PSCOAST

Section: Misc. Reference Manual Pages (l)
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#ifdef SI #define UNIT cm #define LEN_1 0.25 #define SCALE_M1 -Jm0.25 #define LEN_2 1.25 #define LEN_3 1 #define SCALE_M2 -Jm1 #else #define UNIT inch #define LEN_1 0.1 #define SCALE_M1 -Jm0.1 #define LEN_2 0.5 #define LEN_3 0.4 #define SCALE_M2 -Jm0.4 #endif  

NAME

pscoast - To plot land-masses, water-masses, coastlines, borders, and rivers  

SYNOPSIS

pscoast -Jparameters -Rwest/east/south/north[r] [ -Amin_area/max_level ] [ -Btickinfo ] [ -Cfill ] [ -Dresolution ] [ -Eazimuth/elevation ] [ -Fred/green/blue ] [ -Gfill ] [ -Iriver[/pen] ] [ -K ] [ -L[f][x]lon0/lat0/slat/length[m] ] [ -Nborder[/pen] ] [ -O ] [ -P ] [ -Sfill ] [ -U[/dx/dy/][label] ] [ -V ] [ -Wpen ] [ -Xx-shift ] [ -Yy-shift ] [ -ccopies ]  

DESCRIPTION

pscoast plots grayshaded, colored, or textured land-masses [or water-masses] on maps and [optionally] draws coastlines, rivers, and political boundaries. The datafiles come in 5 different resolutions: (f)ull, (h)igh, (i)ntermediate, (l)ow, and (c)rude. The full resolution files amount to more than 55 Mb of data and provide great detail; for maps of larger geographical extent it is more economical to use one of the other resolutions. If the user selects to paint the land-areas and does not specify fill of water-areas then the latter will be transparent (i.e., earlier graphics drawn in those areas will not be overwritten). Likewise, if the water-areas are painted and no land fill is set then the land-areas will be transparent. The PostScript code is written to standard output.
       No space between the option flag and the associated arguments. Use upper case for the
option flags and lower case for modifiers. #include "explain_-j.txt" #include "explain_-R.txt"  

OPTIONS

-A
Features with an area smaller than min_area in km^2 or of hierarchical level higher than max_level will not be plotted [Default is 0/4 (all features)]. See DATABASE INFORMATION below for more details. #include "explain_-b.txt"
-C
Set the shade (0-255), color (r/g/b), or pattern (p|Psize/pattern) for lakes [Default is the fill chosen for "wet" areas (-S)].
-D
Selects the resolution of the data set to use ((f)ull, (h)igh, (i)ntermediate, (l)ow, and (c)rude). The resolution drops off by 80% between data sets. [Default is l].
-E
Sets the viewpoint's azimuth and elevation (for perspective view) [180/90]
-F
Sets the color used for Frame and annotation. [Default is 0/0/0 (black)]
-G
Select painting of "dry" areas. Optionally, set the shade (0-255), color (r/g/b), or pattern (p|Psize/pattern) [Default is black].
-I
Draw rivers. Specify the type of rivers and [optionally] append pen attributes [Default pen: width = 1, color = 0/0/0, texture = solid]. Choose from the list of river types below. Repeat option -I as often as necessary.
        1 = Permanent major rivers

        2 = Additional major rivers

        3 = Additional rivers

        4 = Minor rivers

        5 = Double lined rivers

        6 = Intermittent rivers - major

        7 = Intermittent rivers - additional

        8 = Intermittent rivers - minor

        9 = Major canals

       10 = Minor canals

        a = All rivers and canals (1-10)

        r = All permanent rivers (1-4)

        i = All intermittent rivers (6-8)

        c = All canals (9-10)

#include "explain_-K.txt"
-L
Draws a simple map scale centered on lon0/lat0. Use -Lx to specify position in UNIT instead. Scale is calculated at latitude slat, length is in km [miles if m is appended]. Use -Lf to get a "fancy" scale [Default is plain].
-N
Draw political boundaries. Specify the type of boundary and [optionally] append pen attributes [Default pen: width = 1, color = 0/0/0, texture = solid]. Choose from the list of boundaries below. Repeat option -N as often as necessary.
       1 = National boundaries

