Beginner’s Tutorial: Getting Started with pbfcut

pbfcut vs Alternatives: Which Tool Is Right for You?pbfcut is a command-line utility designed to extract, filter, and manipulate OpenStreetMap (OSM) data stored in PBF (Protocolbuffer Binary Format) files. It aims to be fast, memory-efficient, and script-friendly, making it a common choice for developers, GIS analysts, and hobbyists working with large OSM datasets. This article compares pbfcut with several popular alternatives, outlines typical use cases, performance considerations, ease of use, and recommends when to choose each tool.

What pbfcut does well

• Fast extraction of specific tags and elements: pbfcut excels at selecting nodes, ways, or relations and extracting only specified tags or fields, which reduces output size and downstream processing.
• Low memory footprint: Implemented to stream through PBF files, pbfcut often requires far less RAM than full in-memory processors.
• Scriptability: Simple command-line syntax and predictable outputs make pbfcut easy to include in shell scripts and data pipelines.
• Suitable for large PBFs: When you need to slice out a subset (e.g., highways, POIs, administrative boundaries) from continent- or planet-sized PBFs, pbfcut is a practical tool.

Common alternatives

• osmium-tool (osmium)
• osmfilter
• osmosis
• imposm (imposm-tool)
• ogr2ogr (GDAL)
• custom code/libraries (e.g., PyOsmium, osmapi, Osmium C++)

Each of these has different strengths: osmium is high-performance and feature-rich; osmfilter is simple and very fast for tag-based filtering; osmosis supports complex pipelines and transformations; ogr2ogr is excellent for format conversions and geospatial reprojection; libraries allow custom logic.

Feature comparison

Performance and scalability

• pbfcut is optimized for streaming and minimal allocations. For simple extraction tasks (e.g., pull all nodes with amenity=restaurant), pbfcut and osmium-tool typically outperform osmosis and ogr2ogr in both speed and RAM usage.
• For very large files (country/planet), disk I/O and single-threaded CPU become limiting factors. Tools that support multi-threading (some builds of osmium, custom code) can provide better throughput.
• If you need to perform many successive operations (filter → convert → reproject → import), consider building a pipeline using osmium + ogr2ogr or a custom script to parallelize and cache intermediate results.

Ease of use and learning curve

• pbfcut: Simple and predictable; excellent for users comfortable with shell commands. Minimal options reduce complexity.
• osmium-tool: Rich feature set; small learning curve but more capabilities to learn.
• osmfilter: Extremely straightforward for tag filters; less flexible for complex workflows.
• osmosis: Powerful but older; XML-based workflows and more verbose commands can feel heavy.
• ogr2ogr: Familiar to GIS users; strong for format and CRS operations but not optimized for OSM-specific tag handling.
• Libraries: Highest flexibility; requires programming skills and debugging.

Typical workflows and recommended tool

1. Quick tag extraction (single command): pbfcut or osmfilter

   • Example: extract all POIs with shop=* or amenity=* for a city.

2. Complex filtering + relations/way rebuilding: osmium-tool or osmosis

   • Example: extract administrative boundaries needing relation resolution and way reconstruction.

3. Format conversion and reprojection (to GeoPackage, Shapefile, GeoJSON): ogr2ogr (GDAL) or osmium + ogr2ogr

   • Example: convert filtered OSM to GeoPackage for QGIS.

4. High-performance custom processing or repeated transformations: custom code with PyOsmium or Osmium C++

   • Example: compute derived attributes, run large-scale joins, or produce tiled vector MBTiles.

5. Batch pipelines with many transformations: combine tools—use pbfcut/osmium for filtering, ogr2ogr for reprojection/format, and a DB import (PostGIS + osm2pgsql or imposm) for queries.

Pros and cons (summary table)

When to choose pbfcut

Choose pbfcut if you need a straightforward, efficient way to extract a subset of tags or element types from large PBF files and want minimal memory usage and easy scripting. It’s especially appropriate for single-step filtering tasks in automated pipelines.

When to choose alternatives

• If you need advanced relation resolution or way rebuilding, choose osmium-tool or osmosis.
• If you want reprojection or conversion to GIS-native formats, use ogr2ogr (GDAL) or a combined workflow.
• If you require custom derived data or complex algorithms, implement with PyOsmium or Osmium C++.
• If raw tag filtering with ultra-simple rules is all you need and speed is critical, osmfilter is a strong option.

Example command snippets

pbfcut-like extraction (conceptual):

# extract nodes/ways with amenity and shop tags (conceptual example) pbfcut --input germany-latest.osm.pbf --output berlin_pois.osm.pbf --tags amenity,shop 

osmium extract/filter example:

# filter by tag and write to new PBF osmium tags-filter planet-latest.osm.pbf amenity shop -o pois.osm.pbf 

ogr2ogr conversion example:

# convert OSM PBF to GeoPackage (needs intermediate conversion or ogr's OSM driver) ogr2ogr -f GPKG output.gpkg input.osm.pbf 

Final recommendation

• Use pbfcut for fast, memory-efficient extraction of tags and simple element selection from large PBF files.
• Use osmium when you need more advanced OSM-specific processing (relations, reconstructions) with high performance.
• Use ogr2ogr (GDAL) for format conversion and reprojection.
• Use libraries when you need full customization or to build reusable, high-performance applications.

Choose the tool that matches the complexity of your task: pbfcut for simple, fast extraction; osmium/osis for complex OSM logic; GDAL for GIS conversions; libraries for custom processing.