Cell 2 Fire QGIS plugin

Table of contents

1. Installation
   1. Windows
   2. Linux
   3. Activate
2. Usage Overview
3. Screenshot
4. Known issues

This repo contains a QGIS plugin for graphically interfacing with Cell2Fire SB simulator.
Choose your guide:

• User
• Developer

This softwares enables you to simulate thousand of forest fires on a landscape using QGIS. At least you’ll need a fuel and elevation layer.

Installation

• pip install python required packages
• move the source folder to QGIS’s plugins directory
• activate inside QGIS

Windows

1. Install QGIS, using OSGeo4W net installer
   • https://qgis.org/en/site/forusers/alldownloads.html#osgeo4w-installer
   • Use default options for everything but
   • Select packages to install “QGIS desktop” & “pip”
2. At least open and close QGIS once
3. Download & un7zip a release (from the right tab) into fire2am (default suggested name)
4. Inside, double click on installer_windows.bat
   • ‘More info’ on the warning dialog
   • ‘Run anyway’
5. Install the plugin inside QGIS

<img src="img/win_install_script.gif" width=66% alt='missing'>

executing installer

Linux

1. Install QGIS
   • Debian LTR version: Super Key > type ‘QGIS’ > Click Install
   • Others: https://qgis.org/en/site/forusers/alldownloads.html#linux
2. Donwload a release, unzip into the plugins folder ~/.local/share/QGIS/QGIS3/profiles/default/python/plugins/fire2am
3. cd into it
4. Python requirements
   (Optional) A virtual environment can be used, but you must remember to activate it before launching QGIS, for example $ source ~/pyenv/qgis/bin/activate && qgis

    pip install --upgrade pip wheel setuptools
    pip install -r requirements.txt
   

5. A Cell2Fire c++ simulator binary is provided, but is better to compile it

    cd C2FSB/Cell2FireC
    sudo apt install g++ libboost-all-dev libeigen3-dev
    make 
   

   If it fails check where your distribution installs eigen. Because the makefile assumes EIGENDIR = /usr/include/eigen3/
   Locate it with nice find / -readable -type d -name eigen3 2>/dev/null
   Then edit makefile accordingly & try again.

6. Enable the plugin inside QGIS

Activate

1. QGIS Menu > Plugins > Manage and Install Plugins > All
2. type ‘fire’, select ‘Fire Simulator Analytics Management’
3. click ‘Install Plugin’
   Now you have a new icon on the plugin toolbar and a new plugin menu.

Usage Overview

1. Open & save a qgis project
2. At least have a fuel raster layer in ascii AAIGrid format, according to Scott & Burgan fuels definition
3. Set project & layers CRS
4. Open the dialog, setup the layers, ignitions, weather on each tab. Click Run!
5. Wait for the simulation & postprocessing.
6. Main results will be added as a layer, the rest will be stored into outputs.gpkg

Screenshot

1. On the Plugin Menu this plugin is shown selected
2. Its icon is also available on the Plugin Toolbar
3. Along other very useful plugins:
   • Plugin Builder : For developers wanting a minimal working plugin template
   • Plugin Reloader : If the provided Restore Defaults button doesn’t work, use this
   • Time Manager : For earlier versions of QGIS (<3.2) this is needed for animating the fire isochrones (merged fire evolution layer)
   • IPython QGIS Console : A introspection capable ipython session based on qtconsole

Known issues

• Directories or folders with spaces won’t work
• Don’t close the current project with the dialogs opened
• Don’t try opening the results directory while the simulation is running, specially -after the simulation- while postprocessing statistics