GeoNotes Blog

Notes for myself and others

  • Wish I didn’t invest in the iPad2

     By John C. Zastrow

    Posted on July 17, 2011

    After much deliberation we plunked down the plastic for an iPad2. It was supposed to be a gift for me.. though I likely use it the least of all people over the age of 2 in this house. It shipped much faster than expected and just in time for the... [Read More]

  • USGS GNIS column names and shapefiles

     By John C. Zastrow

    Posted on May 26, 2011

    If you try to convert the USGS geographic names (GNIS) text files from the website straight into shapefiles, you will have field name collisions because the field names willbe truncated to 10 characters which result in duplicate field names. [Read More]

  • find to copy files into single directory

     By John C. Zastrow

    Posted on April 29, 2011

    Useful little one liners. This one makes copy of subset of dir/ and below based on finding files that match the criteria. In this case, I wanted all .doc files copied into a single place. [Read More]

  • My MySQL latest config file

     By John C. Zastrow

    Posted on April 29, 2011

    I never record this stuff and I always wish I did. So here’s a working MySQL config file that I’m using on a linux virtual machine with 2GB of memory. Notes and all so I don’t keep having to look stuff up. [Read More]

  • File listing ditties

     By John C. Zastrow

    Posted on April 29, 2011

    Here are some simple bash scripts to list files into a text files that can be used to catalog stuff. Most of the time I use the last one. ```bash [Read More]

  • Benchmarking MySQL

     By John C. Zastrow

    Posted on April 22, 2011

    So I’m trying to figure which old machine to turn into a little mySQL number cruncher. So, I’m going to do some clean installs of Ubuntu server on each and run this little script (with the same my.cnf) and see how they fair. Perhaps you will this useful, run it... [Read More]

  • Run queries in sequence in Access

     By John C. Zastrow

    Posted on April 22, 2011

    I’ve gotten so used to using “real” databases, that I find myself frustrated when I have to switch back to Microsoft Access. But, hey, it’s good for a lot of things. [Read More]

  • Screen capture programs

     By John C. Zastrow

    Posted on April 22, 2011

    I always need to capture computer screens into graphic files. Even for my Mom who needs the occasional over-email tutorial. So here is a list of screen capture utitlities that I’ve used over the years. Snag-it is by far my tool of choice. But really, all will work. Do you... [Read More]