• Locus Map currently supports a wide range of map formats (see more here >>). But many other formats are not yet covered. If you want to convert your maps to some format usable by Locus Map, have a look at MAPC2MAPC software.

• Firstly we recommend to test the demo version if this fits your needs. Here are instructions of the MAPC2MAPC author.

• In case you are satisfied we suggest to buy the full version
  

Locus Map Classic user gets 10% discount of this product. Read more >>

• MAPC2MAPC: http://www.the-thorns.org.uk/mapping/

• Converting IMG maps to a Locus supported sqlitedb map
• Converting pictures to a Locus supported sqlitedb map

http://forum.locusmap.eu/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=413&p=1876&hilit=MAPC2MAPC#p1876
http://forum.locusmap.eu/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=4&p=4874&hilit=MAPC2MAPC#p4874
http://forum.locusmap.eu/viewtopic.php?f=44&t=899&p=5043&hilit=MAPC2MAPC#p5043
http://forum.locusmap.eu/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=3&p=6142&hilit=MAPC2MAPC#p6142
http://forum.locusmap.eu/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=3&p=12802&hilit=MAPC2MAPC#p12802

The Netherlands kartographic service PDOK offers topographic map Top25raster for free. These maps are provided in geotiff format in local coordinate system. Locus Map is not able to handle geotiff format, therefore it is necessary to convert these data manually.

• Whole Netherland is divided into sections – download a section which is suitable for you
• Download page: https://www.pdok.nl/nl/producten/pdok-downloads/basis-registratie-topografie/topraster/topraster-actueel/top25raster and other scales

• For purpose of this tutorial download gdal http://www.gisinternals.com/sdk/PackageList.aspx?file=release-1600-gdal-1-10-0-mapserver-6-2-1.zip
• Download gdal-110-1600-core.msi installer

• Open command line (CMD) and go to the GDAL installation folder (in our case C:\Program Files (x86)\GDAL)
• Transform downloaded geotiff into WGS84 system

set GDAL_DATA=.\gdal-data
gdalwarp -t_srs EPSG:4326 44a-top25raster-2010.tif  44a-top25raster-2010-4326.tif

• Download and install Mapc2Mapc http://www.the-thorns.org.uk/mapping/down.html
• Start Mapc2mapc and set the location of gdal_translate
  • Edit > Locate > GDAL_translate (choose path to the installation folder of gdal)
• Open transformed geotiff
  • File > Load Calibrated map
• Export file for Locus
  • File > Write map for Mobile devices
  • Choose Locus/RMAPS sqlitedb
  • Set zoom levels
  • optional: check Make tile margins transparent
  • Press OK and confirm all zoom levels that will be generated

• Copy generated sqlitedb map into your device folder Locus/maps
• Start Locus Map

• The demo version of Mapc2mapc will add random red crosses over the map. This is limitation of free/demo version

44a-top25raster-2010-4326.zip

Locus Map basically does not support SHP files at this moment. On the other hand there are some possibilities how to convert SHP to a different format that can be imported into Locus Map.

Probably the easiest way of converting SHP file which is fully supported by Locus. Unfortunately there is a limitation in size of KML file. The limit for Locus Map is about 5000 – 10000 points depending on your device.

• Download free tool Shp2kml http://www.zonums.com/files/Shp2kml.zip
• Unzip and run shp2kml.exe
• Select the file for conversion on the first screen

• Define color of lines/polygons

• Skip balloon definition screen
• Define name of layers and description on the last screen

• Create KML file
• Copy created KML file into Locus/mapItems
• Run Locus Map and go to the Data manager > tab Items

In this example we expect that shp file for converting is very simple. Unfortunately converting is little bit tricky and requires a specific approach for particular SHP files. So it is not possible to say that this example could be used for every SHP file.

For this example we use free shp data (Czech Republic boundaries ) download-able at http://gadm.org/data/shp/CZE_adm.zip.

There are lots of possibilities how to do it - see http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Shapefiles. In this example we use Merkaartor SW.

• Download Merkaartor http://merkaartor.be/wiki/merkaartor/Download
• Run it and open SHP file for converting
• Export OSM: File > Export > OSM (XML)
• Note: Merkaartor place <bound> tag in the end of osm.xml file. You need to move it and place whole tag before first geometry element

cze_adm.osm

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<osm generator="Merkaartor 0.17" version="0.6">
   <bound box="48.540841,12.085860,51.054381,18.862533" origin="http://www.openstreetmap.org/api/0.6"/>
  <node version="0" lon="14.4138160" lat="49.2553340" timestamp="2013-04-28T10:55:33Z" user="" id="-1" actor="0"/>
...
...
...

• Download and install osmosis 0.40.1 http://bretth.dev.openstreetmap.org/osmosis-build/osmosis-0.41.zip
• Note: there are newer versions of Osmosis but the Map writer plugin does not work properly with them
• More details about Osmosis http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Osmosis/Installation

• Download Mapwriter plugin mapsforge-map-writer-0.5.0-jar
• Copy downloaded plugin into Osmosis folder osmosis/plugins .
• More about installing Map writer plugin: https://github.com/mapsforge/mapsforge/blob/master/docs/Getting-Started-Map-Writer.md#plugin-installation

• Map writer plugin uses a XML file (tag-mapping.xml) that contains pairs of known tags for generation. This xml defines which OSM element will be included in the map file.
• Use Merkaartor or arbitrary GIS/DBF viewer and decide which SHP attributes you want to export to the map file.
• For this example we create tag-mapping-shp.xml file based on tag _ENGTYPE_2_

tag-mapping-shp.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<tag-mapping xmlns="http://mapsforge.org/tag-mapping" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
	xsi:schemaLocation="http://mapsforge.org/tag-mapping ../resources/tag-mapping.xsd" default-zoom-appear="16"
	profile-name="default-profile">
 
	<!-- CZE_ADM_2 -->
	<ways>
	    <osm-tag key="_ENGTYPE_2_" value="District" zoom-appear="4" force-polygon-line="true" />
            <osm-tag key="_ENGTYPE_2_" value="Statutory city" zoom-appear="4" force-polygon-line="true"/>
	</ways>
</tag-mapping>

• Run generation

bin\osmosis.bat --read-xml cze_adm.osm --mapfile-writer file=cze_adm.osm.map type=ram tag-conf-file=tag-mapping-shp.xml bbox-enlargement=0

• More information about generation and Mapwriter plugin https://github.com/mapsforge/mapsforge/blob/master/docs/Getting-Started-Map-Writer.md

• We’ve generated vector map and in next step we need to define appearance of geometry. Appearance is defined via theme XML.
• You can edit any free theme for Locus or create new one which will be created especially for your SHP file.
• Create theme xml (in our case cze_adm_theme.xml)

cze_adm_theme.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rendertheme xmlns="http://mapsforge.org/renderTheme" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
	xsi:schemaLocation="http://mapsforge.org/renderTheme ../renderTheme.xsd" 
	locus-extended="1" fill-sea-areas="0" version="1" map-background="#00FFFFFF">
 
	<!-- Render Boundaries -->
 	<rule e="way" k="*" v="*">
		<rule e="way" k="_ENGTYPE_2_" v="District" >
                        <line stroke="#FF3E96" stroke-width="4" />
		</rule>
		<rule e="way" k="_ENGTYPE_2_" v="Statutory city">
			<line stroke="#B56904" stroke-width="4" />
		</rule>
	</rule>
</rendertheme>

• Copy vector map file cze_adm.osm.map into folder Locus/mapsVector
• Copy theme xml into folder Locus/mapsVector/_themes