Direct Interface to (Q)GIS for Mapping XRONOS Data

[MartinHinz]

Description

To enhance the functionality of XRONOS, we could implement a direct interface to (Q)GIS, allowing users to directly leverage the API to map data from XRONOS. This would streamline workflows and improve data visualization options.

Two potential approaches:

1. Create a specific endpoint serving GML in a WFS-compliant standard

• Advantages:
  • Minimal additional maintenance effort for us
  • Potentially faster data processing
• Disadvantages:
  • Querying could be more complicated for users
  • Likely to retrieve all data at once, which may be inefficient

2. Develop a (Q)GIS Plugin

• Advantages:
  • Query functionality can be easily provided to users
  • Data retrieval could be simplified to a few clicks, avoiding the need to manually input specific URLs in GIS
• Disadvantages:
  • Requires ongoing maintenance of the plugin
  • Involves additional programming effort to develop the plugin
  • Users would need to install an extra plugin

Current Recommendation:

Despite the extra development and maintenance effort, creating a plugin might still be the best solution to provide a seamless user experience.

[joeroe]

I also like the plugin option more. That way we can reuse our existing APIs and the user gets more functionality.

Actually writing the QGIS plugin would be a relatively self-contained project – could be a good fit for a student project, workshop and/or small grant?