DSreader

Tools for reading vegetation maps created in the 'Digitale Standaard' data format, developed by the Dutch National Forestry Service ('Staatsbosbeheer').

Why DSreader?

Staatsbosbeheer is a Dutch governmental institute that manages over 200.000 hectare of nature areas in the Netherlands. To monitor changes in time vegetation maps are made about every twelve years. These data are available in the Digital Standard data format, that consists of:

1. shapefiles with polygones and lines of mapped elements.
2. A Microsoft Access database with non-spatial information about the vegetation types and vegetation quality.

The field ElmID is used to connect All spatial information in the shapefile elements are connected to the vegetation data in the datbase using the field ElmID (element ID). The python package DSreader can be used to read data and export data to shapefiles or to analyse data in a vegetation map.

Getting started

The DSreader package can be installed on your system using PIP:

pip install DSreader

Code is documented with docstrings, to get started, try:

import DSreader as dsr
dsr?
dsr.MapData?