chinese-postman

chinese-postman copied to clipboard

Chinese postman problem

This is a Python program to solve the Chinese postman problem.

Usage with QGIS

Installation (QGIS 3.x)

Python 3.x and QGIS 3.x is required for the plugin to run.

Download the "Chinese Postman Solver", using the QGIS plugin manager.

Manual Installation - Linux / OSX

1. Clone this repository.
2. Run ./install.sh.

Alternatively, run ./bundle.sh, and install the generated zip file as a plugin.

Usage in QGIS

1. Select the layer for which you want to solve the CPP.
2. Select the features that you want to use. The "Select Features by Polygon" tool works great if you only want to use a small part of a large network.
3. Run Plugins -> Chinese Postman -> Chinese Postman.

It should create a new layer with the results.

Command-line Usage

Requirements:

• Python2.7 or Python 3.x
• NetworkX
• Optionally, if you want to export PNG images from the command line (not needed for using the QGIS-plugin):
  • Graphviz, and
  • One of:
    • For all NetworkX versions except 1.10: PyGraphviz (preferred), or
    • For NetworkX <=1.10 and >=2.0: pydot, or
    • For NetworkX 1.10 and 1.11: PyDotPlus

Input data file must be in CSV format, with each row containing the following columns:

• Start node ID
• End node ID
• Segment length in meters
• Segment name or ID
• Start longitude, for example 18.4167
• Start latitude, for example -33.9167
• End longitude
• End latitude

Example:

Start Node,End Node,Segment Length,Segment ID,Start Longitude,Start Latitude,End Longitude,End Latitude
1,13,57,Segment 1,18.4167,-33.9167,18.6532,-33.8561
13,22,80,Segment 2,18.6532,-33.8561,18.7650,-33.7930

Then run (assuming the file is saved as input.csv):

python postman.py --csv path.csv --gpx path.gpx input.csv

The segment ID and GPS coordinates in the input file are not used for any calculations, but are used for the CSV and GPX output.

Use option --png to create a graph visualization of the route in PNG image format:

python postman.py --csv path.csv --gpx path.gpx --png path.png input.csv

License

All code is licensed under The MIT License (MIT).