{"slug": "qgis", "name": "QGIS", "category": "other", "category_name": "Other software", "description": "", "recommenders": 4, "commenters": 9, "warners": 0, "score": 4.863, "rising": 0.02, "first": "2026-03-07", "latest": "2026-10-12", "why": "QGIS is great. One of the truly good open source projects.", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 4, "neutral": 4, "compare": 1, "warn": 0}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 3, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "QGIS is great. One of the truly good open source projects.", "icon": true, "domain": "stosberg.com", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://qgis.org", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["QGIS"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 800912736, "item_id": 50057046, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50057046", "by": "Ariarule", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Nonetheless it's an obvious gem and I hope they're able to arrive at a balanced and sustainable policy.", "excerpt": "I don't completely like or think this is a good ultimate decision, but looking over the thread on Github, it's being done for practical rather than ideological reasons after trying a more liberal policy first, and the discussion thread there indicates that they're already considering how to relax and refine it. A long-term and total ban on AI contributions would be a mistake as it all but guarantees a competitor or a", "context": "limited, basic user", "use_case": "viewing archived local maps", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS enacts moratorium on AI contributions"}, {"id": 756621568, "item_id": 47288848, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47288848", "by": "apexalpha", "date": "2026-03-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "this piece of (free!) software that essentially runs circles around the software we pay heavily for.", "excerpt": "Wow. I recently joined a grid management company and we use an (in my view) ancient piece of German software called Lovion. It's written in .net 4 I think. Crazy to now see this piece of (free!) software that essentially runs circles around the software we pay heavily for.", "context": "works at a grid management company", "use_case": "grid management GIS", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS 4.0"}, {"id": 756585248, "item_id": 47286578, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47286578", "by": "hern42", "date": "2026-03-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "qgis is the best gis software ever...", "excerpt": "qgis is the best gis software ever... i use it weekly, almost daily. my next move would be to learn how to make my own plugins. ps: i'm a forester, fwiw :)", "context": "forester", "use_case": "GIS work", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS 4.0"}, {"id": 756580912, "item_id": 47286307, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47286307", "by": "atoav", "date": "2026-03-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "QGIS is great. One of the truly good open source projects.", "excerpt": "QGIS is great. One of the truly good open source projects. I used it to successfully extract 3D height data for the mountains next to my hometown. This was not an easy task since the miuntains are on a national border and I had to combine height data from two national sources. It still worked out perfectly fine.", "context": "", "use_case": "extracting 3D height data", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS 4.0"}]}], "caveats": [], "who": [{"by": "Ariarule", "context": "limited, basic user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50057046", "date": "2026-10-12"}, {"by": "Linux-Fan", "context": "prefers terminal for most things", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49399036", "date": "2026-08-22"}, {"by": "zzleeper", "context": "researcher", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47289625", "date": "2026-03-07"}, {"by": "apexalpha", "context": "works at a grid management company", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47288848", "date": "2026-03-07"}, {"by": "hern42", "context": "forester", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47286578", "date": "2026-03-07"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["gis work", "gis mapping", "viewing archived local maps", "intersection crash analysis", "making maps for research papers", "grid management gis"], "compared": [], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47285846", "title": "QGIS 4.0", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50054751", "title": "QGIS enacts moratorium on AI contributions", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49477311", "title": "AI Agent Has Root", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49384210", "title": "Stop Making TUIs", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48936110", "title": "Google Earth Desktop Client to Be Retired in 2027", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48385457", "title": "Spherical Voronoi Diagram", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 1}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-07": {"compare": 1}, "2026-08": {"neutral": 2}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {"recommend": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 800912736, "item_id": 50057046, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50057046", "by": "Ariarule", "date": "2026-10-12", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Nonetheless it's an obvious gem and I hope they're able to arrive at a balanced and sustainable policy.", "excerpt": "I don't completely like or think this is a good ultimate decision, but looking over the thread on Github, it's being done for practical rather than ideological reasons after trying a more liberal policy first, and the discussion thread there indicates that they're already considering how to relax and refine it. A