphics tasks (each has their own strong suits)
• FileZilla, for FTP sites
• 7-Zip, for ZIP/RAR files
• UnxUtils - For a lightweight (native Win32) port of common GNU utilities like "tail" and "grep". Tail is great for displaying log files in realtime, while grep is a powerful (regular expressions-based) text search tool.

Answer 2

GIMP and INKSCAPE

I use these two for cartographic purposes.

Gimp has good raster support (until they get huge/GB in size, then you run it on a linux OS!) and Inkscape handles vectors really well.

Answer 3

For documentation and screen grabs and copying workflows to video, then Snagit and Camtasia are used regularly by me. These may not be GIS specific but a must in my world.

Answer 4

Fiddler is excellent.

Update

Suppose I'm looking at a Web App, like Esri's Redistricting Online ...

... and I become curious about the mapservices it uses. I can fire up Fiddler and see what Urls it is accessing.

I can right click and copy the url and paste into a web browser, since we're dealing with REST ...

http://redistricting.esri.com/arcgis/rest/services/Redistricting2010/Texas_2010/MapServer/1/query

I notice that as I add census blocks to a district, it simply does a query; it does not make a call to a geometryservice to union the blocks into a district as I would have expected. From this I can infer that Esri is holding back on us: somewhere in the client there must be code that unions geometries - but there is no such capability documented in the web SDK api.

Since there's no message on the root page of their redistricting mapservice saying I shouldn't use it, I guess I'm free to use it in my own app ... or at least until they implement the idea I've suggested.

Answer 5

For metadata and other XML files, First Object's Free XML editor (Windows) works really well.

Answer 6

• Irfanview - for making simple image edits, such as cropping screenshots. Much more useful than MS Paint
• Free JavaScript Editor - for editing JS, but also CSS, HTML, etc. Contains some great error checking functions, including a direct link to JSLint
• Firebug - priceless when debugging a web application in FireFox
• PythonWin - arguably easier debugging than Idle as it allows the use of breakpoints and "step over", "step into" handling

Answer 7

• Eclipse and PyDev for Python coding - the latest version (finally) allows you to run a script without it being in the project, and has some other great features as well (break on exception etc.). That and the almost unlimited other number of extensions that you can install in Eclipse.
• Git for version control. Free, easy, and you don't need to install any software on the server.
• TruCrypt for storing sensitive data by creating an encripted volume with a whole bunch of security options.

Answer 8

Java Topology Suite, particularly JTS TestBuider (for Windows users, make a Shortcut to C:\Program Files\JTS\jts-1.11\bin\testbuilder.bat).

With JTS TestBuilder, you can copy/paste WKT or WKB into the geometry inputs, and debug a geometry (especially if it is invalid and you want to know why) or explore spatial functions and spatial predicate operators, etc. Most of the functions developed in JTS trickle down to GEOS, Shapely, JSTS, NetTopologySuite, etc., so it is a good graphical tool to work with.

Answer 9

GDAL: GDAL - Geospatial Data Abstraction Library

When you don't know how to do it, you can usually do it with GDAL.

Answer 10

Color Oracle - a colorblindness simulator for Window, Mac and Linux. I use this for checking the "look" of my composed maps.

Answer 11

Firebug for Firefox

Inspect HTML and modify style and layout in real-time . Use the most advanced JavaScript debugger available for any browser. Accurately analyze network usage and performance. Extend Firebug and add features to make Firebug even more powerful.

http://getfirebug.com/

Like it as you can edit webpages online and see the changes instantly without re-uploading files.

This with Fiddler (mentioned already in this community wiki) are very useful and time-saving tools.

Answer 12

QGIS. Although I do most of my analysis using ESRI based tools, QGIS is extremely fast for quickly examining a shapefile, and zooming/panning/reading the attributes.

I don't mean this in a derogatory way, as QGIS is also a wonderful open-source desktop GIS; but for quick file opening/closing it's wonderful and the quickest I've found.

Answer 13

I use MapServer with batch files to generate series of maps (same layers, but different places).

Answer 14

OpenOffice/LibreOffice - I use this tool to make the maps layouts.

Answer 15

The Gdal command line tools are quite useful.

ogrinfo myshapefile.shp

gdalinfo myrasterfile.tif

ogr2ogr to convert files.

Sometimes I also use the xpath tool (provided with the gnome libxml2 library) to inspect xml/xsd/kml files:

cat my-insanely-complex-xml-file.xml | xpath "//Placename/text()"

You get the idea.

