Tired of using Helvetica in your R graphics? Here’s how to use the fonts you like

Although R has vast graphical functionality I've lamented the lack of support for additional fonts. You can spend an incredible amount of time fine-tuning a ggplot2 graphic, fiddling with the length of the tick marks, getting the legend just right but then the Helvetica text detracts from the beauty of what you've created. My understanding […]

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Simpler than you think: use Python to upload GIS layers to CartoDB

CartoDB has a nice dashboard you can use to upload shapefiles for viewing online. They have even included drag-and-drop functionality to help improve the experience. Nevertheless, uploading geographic files manually can be cumbersome and you can end up forgetting files sources, when you uploaded etc. Fortunately, CartoDB recently posted a Python script that you can […]

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MongoDB: Getting Started

For most of our projects that involve large datasets we use either PostgreSQL or MySQL to conduct analysis and feed data-driven web sites. In general, we’re happy with these tools, particularly PostgreSQL and its spatial functionality, and find that they meet our data needs. PostgreSQL has also been fairly innovative, recently adding functionality focused on […]

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