No doubt, if any information is displayed spatially, it can be understood more instinctively and more completely – Online mapping is a great example of it. Earlier, for most part, Maps were just considered as essentially pretty pictures that required for guiding you on the right track of your destinations or looking at a location on a static map only. But things are different from the past few years as we’ve all gone much further, wherein maps are becoming dynamic in use and extended to help us interact with data in new ways, find additional information, draw new conclusions and answer new questions. All thanks to Spatial technology, and Cartodb.com is a kind of Open Source tool that utilizes today’s higher Spatial technology and allows the storage and advanced visualization of geospatial data on the web along with the ability to create map based visualizations of large data sets and sharing of interactive maps too.
It is really hard to control a huge and complex data but worry not; this tool lets you make data useful and beautiful. At Cartodb.com, you can do everything hassle free from creating maps, analyzing data to build your location aware applications. CartoDB’s full potential can be highlighted with its open-source projects, including PostgreSQL, PostGIS, etc. Both of these geospatially enabled databases are aimed to give you complete control to your data along with the set of tools for potential analyzing.
Users can get an amazing opportunity to create and publish compelling stories even from huge datasets by having the power of PostGIS and Mapping API. For example, it offers combination of custom SQL and Carto map styling language for creating a map that can be understood easily at a glance. If you have large data sets, it’s importing and visualizing is also easy with CartoDB and drag-and-drop GPS data visualization. Some users would like to display data differently at different scales, for this it provides variable styling through the SQL API.
Interestingly, here users can create artistic maps or sketchy maps by using the Vecnik HTML5 mapping library, such maps sounds like it were drawn on the back of napkin. In fact, this sketchy map is combination of Vecnik shaders which allow the linework to capture the essence of the iconic Blue Bic ballpoint pen. Really great! You may be glad to know that CartoDB also helps to build complex maps, filter your tables and select different views for easy highlights. Also, it provides you with vast range of thematic mapping possibilities. In some cases, users can pick out hotspots clearly within the data, and filter by demographic level too.
When it comes to analysis, CartoDB is fully supported by Raster and Vector, means users can find the average altitude in the selected area by drawing a polygon or anything else, or let the user calculate it dynamically based on such multi-mode analysis. Thus, you can say that CartoDB is a great tool for geo-processing applications. CartoDB users can get benefited of merging multiple datasets, and thus extracts new insights by understanding the correlation between your dataset and others in minutes. Moreover, it allows users to run SQL queries on data – it means they can also get support for both common and advanced spatial operations, including geometry creation and conversion, re-projection, buffer, convex hull, generalization, union, and more.
CartoDB can be your own Datastore, as it provides secure and safe storage for your data. Your data is only yours to write and modify in all accounts. In all subscription level accounts, you can also host private tables, where you will be the only person able to read the data. Even, CartoDB offers data backup services at every level of hosting. Make sure that all 5 tables on free plans are public and if you need private tables, you can get direct and clear information about different paid plans at pricing page.
CartoDB is the perfect platform to build location aware applications simply and easily using its powerful data management and geospatial analysis backend. Its rich feature of Maps API provides projected map tiles for creating fast data visualization; and SQL API allows querying the data or you can write new data to your CartoDB tables. Thus, it allows you to visualize your data layers with all popular map frameworks. No matter whether you are using Google Maps, Leaflet, or else, it provide you many popular open source libraries for easy get started. Moreover, server gets your data as JSON for handling directly with the client with a single request only. CartoDB users also have power of the Cloud wherein users can resize their database at will but pay for only what they use.
It is soooo simple to get data into CartoDB, as you can import data from a URL directly to avoid slow uploads, create a table from scratch or upload data from a file. Using drag and drop system, you can drag any downloaded zip files to your CartoDB dashboard in no time. As soon as your data gets into CartoDB, tables are created directly. Later on, you can add any number of rows or columns by clicking on given bottom tabs.
By clicking on the “Map” tab, you can take a look at your data. Here, you can select your map type from four different types and also select Visualization type for displaying your data over the map in 2 ways that includes simple custom points & interesting Bubble map. At this stage, CartoDB provides you with good options to select color of point and border along with the opacity. Info window customization offers default and custom markings for data of table. As and when you move cursor over the points in the map, you can get 3 direct options of Info, Delete and Single point view.
In case, you want to add point directly over the map, you can do this easily by clicking on the given add button at bottom. Along with it, you can also get Select, SQL and Carto buttons for direct access. Search button makes it easier to get the place you want in the map. The same page allows changing the name and tag of your table by clicking on them.
Also, you can choose geocoding method for creating table by clicking on Georefrence tab on the top. The advance tab offers you direct options to Import, Export and get Duplicate one for your data. Here, you can get direct download option for your created map even in your desired formats (CSV, KML, SHP, SQL). Best of all, CartoDB provides you with Direct link or HTML embed code for easy and direct sharing of your created map.
All in one, with CartoDB, it really seems very easy to make large interactive maps that allow users to customize the search and analysis of experience to their unique needs. This offers greater insights with easy to understand and unique highlights far than a spreadsheet or static map could ever provide.
Pros:
- Free and easy to sign up
- It offers ability to create map based visualizations of your data sets
- It allows easy building of location aware applications
- Having open-source projects like PostgreSQL, PostGIS, etc.
- It provides variable styling through the SQL & API to display data differently
- Users can create artistic maps or sketchy maps by using the Vecnik HTML5 mapping library
- Offers vast range of thematic mapping possibilities
- Fully supported by Raster and Vector for analysis
- Users can get benefited of merging multiple datasets and understand the correlation in minutes
- It allows users to run SQL queries on data
- It provides secure and safe storage for your data
- You can host private tables by paid plans
- Users have power of the Cloud
- More than one way offered to import data
- Create interesting map by selecting color, type, size of hot spots in the map
- You can choose geocoding method to create table
- Direct link or HTML embed code for easy and direct sharing of your created map
- Direct download option along with desired formats for your created map
Cons:
- Free plans have only (5) public tables
