Geospatial File Descriptions

At UCLA Dataverse not all of the geospatial files we are or will be injesting are shapefiles. It might be worth considering adding definitions of Geodatabases (ESRI) and Geopackage (QGIS).

ESRI Geodatabase or “File Geodatabase” (GDB)
. “File geodatabases—Stored as folders in a file system. Each dataset is held as a file that can scale up to 1 TB in size. The file geodatabase is recommended over personal geodatabases.”

“A collection of various types of GIS datasets held in a file system folder.(This is the recommended native data format for ArcGIS stored and managed in a file system folder.)”

Geodatabases are a collection of files in a folder. Some LIDAR data is stored as a geodatabase. It is strongly recommended that a file geodatabase is zipped before ingestion.

QGIS can read ESRI geodatabase file format.

QGIS Geopackage (GPKG)
A GeoPackage is an SQLite Database file with a . gpkg extension. If you are unsure whether a file is an SQLite database, you can use a binary or text editor to view the starting bytes of the file and see if they state SQLite format 3 .

A GeoPackage (GPKG) is an open, non-proprietary, platform-independent and standards-based data format for geographic information systems implemented as a SQLite database container. Defined by the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC)[1] with the backing of the US military[2] and published in 2014, GeoPackage has seen wide widespread support from various government, commercial, and open source organizations[3].

Zipping before ingestion is suggested but not required.

No documentation file or test is named. Start by locating the existing geospatial file descriptions in the Dataverse documentation, then compare their structure with the supplied ESRI File Geodatabase and QGIS GeoPackage material. Done means both formats have definitions and the stated ingestion guidance.