And now it's time for a tiny bite of knowledge . Hey Sarah , could you send me that shape file over ?
Absolutely . I'll get you that prescription right away , sarah . Yes , I can't just have the dot SHP .
Sarah , yes , I can't just have the shp , I need the whole shapefile .
What do you mean ? The whole shapefile . Today , on this little tiny bite , we are going to talk about what is a shapefile , because we run into this all the time , Jodi what is a shapefile ?
A shapefile is a vector file format that's commonly used in GIS and Precision Ag . If you're anybody that does anything with yield data any sort of Precision Ag stuff you've probably heard about shapefiles before .
Okay , and often we find shapefiles are handling items then like points lines , boundaries , are handling items then like points lines , boundaries , polygons , prescriptions , raw yield data . But what really makes up a shapefile ?
So there's four different files that make up a shapefile , and I think this is the part that gets confusing right , because I think typically for us , like non-supercomputer users , we think of a file as being one thing and not other parts , but when it comes to shapefiles , one single shapefile is made up of four different files , and I'm just going to list them
out , not going to go into detail , but typically these include the shp , the shx , the dbf or the database , and then , in some of the newer formats , the prj or the projection as to where the file is .
That's correct . So the shp is the actual shape file and what that contains is the actual geometry of the object that's getting exported out . The shx is the shape index format that is really carrying the positional information for that object . Where is the location of the object ? The dbf contains all of the attribute data .
Rates for your prescription are held , or your yield data , or the elevation for the topography at each individual point , each individual GPS coordinate . So at that coordinate this is the attribute value and the PRJ file is the projection file . In other words , how on the earth is this object projected ?
The earth is round and when we think of maps we think of maps as flat , and so somehow we have to get that object projected from a flat map onto a round earth and that is the information that tells the shapefile how it is projected .
But I think we need to back up and talk just for a second about the database file , because it really is quite an interesting item in a shapefile . It contains , again , all of the attribute information .
So backing up what that database file refers to is like if you're working in ADMS and working with a drawing in layer , so a vector file , a shapefile , like we're discussing here , what you'll notice is that you have the option to look at a database , and so what that database in ADMS is showing is this data here , all of that data that's in the dbf .
If you think about it , it kind of looks like an Excel table , right , you've got columns , you've got rows of data . That's what is in the dbf . Is it's giving ? It's telling the vector file what data is located where in the file .
As we know , vector files can have more than one attribute associated with it , and all of those attributes are contained in the database file . Again , that's where you're going to find anything that was logged . For example , you might have as applied planter rate data along with the prescription that actually went into the controller .
You might have elevation data , you might have down pressure data . All of that's going to come in in a separate column for each attribute . That is the information that is contained in the database , and the database also contains , and will tell you , how many polygons are associated with your shapefile as well .
Like we alluded to at the top of the show , it's really important to include all all three or four of these file types when you're moving shapefiles around . If somebody wants a shapefile from you and you only send them one of the four file types for example , if you just send them the shp they most likely will not be able to use that file .
They need all different file types , all four of those file types the shp , the shx , the dbf and the prj in order to actually use that file and they all must be named exactly the same .
So be very careful within your software . If you're going to rename one of these files , they absolutely have to have exactly the same name , exactly the same spacing , exactly the same very case sensitive with the letters as well .
So I always rename my shapefiles actually within the ADMS software itself , because that will automatically rename every single file that is associated with that shapefile . But shapefiles are a very powerful way of delivering data and working with data and a very common file format that we run into in precision agriculture all the time .
And avoid the cussing when you're working with shapefiles and send all four file formats when you're working with them .
With that at GK Technology we've got a map and an app for that .
Tune in next time for a tiny bite of knowledge from GK Technology .