       2 = State boundaries within the Americas

       3 = Marine boundaries

       a = All boundaries (1-3)

#include "explain_-O.txt" #include "explain_-P.txt"
-S
Select painting of "wet" areas. Optionally, set the shade (0-255), color (r/g/b), or pattern (p|Psize/pattern) [Default is white]. #include "explain_-U.txt" #include "explain_-V.txt"
-W
Draw coastlines. [Default is no coastlines]. Append pen attributes [Defaults: width = 1, color = 0/0/0, texture = solid]. #include "explain_-XY.txt" #include "explain_-c.txt"
 

EXAMPLES

To plot a green Africa with white outline on blue background, with permanent major rivers in thick blue pen, additional major rivers in thin blue pen, and national borders as dashed lines on a Mercator map at scale LEN_1 UNIT/degree, try

pscoast -R-30/30/-40/40 SCALE_M1 -B5 -I1/4/0/0/255 -I1/1/0/0/255 -N1/1ta -W3/255/255/255 -G0/255/0 -S0/0/255 -P > africa.ps

To plot Iceland using the lava pattern (# 28), unit size LEN_2 UNIT, on a Mercator map at scale LEN_3 UNIT/degree, try

pscoast -R-30/-10/60/65 SCALE_M2 -B5 -Gp0.5/28 > iceland.ps  

DATABASE INFORMATION

The coastline database is compiled from two sources: World Vector Shorelines (WVS) and CIA World Data Bank II (WDBII). In particular, all level-1 polygons (ocean-land boundary) are derived from the more accurate WVS while all higher level polygons (level 2-4, representing land/lake, lake/island-in-lake, and island-in-lake/lake-in-island-in-lake boundaries) are taken from WDBII. Much processing has taken place to convert WVS and WDBII data into usable form for GMT: assembling closed polygons from line segments, checking for duplicates, and correcting for crossings between polygons. The area of each polygon has been determined so that the user may choose not to draw features smaller than a minimum area (see -A); one may also limit the highest hierarchical level of polygons to be included (4 is the maximum). The 4 lower-resolution databases were derived from the full resolution database using the Douglas-Peucker line-simplification algorithm. The classification of rivers and borders follow that of the WDBII. See the GMT Cookbook and Technical Reference Appendix K for further details.  

BUGS

The options to fill (-C -G -S) may not always work if the Azimuthal equidistant projection is chosen (-Je|E). If the antipole of the projection is in the oceans it will most likely work. If not, try to avoid using projection center coordinates that are even multiples of the coastline bin size (1, 2, 5, 10, and 20 degrees for f, h, i, l, c, respectively).
The political borders are for the most part 1970ies-style and do not reflect the recent border rearrangments in Europe. We intend to update these as high-resolution data become avaiable to us.
Some users of pscoast will not be satisfied with what they find for the Antarctic shoreline. In Antarctica, the boundary between ice and ocean varies seasonally and interannually. There are some areas of permanent sea ice. In addition to these time-varying ice-ocean boundaries, there are also ice grounding lines where ice goes from floating on the sea to sitting on land, and lines delimiting areas of rock outcrop. For consistency's sake, we have used the World Vector Shoreline throughout the world in pscoast, as described in the GMT cookbook Appendix K. Users who need specific boundaries in Antarctica should get the Antarctic Digital Database, prepared by the British Antarctic Survey, Scott Polar Research Institute, World Conservation Monitoring Centre, under the auspices of the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research. This data base contains various kinds of limiting lines for Antarctica and is available on CD-ROM. It is published by the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research, Scott Polar Research Institute, Lensfield Road, Cambridge CB2 1ER, United Kingdom.  

SEE ALSO

gmtdefaults, gmt, grdlandmask, psbasemap #include "refs.i"


 

Index

NAME
SYNOPSIS
DESCRIPTION
OPTIONS
EXAMPLES
DATABASE INFORMATION
BUGS
SEE ALSO

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Time: 07:11:28 GMT, January 07, 2025