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I am trying to export polygon coordinates from a shapefile to a CSV file, but so far all my attempts have failed. I have found numerous questions and answers about this, but none have solved my problem.

I have downloaded the file

www.naturalearthdata.com/http//www.naturalearthdata.com/download/10m/cultural/ne_10m_admin_0_countries.zip

which is a shapefile containing a basic world map. I have imported the shapefile into QGIS by adding a vector layer, and then I try to export the polygons with coordinates for each country. The tips that I have found suggest either saving the layer by right-clicking it and then selecting Save as or opening the attribute table and copying it into Excel. If I try these I only get master information with one row for each country in the map.

Does anyone know how I can retrieve detail information for each country containing the polygons with coordinates?

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    So you want coordinates for all vertices ("corners") for all polygons exported? That could be quite a lot of rows. What you probably get now is the centroid. Can I ask what you need this for - maybe there's an easier way to accomplish what you want to do?
    – Martin
    Commented Aug 6, 2014 at 7:56
  • Would Well know Text(WKT) representation be enough for you?
    – vinayan
    Commented Aug 6, 2014 at 7:59
  • I am not familiar with WKT, but from what I have found on the web it seems that it will be a bit difficult for me to use. I need the data in a csv file. The shape file I am using here is only for testing, I will not use it in my work. I am working with some special geograpghical zones related to fisheries. These zones are stored in a database. I would like to import the shape file data into the database for comparison purposes. I was hoping that I could find a way of exporting the coordinates for one chosen country in my test file to a csv file and then import it into the data base.
    – Sveinung
    Commented Aug 6, 2014 at 11:05

4 Answers 4

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Use the plugin MMQGIS to export geometry to csv. I just try with your file, it works perfectly.

enter image description here

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  • Great! I think this may solve my problem! Here I am able to connect attributes and nodes. The real files that I will be working with will be much smaller than my very large test file. I think this is just what I was looking for. Thanks a lot! Unfortunately my reputation is still too low to vote anything useful.
    – Sveinung
    Commented Aug 6, 2014 at 11:38
  • This worked for me and saved time. Thanks!
    – Hesham Eraqi
    Commented Mar 21, 2023 at 0:10
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Choose Layer > Save As... with format as CSV. Make sure 'Layer Option', 'GEOMETRY' is set to AS_WKT in the 'Save vector layer as...' window. The first column of the CSV file will now include polygon coordinates.

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  • That worked! I got the coordinates! However, it will be a bit awkward using them as I need the data in a CSV file. I don't know if there is any easy way of converting from this format to csv. But this was very useful. Thanks!
    – Sveinung
    Commented Aug 6, 2014 at 11:15
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You can use this simple app to load a shapefile, and then export as X/Y's

http://www.qarah.com/shapeviewer/#download

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  • That worked too! But here it seems I will have some problems connecting the coordinates to a country. If I export the attribute table with the country names I can find no obvious relation between the two data sets. I need both the master and detail information. But this is a neat little app that I will continue using. Thanks!
    – Sveinung
    Commented Aug 6, 2014 at 11:21
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A Greek way: A) Select the feature you want, copy it and paste onto a word processor. B) delete the first part wkt_geom… and the parenthesis at the end so there are only numbers. C) Replace: ,(comma and one space) with ^p (MS word) or \n (Libre office-Open office) D) replace one space with comma. You get the list of coordinates in the X,Y format.

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