Answer 16

ColorBrewer is a great freebie for anyone who is publishing maps, even though it's not an "installed program". It allows you to pick effective, attractive color schemes based on number of classes, data types (e.g. sequential or qualitative), and many optional parameters. It also allows you to preview the color scheme with common features such as roads and city names, and export the scheme for (relatively) easy use in your software or code.

Answer 17

Hard to add much to this comprehensive list, but for web map development you might look at FlashDevelop for Flash/Flex/AIR (Windows only) and Aptana Studio 3 for Javscript etc...

Answer 18

No one mentioned GRASS GIS or SAGA GIS...

Answer 19

soapUI is a really good tool for testing SOAP and REST web services. It's designed more for building extensive test suites, but it's also a fairly quick way to run simple one-off calls to your web services.

Answer 20

Notepad++ as well as the extra settings from TWIAV.nl especially the code highlighting. Came in very handy after changing server structures as all our .wor files were broken. One short find and replace later and everything works!

Answer 21

Cygwin, for access to all of the Posix tools in a Windows environment.

Answer 22

If you want to work with SONAR data SonarWave Lite is a free solution. It was referenced on this thread on GIS SE.

Answer 23

I wonder why MAPNIK has not been mentioned yet. It is also pluged in to QGIS. Very nice tool for easily making astonishing looking maps.

Answer 24

No-one's mentioned postgresql and PostGis yet for storing, organising and manipulating geodata.

Answer 25

While it's not focused on GIS development, Rainmeter has proven to be very useful in terms of increasing productivity and monitoring system resources. I have created a GIS "sidebar" on my desktop that holds all of my development tools, as well as links to the online resources I used the most. It's nice to be able to use one location, rather than many (e.g. taskbar, bookmarks in browser, search engine).

Answer 26

For statistical analysis, there is R. An integration of R with ArcGIS provides the Geospatial Modelling Environment.

Answer 27

Self-link, but TileMill is very useful for exploring geodata, making pretty maps, doing analysis, etc. It's mainly for the presentation and exploration steps, while the heavy-lifting of analysis can be done in QGIS or similar.

Answer 28

You can use : ArcGIS Explorer

With ArcGIS Explorer, you can

• Access ready-to-use ArcGIS Online basemaps and layers.
• Fuse your local data with map services to create custom maps.
• Add photos, reports, videos, and other information to your maps. Perform spatial analysis (e.g., visibility, modeling, proximity search).

Link

Answer 29

For file management that goes beyond windows explorer, it's hard to beat eXtreme from http://textmode.cwahi.net/

for quick viewing of shapefiles, where you can see the shape and the attributes table, I use Mapbrowser from http://www.vdstech.com/mapbrowser.htm

For renaming multiple files I use http://www.fastfilerenamer.com/

Answer 30

Benjamin already mentioned SAGA GIS, but just the name so I would like to add more info about this excellent SW:

SAGA (System for Automated Geoscientific Analyses)

SAGA is also free and opensource like QGIS, but it is focused on raster data analysis and processing.

The standard modules are:

• File access: interfaces to various table, vector, image and grid file formats, including shapefiles, Esri grids (ASCII and binary), and numerous grid file formats that are supported by the GDAL library, in addition to the native SGRD format of SAGA GIS.

• Filter for grids: Gaussian, Laplacian, multi-directional Lee filter.

• Gridding: interpolation from vector data using triangulation, nearest neighbour, inverse distance. (my favourite is Multilevel B-Spline interpolation)

• Geostatistics: residual analysis, ordinary and universal kriging, single and multiple regression analysis, variance analysis.

• Grid calculator: combine grids through user defined functions.

• Grid discretisation: skeletonisation, segmentation.

• Grid tools: merging, resampling, gap filling.

• Image classification: cluster analysis, box classification, maximum likelihood, pattern recognition, region growing.

• Projections: various coordinate transformations for vector and grid data (using Proj4 and GeoTrans libraries), georeferencing of grids.

• Simulation of dynamic processes: TOPMODEL, nitrogen distributions, erosion, landscape development.

• Terrain analysis: geomorphometrical calculations such as slope, aspect, curvatures, curvature classification, analytical hillshading, sink eliminition, flow path analysis, catchment delineation, solar radiation, channel lines, relative altitudes.

• Vector tools: polygon intersection, contour lines from grid.

According to the users it can partially replace commercial tools like Spatial analyst in ArcGIS and some people say, that the hydrological tools are even better than ArcHydroTools.

In my opinion it is good choice for people who are not familiar with GRASS and who need user friendly and free solution which can share data with other GIS tools.

I use it together with QGIS and it works really nice - SAGA for raster data, QGIS for vectors and final map finishing and for quick mapping.