long-term and total ban on AI contributions would be a mistake as it all but guarantees a competitor or a", "context": "limited, basic user", "use_case": "viewing archived local maps", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS enacts moratorium on AI contributions"}, {"id": 791642753, "item_id": 49477672, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49477672", "by": "walrus01", "date": "2026-08-28", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "the GUI is for leaving things like QGIS running full screen", "excerpt": "I use screen extensively, the GUI is for leaving things like QGIS running full screen (which is sure not going to work in a TUI). Both CLI environment and GUI get used.", "context": "", "use_case": "GIS work", "switched_from": "", "story": "AI Agent Has Root"}, {"id": 790384577, "item_id": 49399036, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49399036", "by": "Linux-Fan", "date": "2026-08-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "there is no way to replace graphical-heavy programs (GIMP, QGIS etc.) with TUIs", "excerpt": "I use the terminal for most things which are not web browsing hence for me it makes sense to prefer TUIs for \"lightweight\" GUI needs. I love how I have to configure font size and family only once in the terminal emulator and not for each program/GUI toolkit again. Of course, there is no way to replace graphical-heavy programs (GIMP, QGIS etc.) with TUIs. <https://masysma.net/37/why_terminal.xhtml>", "context": "prefers terminal for most things", "use_case": "GIS mapping", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stop Making TUIs"}, {"id": 783033153, "item_id": 48939572, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48939572", "by": "4ff618", "date": "2026-07-16", "stance": "compare", "quote": "While QGIS is incredible and powerful, it is too complicated sometimes", "excerpt": "The biggest problem I have with this is that no other software exists with such easy-to-use tools for importing GPS tracks, creating custom points, and exporting KMZ files for share with other people. I use it a lot in my work to track routes to rural locations, POIs, and calculate areas. Additionally, all of these important features work offline using cached maps. While QGIS is incredible and powerful, it is too com", "context": "", "use_case": "GIS mapping", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google Earth Desktop Client to Be Retired in 2027"}, {"id": 775142688, "item_id": 48446418, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48446418", "by": "markstos", "date": "2026-06-08", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used for intersection crash analysis to make sure each crash was assigned to at most intersection.", "excerpt": "Voroni is useful for spatial analysis when you want to assign points to a nearest /something/ like airplane positions to the nearest airport. I used for intersection crash analysis to make sure each crash was assigned to at most intersection. I combined this with a radius around each intersection so crashes too far away were also not attributed to an intersection. More here: https://mark.stosberg.com/intersection-cra", "context": "", "use_case": "intersection crash analysis", "switched_from": "", "story": "Spherical Voronoi Diagram"}, {"id": 756634000, "item_id": 47289625, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47289625", "by": "zzleeper", "date": "2026-03-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used QGIS 2.x and 3.x a lot when making maps for research papers.", "excerpt": "I used QGIS 2.x and 3.x a lot when making maps for research papers. But something that always stung was reproducibility. The python tooling was not there compared to what I could do with click-and-mouse, and there was no easy way to transfer my click-and-mouse sessions into an equivalent python script. Is the situation unchanged? (Maybe a good use for Opus would be to write a wrapper for the python tooling?)", "context": "researcher", "use_case": "making maps for research papers", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS 4.0"}, {"id": 756621568, "item_id": 47288848, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47288848", "by": "apexalpha", "date": "2026-03-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "this piece of (free!) software that essentially runs circles around the software we pay heavily for.", "excerpt": "Wow. I recently joined a grid management company and we use an (in my view) ancient piece of German software called Lovion. It's written in .net 4 I think. Crazy to now see this piece of (free!) software that essentially runs circles around the software we pay heavily for.", "context": "works at a grid management company", "use_case": "grid management GIS", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS 4.0"}, {"id": 756585248, "item_id": 47286578, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47286578", "by": "hern42", "date": "2026-03-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "qgis is the best gis software ever...", "excerpt": "qgis is the best gis software ever... i use it weekly, almost daily. my next move would be to learn how to make my own plugins. ps: i'm a forester, fwiw :)", "context": "forester", "use_case": "GIS work", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS 4.0"}, {"id": 756580912, "item_id": 47286307, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47286307", "by": "atoav", "date": "2026-03-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "QGIS is great. One of the truly good open source projects.", "excerpt": "QGIS is great. One of the truly good open source projects. I used it to successfully extract 3D height data for the mountains next to my hometown. This was not an easy task since the miuntains are on a national border and I had to combine height data from two national sources. It still worked out perfectly fine.", "context": "", "use_case": "extracting 3D height data", "switched_from": "", "story": "QGIS 4.0"}]}