Hi Sama:

I use QGis (http://www.qgis.org/es/site/) to make map representation of any kind of data, it is very esay to use. You can use your own data to plot them with stantard shapefiles with base map data from any organization. Base map shapefile can be downloaded from your national GIS administration or open data (http://www.naturalearthdata.com/downloads/) Also it is possible to aply custom styles to your maps

Kind regards

Hi Sama:

I use QGis (http://www.qgis.org/es/site/) to make map representation of any kind of data, it is very esay to use. You can use your own data to plot them with stantard shapefiles with base map data from any organization. Base map shapefile can be downloaded from your national GIS administration or open data (http://www.naturalearthdata.com/downloads/) Also it is possible to aply custom styles to your maps

Kind regards

Hi Sama,

There's many open source application for GIS , such QGIS, etc (http://opensourcegis.org/) etc, to make map representation.

I use QGIS, illwis for opensource and use ArcGIS for propreitary software.

with QGIS its easy to use and possible if you wan draw map and use online data as base map(using mapservice, such as google map, bing and else). You can draw map and process your data with that application.

If you wan your result can view and acces at web, you will need some GIS server to transform your data for easily access by web application you made(using WMS\WFS\WCS capabilities), You can use QGIS Server, map server(http://mapserver.org/) or geoserver(http://geoserver.org/) as GIS server and you can create your own web application.

best regards,

Hello

Normally we used ArcGIS to produce the maps which is connected to a data base. also you can use Bing maps (http://www.bing.com/maps/)

Hello,

If you are R-packages enthusiastic, there is a good summary of them for using R as a GIS in Francisco Rodriguez-Sanchez' tutorial web page: http://pakillo.github.io/R-GIS-tutorial/

Best regards,

Diego

Hello, we also used ArcGIS to make the maps which is connected to data layers, such as climatic rasters of precipitation and temperature, vegetation types. We usually pre-make the site shapefiles according to the geographical coordinates of each site.

Hi! Usually I use ArcGIS to make a map with scale bars, legend etc. which is connected to data base of my university or Bing. After I export map as vector graphic file (for example .pdf or .ai) and in the Adobe Illustrator (I do not like CorelDraw) I make it more visual attractive - change line thickness, position of legend and scale bar, North arrow etc., if it is needful I use some effects (outer glow, shadow, transparency and other effects) for the text or other elements to make them well visible or more selected on the map.

All the answers above are spot on, SAGA gis is also good for some mapping applications. ArcGIS and QGIS are my first choices, but if your looking to learn some new software's and some clever data visualization techniques check out http://www.geovista.psu.edu/index.jsp they have some very cool data visualization software

Thanks Jose and other QGIS is great, if you want to try your hand with some other staff offline check Surfer as well.

everyone, thank you so much... i am trying QGIS now... this is my first time using GIS software, for me it is quite complicated. i am going through the manual to see how can i start. thanks again

You may find this useful for a simple task: http://www.simplemappr.net/

@Sama,

Have a look at the following link:

https://www.researchgate.net/post/How_to_learn_the_ArcGIS_in_an_effective_way?cp=re65_x_p2&ch=reg&loginT=6FJacrKHrsLNEQhtdSWpsUVUmsitI23xh7cDs2PrKLWjdx1OiTdYLQ**&pli=1#view=538d917fd039b1835a8b4620

We use ArcGis or Surfer, depending on the layers of infrmation you wish to represents. If You have few layers of information Surfer is very good and is very user freindly to format your maps and graphs. ArcGis is very good for several layers of information and also when the information you wish to represente are "heavy", but it is more difficult to format the documents view.

QGIS has a very good tool to add gridded sample or random sample points. If you have an old enough version of Arc Map, there was an old Hawth's Tools that worked great. It has since been morphed into another program. One a side note I like to use a stratified random design. Sort your surface by some variable, and randomly assign a fixed number of points randomly to each surface.

Hi Sama,

I use ArcGIS most often but the most simple way is "my maps" in google maps. If you only want to show loations.

https://www.google.com/maps/@64.1546445,-19.433775,10z/data=!4m2!6m1!4s211786029566974293235.0004cb133ceda6e33054d

I primarily used ArcGIS because that's what I was trained on, but others have mentioned good alternatives.  A piece of advice I would give:  GIS software has become very user friendly over the years. So much so that a novice can easily create a map that on the surface may appear sharp/valid, but in fact could contain many errors or poor practices. I would recommend reading up on some fundamentals of cartography literature, projections, etc., to be sure your map/figure not only "looks" good but is "spatially" accurate and well designed.  Many resources out there for this kind of thing.  Take advantage.  Better to do your homework now, than to send out something less than appropriate and/or repeat work later.  Good luck!!!

I also recommend QGIS. ArcGIS is a great software but QGIS is open source, so you can use it without any restriction. If there are base maps of your area of interest available you can use them as a layer and them add others layers you want (polygons, points, lines)

ArcGIS is one of the good software for producing any kind of map. similar to others answer, you can easily add base map of your study area with good resolution. In that you can add GPS data also in case if you used GPS for coordinate collection. Good luck...

Hi,

You can make study area maps using ArcMap.

You must have co-ordinates of several points encompassing your study area.

These co-ordinates can be converted to layer file in ArcGIS, using Add XY data option or Display XY data option.

Once a layer file is generated, you can add base maps to give context to your co-ordinate data.

Further, you can add items such as legends, North arrows, extent window, scale bar etc. to your map, and can export the same to use it in your papers/thesis.

Good Luck.

Regards

Ashu

Dear in easy way, you need to use arc map with create geodata base, then you need to create shapefile for features representing as points

regards

Dear Sama,

I usually use Qgis to make gorgeous images that captive readers, it's easy and it works.