g.gui.vdigit(1grass)

📦
version 8.5.0 · 13 versions
, in ubuntu stonking

💖 g.gui.vdigit 💖

okay bestie, welcome to the manual page for g.gui.vdigit — she's a GRASS User's Manual girlie and she's about to make vector editing feel like a group chat. let's go 🫶

✨ NAME ✨

g.gui.vdigit — interactive editing and digitization of vector maps. that's it, that's the whole vibe. click things, draw things, edit things, slay. 💅

🌈 KEYWORDS 🌈

general, GUI, vector, editing, digitizer

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

g.gui.vdigit
g.gui.vdigit --help
g.gui.vdigit [-c] map=name  [--help]  [--verbose]  [--quiet]  [--ui]

🌸 Flags:

  • -c — create new vector map if it doesn't exist. no map? no problem, we make one.
  • --help — print usage summary. your lil cheat sheet.
  • --verbose — verbose module output. she will not stop talking and honestly? iconic.
  • --quiet — quiet module output. shhh era.
  • --ui — force launching GUI dialog. drag her onto the screen, periodt.

🦋 Parameters:

  • map=name [required] — name of vector map to edit. or a data source for direct OGR access. yep, that's required, don't come in empty-handed.

💜 DESCRIPTION 💜

the vector digitizer is a wxGUI component built for interactive editing and digitizing of vector maps. (if you want the non-interactive version, that's v.edit — GRASS has non-interactive vector editing capabilities too, and yes she ate.)

lowkey important: only vector maps stored or generated in the current mapset can be opened for editing. so if you're wondering why a map is giving nothing, that's why. 🙈

the digitizer lets you edit 2D vector features: points, lines, centroids, boundaries, and areas. the whole squad. 💖

vector features can be selected by mouse — either a bounding box or simply by mouse click, see select threshold in Settings→General→Select threshold — or by query, eg. by line length, see Settings→Query Tool. two ways to pick your faves, choose your fighter. ✨

🚀 STARTING THE DIGITIZER 🚀

the vector digitizer can be launched from the Map Display toolbar by selecting "Digitize" from the Tools combobox. the vector map is selectable for editing from the Digitizer toolbar ("Select vector map" combobox — heads up, only vector maps from the current layer tree in Layer Manager are listed, no randoms allowed). 🎀

she can alternatively be activated from the contextual menu in the Layer Manager by selecting "Start editing" on a selected vector map in the layer tree, or directly from the Layer Manager toolbar.

and ngl? the vector digitizer can also also be launched from the command line as a stand-alone application: g.gui.vdigit. main character energy in every context. 👑

🌟 CREATING A NEW VECTOR MAP 🌟

a new vector map can be easily created from the digitizer toolbar by selecting "New vector map" in the "Select vector map" combobox. a new vector map is created, added to the current layer tree in Layer Manager, and opened for editing. 💅

the "Select vector map" combobox in the digitizer toolbar also allows easily switching between vector maps to be edited. hop between them like it's nothing fr fr.

🧚 EDITING AN EXISTING VECTOR MAP 🧚

an existing vector map is selected in the digitizer toolbar in the "Select vector map" combobox. this map is then opened for editing and added to the current layer tree in the Layer Manager.

this "Select vector map" combobox in the digitizer toolbar also allows to easily switch between vector maps to be edited. yes we said that twice, because it's that girl. 💅

🖼️ USING A RASTER BACKGROUND MAP 🖼️

in order to digitize from a raster map, simply load the map into the Map Display using the Layer Manager. then start digitizing, see below for details. load, digitize, devour. 🍓

🌈 USING A VECTOR BACKGROUND MAP 🌈

the vector digitizer allows you to select a "background" vector map. loading it within the digitizer is different from simply loading it via Layer Manager, since direct interaction with single vector features then becomes possible. 👀

vector features may be copied from the background map by "Copy features from (background) vector map" tool from the "Additional tools" of the digitizer toolbar. newly digitized vector features are snapped in the given threshold to the features from the background map. lowkey magic.

💅 DIGITIZER TOOLBAR 💅

✨ the main tools ✨

  • Digitize new point — add new point to vector map and optionally define its attributes Ctrl+P.
  • Digitize new line — add new line to vector map and optionally define its attributes Ctrl+L.
  • Digitize new boundary — add new boundary to vector map and optionally define its attributes Ctrl+B.
  • Digitize new centroid — add new centroid to vector map and optionally define its attributes Ctrl+C.
  • Digitize new area — add new area (closed boundary and one centroid inside) to vector map and optionally define its attributes Ctrl+A.
  • Move vertex — move selected vertex of linear feature. thus shape of linear feature is changed Ctrl+G.
  • Add vertex — add new vertex to selected linear feature (shape not changed) Ctrl+V.
  • Remove vertex — remove selected vertex from linear feature Ctrl+X. thus shape of selected feature can be changed.
  • Edit line/boundary — edit selected linear feature, add new segments or remove existing segments of linear feature Ctrl+E.
  • Move feature(s) — move selected vector features Ctrl+M. selection can be done by mouse or by query.
  • Delete feature(s) — delete selected vector features (point, line, centroid, or boundary) Ctrl+D. selection can be done by mouse or by query.
  • Delete areas(s) — delete selected vector areas Ctrl+F. selection can be done by mouse or by query.
  • Display/update categories — display categories of selected vector feature Ctrl+J. category settings can be modified, new layer/category pairs added, or already defined pairs removed.
  • Display/update attributes — display attributes of selected vector feature (based on its category settings) Ctrl+K. attributes can be also modified. same functionality is accessible from Main toolbar "Query vector map (editable mode)".
  • Additional tools — see the little list below bestie ⬇️

