mapshaper 0.7.0 → 0.7.1

package/www/docs/guides/combining-layers.html.md

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+---
+title: "Tutorial: combining two layers"
+description: A step-by-step walkthrough of combining and pruning two boundary layers to produce a custom GeoJSON basemap.
+---
+
+# Tutorial: combining two layers in the web UI
+
+> Originally contributed by Amanda Hickman to the project wiki.
+
+This walkthrough shows how to combine and prune two boundary layers to produce a single GeoJSON file you can use as a custom basemap (for example, in [Datawrapper](https://www.datawrapper.de/)).
+
+The example builds a basemap of the San Francisco Bay Area, with both county boundaries and the cities ("places") inside them.
+
+The walkthrough uses the web app at [mapshaper.org](/), driving the workflow from the **Console**. The same commands work on the CLI — chain them together with leading `-` prefixes (so `clip bayarea_county` becomes `-clip bayarea_county`) and connect them with backslash line continuations.
+
+## The starting data
+
+We'll use two source files:
+
+- A county boundary file from the California Open Data Portal — or, in this case, a [version clipped to the shoreline](https://geodata.lib.berkeley.edu/catalog/ark28722-s7hs4j) from UC Berkeley's Geo Data Commons. The shoreline-clipped version reads more naturally on a map than the legal-boundary version, which extends into the bay.
+- A statewide [places boundary file](https://geodata.lib.berkeley.edu/catalog/ark28722-s7bp4z) for city boundaries.
+
+Download both as `.zip` files.
+
+## Open them in Mapshaper
+
+Drag the two `.zip` files onto [mapshaper.org](/), or run the web app locally with `mapshaper-gui`. You'll end up with two layers loaded into the session.
+
+## Set the projection
+
+Datawrapper expects WGS84 coordinates. Open the **Console** (top-right of the header) and run, with each layer selected:
+
+```
+proj wgs84
+```
+
+You'll need to run this once per layer — switch which layer is selected in the layer panel between runs.
+
+→ See the [`-proj` reference](/docs/reference.html.md#-proj).
+
+## Clip the places layer to the Bay Area
+
+The places layer covers the whole state. We only want places inside the Bay Area counties. With the places layer selected:
+
+```
+clip bayarea_county
+```
+
+→ See the [`-clip` reference](/docs/reference.html.md#-clip).
+
+Alternatively, if the places layer has a `COUNTY` attribute, a filter expression works too:
+
+```
+filter '["Marin", "Contra Costa", "Alameda",
+         "San Francisco", "Santa Clara", "San Mateo"].includes(COUNTY)'
+```
+
+→ See the [`-filter` reference](/docs/reference.html.md#-filter).
+
+## Merge the layers
+
+The two layers can now be combined into a single layer with [`-merge-layers`](/docs/reference.html.md#-merge-layers):
+
+```
+merge-layers target=bayarea_county,california_place_clipped force
+```
+
+The `force` flag is needed because the two layers have different attribute schemas; without it, Mapshaper refuses to merge layers whose fields don't match.
+
+## Export
+
+Open the **Export** panel (top-right of the header), pick **GeoJSON** as the format, and save the merged layer. You can now upload that file to Datawrapper (or any other tool that accepts GeoJSON) as a custom basemap.
+
+## What you've learned
+
+- How to load multiple data files into one Mapshaper session.
+- How to apply a projection inside the web UI's console.
+- How to clip one layer by another.
+- How to merge two layers into a single layer for export.
+
+For more on layers and how Mapshaper organizes multi-layer datasets, see [The command-line tool](/docs/essentials/command-line.html.md#working-with-layers).