Spatialise Aggregated Dataset

To optimise web-based interactivity, the AURIN portal usually doesn’t keep most datasets stored as geographically explicit datasets – normally just as tables that have the potential to be linked to a single “template” of geographies.

So, when you create a choropleth or a map of something at, for example, the SA2 level, the portal finds the unique SA2 identifier in your dataset and links it to a stored geometry within the portal, allowing it to be mapped. This is a very fast and lightweight solution: as the geographies are standard coverages, it means we can keep one description of the geography and apply it many times.

Sometimes, however, you may want the dataset in a GIS format (such as a shapefile) for use in your own systems (such as QGIS). Additionally, a number of the tools require a spatialised version of the dataset in order to run.

Spatialise Aggregated Dataset forces a dataset’s geographic geometry to be merged into the dataset. This breaks the connection to the server-side geometry, increases the size of the dataset and makes the entire package downloadable in SHP format for use off-line with standard geospatial tools as well as for doing spatial statistical routines within the AURIN portal, which require the data tables to have specific geographic information, rather than just a “key”

To illustrate the Spatialise Aggregated Dataset tool, we will use some Perth data

• Select Perth GCCSA as your area
• Select SA2 SEIFA 2011 – The Index of Relative Socio-Economic Advantage and Disadvantage (IRSAD) as your dataset, selecting all variables

Once you have added and opened the table you will notice up the top left you have two options to download the data as a .csv or a .json file format – this is a non-spatialised dataset

Once you have added the dataset, navigate to the Spatialise Aggregated Dataset tool (Tools → Spatial Data Manipulation→ Spatialise Aggregated Dataset) and enter select the dataset that you want to spatialise. In this instance we select SA2 SEIFA 2011 – The Index of Relative Socio-Economic Advantage and Disadvantage (IRSAD) shown below

[Click to Enlarge]

Your resultant dataset will be called something like Output: spatialise-dataset XXXXXX – it is often a good idea to rename this to something more intuitive.

If you open the dataset table, you will now see that there are three buttons on the top left, including one that allows you to download your dataset to your desktop in shapefile (.shp) format.