Producing global placename database

This guide shows you have to produce a global placename database from two sources: The US agencies NGA and USGS. An alternative source for global placename data is https://www.geonames.org/

Prerequisites

Tool

The tool which is used to build the database is TPG.GeoFramework.LocationServiceSqliteLoader.exe. Make sure that the support files cc.csv, dsg.csv and gns_adm1.csv are also located in the same folder. For general documentation, see Geolocation

Data

Download global data from https://geonames.nga.mil/gns/html/namefiles.html (Entire country files dataset).

Download US domestic data from https://www.usgs.gov/core-science-systems/ngp/board-on-geographic-names/download-gnis-data (National file)

Steps

2. Run the tool on Countries.txt first:

   TPG.GeoFramework.LocationServiceSqliteLoader.exe "c:\location\Countries.txt" gns "c:\location\20210304_Worldgeonames.location.sqlite"
   

3. Run the tool on NationalFile, with the same output file as in the previous step. This will add the new data to the existing file.

   TPG.GeoFramework.LocationServiceSqliteLoader.exe "c:\location\NationalFile.txt" gns_us "c:\location\20210304_Worldgeonames.location.sqlite"
   

The database is now complete, and can be read by the Maria GDK location service to search for place names with complete global coverage.