OpenSource GIS Packages

1. FWTools

FWTools is a popular and well regarded OpenSource set of tools for GIS. The problem is that FWTools currently only supports Python 2.3. Also, FWTools installs itself as a "Program" on MS-Windows (in the "Program Files" directory) and does not install itself as an extension to an existing Python installation. FWTools does include it's own version of Python that you can use to work with it.

FWTools includes:

• GDAL - Raster file IO
• OGR - Vector file IO
• Proj4 - Projecting spatial data

Another point is that only GDAL comes with examples for Python scripting. OGR and Proj4 have Python bindings but without documentation (although this could change in the future). Another approach with these packages is to run the executable programs they provide as "subprocesses" which is well documented and heaviliy tested.

2. Shapefile.py

Shapefile.py is a Python-only module that will read and write shapefiles. The module is well written and is interesting to examine because it reads and writes binary data.

Additional Resources

GDAL/OGR in Python

GDAL Tutorials (include Python examples)