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Editing

Creating features

Edit › Create draws new points, lines and polygons into the layer selected in Layers: click each vertex and double-click to finish (Esc cancels). Delete (Del) removes the selected features. Edit attributes in the attribute table (Ctrl+T): double-click a cell to change it. Data › Data Design (and Data › Fields) adds and deletes fields and calculates a field from an expression; Calculate Geometry (in the attribute table's toolbar) fills a new or existing numeric field with each feature's area, perimeter, length or X/Y coordinate, in the units you choose, for all features or the selected ones. Every edit is one undo step.

Modifying features

Edit Vertices on Lake Victoria: square vertex handles and round midpoint handles around the selected lake
Edit Vertices: drag a square handle to move a vertex, a round one to add a vertex.

The Edit tab's Edit button turns editing on or off for the map; with it off, the map is read-only. The Editing pane (Settings, Templates, Status, Modify) holds the rest:

  • Modify: move the selected features by metres east and north, rotate them, scale them, merge them (polygons are unioned), explode multipart features, split a line where you click, and flip line direction. A single point turns and scales on itself, so Rotate and Scale leave points (text graphics included) as they are: with only points selected they change nothing, say so, and add no undo step. Edit › Tools lists every editing tool.
  • Edit Vertices (Edit › Features): reshape the selected features on the map. Their vertices show as square handles and each edge has a round midpoint handle. Drag a vertex to move it; drag a midpoint, or click an edge, to insert a vertex; click a vertex and press Del to remove it (a line keeps at least two vertices, a polygon ring three). Clicking elsewhere selects the feature there (Shift adds it). Multipart features and polygon holes work the same way, dragged vertices snap when snapping is on, and each move, insertion or deletion is one undo step. Esc finishes. From scripts and the command line, edit.vertex does the same to one vertex and edit.setGeometry (Set Geometry) replaces a feature's whole shape.
  • Feature templates: named default values for new features, made from a selected feature; the Create tool uses the chosen template.
  • Snapping (Edit › Snapping): new and dragged vertices snap to nearby vertices, edges and line ends (magenta marker). Each of the three can be turned off, and the tolerance is how near, in screen pixels, a vertex must come to snap (10 by default, 1 to 100): edit.snapping={"on": true, "tolerancePx": 12, "edge": false} (without "on" it turns snapping on or off).
  • Settings: Show Vertices marks the vertices of the selected features even when Edit Vertices isn't on (edit.settings={"showVertices": true}).
  • Elevation: new features get a z value, constant or sampled from a raster surface.
  • Ground to grid: a scale factor and rotation applied to entered distances and directions (Move, and edit.traverse, which draws a line or polygon from distances and bearings).
  • Topology: rules (must not overlap, must not have gaps, must not self-intersect, must not have dangles, must be covered by); Validate lists the errors, and clicking one zooms to it.
  • Status: features added, changed and deleted per layer since the last save.

Data design

The Data tab's Data Design pane keeps attributes valid, on every edit (creating, pasting, attribute edits, Calculate Field):

  • Domains: coded values (code=description) or a numeric range for a field.
  • Subtypes: an integer field's codes, each with a name and default values for new features; the layer is symbolized by subtype.
  • Attribute rules: calculations (a field set from an expression on every insert and update) and constraints (a SQL condition every feature must meet).
  • Contingent values: the combinations of values allowed across fields.
  • Archiving: keeps every edit with its time; restore the layer as it was minutes ago.
  • Relationships: link two layers by key fields; Related Data selects the rows related to the selection.

Clipboard and pop-ups

Copy (Ctrl+C) and Cut (Ctrl+X) take the selected features. Paste (Ctrl+V) adds them to the layer selected in Layers, matching fields by name; Paste Special adds them as a new layer. Copied features also go on the system clipboard as GeoJSON, so they can be pasted into another RustGIS window or a text editor, and GeoJSON copied elsewhere pastes into RustGIS. Copy Path copies the selected layer's data source path.

Pop-ups (Home › Navigate) choose which layers a click with Explore identifies: the topmost layer under the click, every visible layer, only selectable layers, only the layer selected in Layers, or nothing. The pop-up lists every feature under the click in those layers, overlapping ones included (up to 100): step through them with ‹ ›. The feature shown is the one selected. The magnifier in the pop-up's header zooms to it.

The topmost and visible modes also identify the features of vector tile layers under the click: PMTiles and MBTiles archives and vector tiles added as data (not catalog basemaps or MapLibre styles), beneath the map's own layers. Each shows its tile layer and source layer (firenze › buildings) and its attributes; tile features can't be selected or zoomed to.