At the new year, I thought that I had resuscitated my GIS. Not so. The shapefile still needed work around the edges. As in any project, its those outstanding edges that were the most difficult.
When that task was finally complete and I tried to populate it with my data file, I noticed that many polling places were showing no results. This could not be the case, as I had notes on the handful of polling places for which I did not have data. A meticulous review of my Project_Master file indicated that perhaps 1/8 of my data was missing. How? Why? Did I lose data in the conversion for xls to cvs (required by QGIS?
Fortunately, after much searching, I was able to find an uncorrupted backup file. I made a spreadsheet of the missing polling place data and am presently integrating the "lost" data into my Project_Master file. Doing so, I uncovered another problem. The results for the second national election in 1924 were jumbled. I will have to diagnose that problem before I continue.
The creation of the original GIS map took +3000 hours; creating the data file (not counting the time collecting data) took a further +2000. I am comforted that all of this work was not lost!
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