Exploring PostGIS for Geographic Analysis

We have been working with PostGIS to support geographic analysis (geometry and geography). Being open source and using additional spatial functions allows us to store geometric information. In this chapter, you will continue to learn how to work with the spatial reference identifier (SRID), as well as a few non-spatial functions. Information and instructions will be formatted as case studies that highlight open source data. These vignettes will correlate with how questions are formulated and encourage creativity and curiosity.

As a brief refresher, when referring to PostGIS, we mean the open source Postgres spatial extension for working with spatial databases. The main reason I rely on PostgreSQL is its natural integration with spatial information at no additional cost. This is the environment where we can execute location queries in SQL. As you will see in the next chapter, we can integrate expanded geoprocessing functions with QGIS as...