🛠️ Additional tools 🛠️

  • Break selected lines/boundaries at intersection — split given vector line or boundary into two lines on given position (based on v.clean, tool=break).
  • Connect two selected lines/boundaries — connect selected lines or boundaries, the first given line is connected to the second one. the second line is broken if necessary on each intersection. the lines are connected only if distance between them is not greater than snapping threshold value.
  • Copy categories — copy category settings of selected vector feature to other vector features. layer/category pairs of source vector features are appended to the target feature category settings. existing layer/category pairs are not removed from category settings of the target features.
  • Copy features from (background) vector map — make identical copy of selected vector features. if a background vector map has been selected from the Layer Manager, copy features from background vector map, not from the currently modified vector map. 👀
  • Copy attributes — duplicate attributes settings of selected vector feature to other vector features. new category(ies) is appended to the target feature category settings and attributes duplicated based on category settings of source vector features. existing layer/category pairs are not removed from category settings of the target features.
  • Feature type conversion — change feature type of selected geometry features. points are converted to centroids, centroids to points, lines to boundaries, and boundaries to lines. glow-up or glow-down, you decide. ✨
  • Flip selected lines/boundaries — flip direction of selected linear features (lines or boundaries).
  • Merge selected lines/boundaries — merge (at least two) selected vector lines or boundaries. the geometry of the merged vector lines can be changed. if the second line from two selected lines is in opposite direction to the first, it will be flipped. see also module v.build.polylines.
  • Snap selected lines/boundaries (only to nodes) — snap vector features in given threshold. see also module v.clean. note that this tool supports only snapping to nodes. snapping to vector features from background vector map is not currently supported — sorry bestie, that one's not available yet. 😭
  • Split line/boundary — split selected line or boundary on given position.
  • Query tool — select vector features by defining a threshold for min/max length value (linear features or dangles).
  • Z-bulk labeling of 3D lines — assign z coordinate values to 3D vector lines in bounding box. this is useful for labeling contour lines.

💫 and the rest 💫

  • Undo — undo previous operations Ctrl+Z.
  • Redo — redo previous operations Ctrl+Y.
  • Settings — digitizer settings Ctrl+T.
  • Show help — show help page for the Digitizer Ctrl+H.
  • Quit digitizing tool — changes in vector map can be optionally discarded when digitizing session is quited Ctrl+Q.

📝 NOTES 📝

🖱️ mouse button functions:

  • Left — select or deselect features
  • Control+Left — cancel action or undo vertex when digitizing lines
  • Right — confirm action

dead (deleted) features are only marked as 'dead' in the geometry file but remain there and occupy space. 😭 any vector module used afterwards on this vector map which really reads and writes vector geometry (so not g.copy) will write only features which are 'alive'. the dead ones are just... lurking. 💀

added or modified vector features are snapped to existing vector features (Settings→General→Snapping). to disable snapping, set the snapping threshold to '0'.

if the digitizer crashes for some reason, the changes are automatically saved. broken topology can be repaired by running v.build. she fell but she got back up. 🫶

GRASS uses a topological vector format, meaning that a common boundary of two polygons is only stored once. when digitizing polygons it is thus important to be able to only draw each boundary once. when drawing a polygon adjacent to an existing polygon, one has to first split the existing boundary at the points where the new boundary will be attached. snapping should be set to ensure that the new boundaries are automatically attached to the chosen points. no cap, this one matters. 🌸

📚 REFERENCES 📚

  • GRASS Vedit Library
  • Vector Database Management (Wiki page)

👀 SEE ALSO 👀

wxGUI, wxGUI components

v.edit, v.category, v.build, g.gui.rdigit, wxGUI.rdigit

see also the WxGUI Vector Digitizer Wiki page including video tutorials. educational content, we love to see it. 🍓

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Martin Landa, FBK-irst (2007-2008), Trento, Italy, and Czech Technical University in Prague, Czech Republic

🌟 SOURCE CODE 🌟

available at: wxGUI Vector Digitizer source code (history)

accessed: Tuesday Sep 08 11:56:22 2026

Main index | GUI index | Topics index | Keywords index | Graphical index | Full index

and that's the whole page bestie!! this was g.gui.vdigit(1grass) from the GRASS 8.5.0 Reference Manual, and it's © 2003-2026 GRASS Development Team, GRASS 8.5.0 Reference Manual. 💖 thanks for reading, go digitize something iconic, and remember: snapping threshold '0' is for the brave. periodt. ✨🎀🦋

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