How to make a vector tile server

This is a demo of how to make a vector file server backend for a web app. An example front end is at asher.org.au/vector-tiles. It'll be easiest in Ubunutu. If you don't have a server, like me, you can just copy the cache to a Github repo.

Install depenedencies

• qgis http://www.qgis.org
• postgis http://trac.osgeo.org/postgis/wiki/UsersWikiPostGIS21UbuntuPGSQL93Apt
• shapely http://toblerity.org/shapely/
• tilestache http://tilestache.org/

Set up PostgreSQL

following https://help.ubuntu.com/community/PostgreSQL

sudo -u postgres psql postgres
	create role mikey login;
	alter role mikey superuser;
	create database mikey;
	\q

Download your source data

The demo uses an ESRI shapefile of the ABS LGAs. Local Government Areas (LGAs) are an ABS approximation of officially gazetted LGAs as defined by each State and Territory (S/T) local government departments. They generally represent administrative regions and are approximated by Mesh Block (MB), Statistical Area Level 1 (SA1) or Statistical Area Level 2 (SA2). http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/1270.0.55.003July,%202012?OpenDocument

Optionally simplify geometries

Go to http://www.mapshaper.org/ to simplify shapefile, 10% good starting point. Use Douglas-Peucker, Visvalingam / effective area or Visvalingam / weighted area. Download simplified shapefile and place in folder with the unsimplified .cpg, .prj, and .dbf .

mapshaper LGA_2014_AUST.shp -simplify 10% -o LGA_2014_AUST_900913_simp.shp
# ogr2ogr -f 'ESRI Shapefile' LGA_2014_AUST_900913_simp.shp LGA_2014_AUST.shp -t_srs EPSG:900913
# shp2pgsql -s 900913 LGA_2014_AUST_900913_simp.shp lga_simp | psql

It seems like Tilestache simplifies for you.

Project source data to spherical mercator

following http://mattmakesmaps.com/blog/2013/10/09/tilestache-rendering-topojson/

# ogr2ogr -f 'ESRI Shapefile' LGA_2014_AUST_3857.shp LGA_2014_AUST.shp -s_srs EPSG:4283 -t_srs EPSG:3857
ogr2ogr -f 'ESRI Shapefile' LGA_2014_AUST_900913.shp LGA_2014_AUST.shp -t_srs EPSG:900913

Import data to Postgresql

psql
	create extension postgis;

shp2pgsql -s 900913 LGA_2014_AUST_900913.shp lga | psql

Use Tilestache to create tiles

Create a config file like topojson.cfg and test your server

tilestache-server.py  -c topojson.cfg

fill the cache

tilestache-seed.py --config topojson.cfg --layer lga-psql --bbox -43.575 112.925 -10.075 153.575 --extension json 5 6 7 8 9 10

A bounding box around Australia (south west north east) , lat long (-43.575 112.925 -10.075 153.575), meters(-5399906 12570753 -1127368 17095890)

Front end

The demo (index.html) uses leaflet and Leaflet GeoJSON Tile Layer

ASGS ABS databases

Download http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/1270.0.55.001July%202011?OpenDocument . Unzip and change into directory

ogr2ogr -f 'ESRI Shapefile' SA2_2011_AUST_900913.shp SA2_2011_AUST.shp -t_srs EPSG:900913
shp2pgsql -s 900913 SA2_2011_AUST_900913.shp sa2 | psql
tilestache-seed.py --config topojson.cfg --layer sa2-psql --bbox -43.575 112.925 -10.075 153.575 --extension json 5 6 7 8 9 10