Build and install latest PostGIS in Ubuntu Linux

If you need to stick with the latest PostGIS version for your PostgreSQL-database, you either have to find a suitable PPA or simply build the extension yourself, because Ubuntu's PostGIS version is out-of-date. Instead of using 3rd party PPAs, I recommend to build it yourself the following way:

1. Install the prerequisite packages:
   
   sudo apt-get install packaging-dev postgresql postgresql-server-dev-9.1 libxml2-dev libgeos-dev libproj-dev libgdal-dev
   
   
2. Download the sources (e.g. for PostGIS 2.1.0):
   
   wget http://download.osgeo.org/postgis/source/postgis-2.1.0.tar.gz
   
   
3. Extract the sources and go into extraction folder:
   
   tar xvzf postgis-2.1.0.tar.gz; cd postgis-2.1.0
   
   
4.  Configure the sources
   
   ./configure
   
   
5. Compile PostGIS
   
   make
   
   
6. Install the compiled PostGIS extension
   
   sudo make install
   
   
7. Use PostGIS within PostgreSQL:
   
   CREATE EXTENSION postgis;
    

Now you can build and control the update of your PostGIS versions by yourself.

Process PostgreSQL data in R with Ubuntu Linux 12.04

Here is the ultimate overview  for all who like to work with R in Ubuntu and who want to process data from PostgreSQL. As a requirement, I assume that you already setup your PostgreSQL database.

1. Step: Install dependencies (PostgreSQL, JDBC-Connector for PostgreSQL and R)

   sudo apt-get install postgresql libpostgresql-jdbc-java r-base-core r-cran-rjava r-cran-dbi 

2. Step: Open Terminal & run R with
   

   R

3. Step: Install JDBC-Package (RJDBC) for R

   install.packages(c("RJDBC"))

4. Step: Connect to your database from within R

   # Include JDBC package
   library(RJDBC)
   
   # Initialize JDBC PostgresSQL driver
   drv <- JDBC("org.postgresql.Driver", "/usr/share/java/postgresql-jdbc4-9.1.jar", identifier.quote="`")
   
   # Establish connection to database
   conn <- dbConnect(drv, "jdbc:postgresql://localhost/database", "user", "pw")

   # Run your SQL select query
   data <- dbGetQuery(conn, "select * from iris where Species='setosa'")

5.  That's it :) 

If you want to connect a non-local database, you have to adjust your dbConnect-command.