g.gui.psmap(1)

📦
version 8.4.2 · 10 versions
, in fedora 44

💖 NAME 💖

g.gui.psmap — bestie, it's the Tool for creating hardcopy map outputs. That's it, that's the whole vibe. ✨

🌈 KEYWORDS 🌈

general, GUI, printing

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

g.gui.psmap
g.gui.psmap --help
g.gui.psmap [file=name] [--help] [--verbose] [--quiet] [--ui]

Flags, babes 🚩

  • --help — Prints the usage summary, aka the "what even is this" button.
  • --verbose — Verbose module output. She's chatty, she's telling you everything.
  • --quiet — Quiet module output. Shhh era. 🤫
  • --ui — Force launching GUI dialog. Like, make the window appear, periodt.

Parameters 🫶

  • file=name — File containing mapping instructions to load. (See ps.map manual for details, iykyk.)

✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

wxGUI Cartographic Composer — also called wx.psmap — is a wxGUI extension that lets you create hardcopy map outputs interactively, no cap. This tool generates a ps.map configuration file and then runs ps.map to create PostScript output. It's giving pipeline energy. 💅

There are two modes:

  • Draft mode — for map composing.
  • Preview mode — requires the Python Imaging Library, and lets you see how the result will look like.

In draft mode, map features (like legend or scalebar) are represented by a colored rectangle with a label. Lowkey abstract art, highkey useful. 🎨

Possible output files 📁

  • ps.map instructions file
  • PostScript/EPS file
  • PDF (using ps2pdf)

Cartographic Composer enables to load in saved instructions file. Loading instruction files created by Cartographic Composer is more robust, as opposed to loading files created manually. Bestie, let the tool write the file. Trust. 🙏

Currently supported ps.map instructions 👑

  • paper
  • maploc
  • scale
  • border
  • raster
  • colortable
  • vpoints
  • vlines
  • vareas
  • vlegend
  • text
  • scalebar
  • mapinfo
  • point
  • line
  • rectangle
  • labels

🦋 CARTOGRAPHIC COMPOSER TOOLBAR 🦋

Generate instructions file

Generates and saves text file with mapping instructions. ✍️

Load instructions file

Load text file with mapping instructions. 📥

Page setup

Specify paper size, margins and orientation. 📐

Pointer

Select object on the paper by clicking, drag the cursor while pressing the left mouse button to move it or resize object (currently only map frame) by clicking on a small black box in its bottom right corner. Double click to show object properties dialog. 🖱️

Pan

Drag the pan cursor while pressing the left mouse button to move your view. 👀

Zoom in

Interactive zooming with the mouse in both draft and preview mode. Drawing a box or just a left click with the mouse and zoom-in cursor causes the display to zoom in so that the area defined by the box fills the display. 🔍

Zoom out

Interactive zooming with the mouse in both draft and preview mode. Drawing a box or just a left click with the mouse and zoom-out cursor causes the display to zoom out so that the area displayed shrinks to fill the area defined by the box. 🔎

Zoom to page

Zoom to display the entire page. 📄

Map frame

Click and drag to place map frame. If map frame is already drawn, open a dialog to set its properties. 🖼️

Raster map

Shows a dialog to add or change the raster map. 🗺️

Vector map

Shows a dialog to add or change current vector maps and their properties:

  • Data selection — Select data to draw:
  • Feature type — Select which data type to draw. In case of point data, points or centroids can be drawn, in case of line data, lines or boundaries.
  • Layer selection — Select layer and limit data by a SQL query or chose only certain categories.
  • Mask — Whether to use mask or not.
  • Colors — Color settings:
  • Outline — Select outline color and width in points. In case of lines, outline means highlighting.
  • Fill — Select fill color, one color for all vector elements or color from rgb column.
  • Size and style — Sets size, style, symbols, pattern; depends on data type:
  • Symbology — Available for point data. Choose symbol or EPS file to draw points with.
  • Line style — Available for line data. Select line style (solid, dashed, ...) and the look of the ends of the line (butt, round, ...)
  • Pattern — Available for areas. Choose pattern file and set the width of the pattern.
  • Size — Available for point data. Choose size (number of times larger than the size in the icon file) as a single value or take the size from a map table column.
  • Rotation — Available for point data. Rotate symbols counterclockwise with the given value or with the value from a map table column
  • Width — Available for line data. Set line width in points or take the value from a map table column.

Add overlays

Add overlays: vector labels, grid (not yet implemented). 🌐

  • Add labels — Add vector labels created beforehand by v.label module.

Add map elements

Add map elements: legend, scalebar, map info, text. 🧩

  • Add legend — Add raster or vector legend or edit their properties.
  • Add map info — Add information about region, grid and scale or edit map info properties.
  • Add scalebar — Add scalebar or edit its properties.
  • Add text — Add text label.

Remove selected element

Select an object and remove it. Pressing Delete key does the same. 💀

Show preview

Generates output and switches to Preview mode to see the result. Be patient, it can take a while. 🫠

Generate hardcopy map output in PS

Generates hardcopy map output in PostScript/EPS file. 🖨️

Generate hardcopy map output in PDF

Generates hardcopy map output in PDF using ps2pdf or Ghostscript gswin32c/gswin64c (OS MS Windows platform only). 📄✨

💜 SEE ALSO 💜

wxGUI, wxGUI components

See also wiki page.

🌸 AUTHOR 🌸

Anna Kratochvilova, Czech Technical University in Prague, Czech Republic (bachelor's final project 2011, mentor: Martin Landa)

👑 SOURCE CODE 👑

Available at: wxGUI Cartographic Composer source code (history)

Accessed: Saturday Jan 17 05:42:35 2026

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© 2003-2025 GRASS Development Team, GRASS GIS 8.4.2 Reference Manual

Okay bestie, that's the whole page — this was GRASS 8.4.2, and the manpage you just read is literally g.gui.psmap(1). Go make some iconic hardcopy maps, you absolute main character. 🦋💖✨

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