Learning Mapnik
Background
How to Approach Map Design
- MapDesign -- use Mapnik to design better looking maps!
How to understand GIS Concepts
- IntroductionToGIS -- a brief intro to the world of mapping systems
- Projections, geodetics, and polygons, oh my...
Core Topics
How to Style your Maps
How to combine Map styles and Layers
- See the MapnikTutorials
- XML Mapfile details XMLConfigReference
How to read in data
How to use the Mapnik Python Bindings
- See the python api docs here: http://media.mapnik.org/api_docs/python/
- You can generate these docs yourself too, look at source:trunk/docs/epydoc_config/readme.txt
- Check out the MapnikTutorials and the references at ExampleCode
- Study applications like Cascadenik or Nik2img at http://mapnik-utils.googlecode.com/
How to use Custom Fonts
Performance
OptimizeRenderingWithPostGIS -- Optimize rendering speed and simplify the stylesheet with PostGIS
Advanced Topics
MapnikRenderers -- Render with AGG or Cairo
LabelingSupport -- Discover the intricacies of label placement.
OutputFormats -- Which format to use based on speed, quality, and rendering tradeoffs.
Generating Contours - Using Mapnik with GDAL to build contours of the world.
ManagingLargeXmlFiles -- Do things once and only once using XML entities.
Scale and Scale denominators -- Scale, Projection and Pixels Per Inch: what it means for determining the scale of your rendered and printed maps.
ModServer -- An experimental mod_python server for Mapnik
IntegrateWithWxPython -- Demonstrate how to integrate mapnik with wxPython
FontSet -- Fallback fonts support
MapnikReferences -- Various other resources related to Mapnik and Mapping
