GIS

Haitian Earthquake: Links for January 15
SERVIR produces maps and data for Central America and the Caribbean, including maps for disaster support. Maps of the Haitian earthquake produced to date include damage assessments from satellite imagery, including damage to Port-au-Prince’s seaport, and a map showing erosion risk (above) — no small thing where hillside buildings…   Read more →
Posted on Friday, January 15, 2010 at 10:58 AM
Categories: Earthquakes, GIS, Haitian Earthquake
A Gentle Introduction to GIS
A Gentle Introduction to GIS (114-page PDF; online supplements here) is a beginner’s guide that uses the open-source Quantum GIS for its examples; the project was sponsored by the government of Eastern Cape, South Africa. Via GIS Lounge and Slashgeo….   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, January 14, 2010 at 11:46 AM
Categories: GIS
Exploring Ways of Using SRTM Data
The Integrity Logic blog looks at some of the things that can be done with elevation data from the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM); it gets particularly interesting when the SRTM data picks up artificial structures like skyscrapers and landfills. Via Slashdot (where, being Slashdot, commenters noted the potential for…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, January 5, 2010 at 5:18 PM
Categories: GIS, Satellite & Aerial
Essential Skills for a GIS Career
Michalis Avraam has compiled a list of the essential skills for a successful GIS career, based on a discussion at a GIS Day event in Seattle. Via Slashgeo….   Read more →
Posted on Friday, November 20, 2009 at 8:07 AM
Categories: GIS
Peter Batty on Free Geodata, the Ordnance Survey and the USGS
The grass is always greener on the other side, Peter Batty argues in this rather funny “georant” at last week’s AGI GeoCommunity 09 in which he defends the Ordnance Survey, sort of, by pointing out that there are significant disadvantages to the U.S.’s free-data policies, too. (Unfortunately the video…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, September 27, 2009 at 7:07 AM
Categories: GIS, Video
State Online Atlases
Western Illinois University librarian Linda Zellmer has compiled a list of state online atlases of various sorts, from online GIS to Google Maps mashups, and from general atlases to those limited to specific topics. Via MAPS-L….   Read more →
Posted on Monday, September 7, 2009 at 4:49 PM
Categories: GIS, Online Maps
More Book Reviews
More reviews of books previously mentioned here: Directions reviews GIS Cartography: A Guide to Effective Map Design (see previous entry). The New York Times reviews The Selected Works of T. S. Spivet, a copy of which I now have and expect to read shortly (previously: The Selected Works of T….   Read more →
Posted on Monday, June 22, 2009 at 12:06 PM
Categories: Astronomy, Books, GIS
GIS Cartography Reviewed
James reviews Gretchen N. Peterson’s GIS Cartography: A Guide to Effective Map Design, which, he notes, is written independent of any particular software package. “Gretchen’s book is something that you can use almost anywhere with any medium and won’t get out of date. That is a great value that…   Read more →
Posted on Saturday, June 20, 2009 at 7:46 AM
Categories: Books, GIS
GIS Web Maps to Critique Web Mapping Applications
It looks like GIS Web Maps will be a blog that critiques GIS web mapping: “I usually don’t have that much to say. But I know good when I see it. I know bad when I see it. I usually can pick up on something good and bad to say…   Read more →
1
Posted on Thursday, June 18, 2009 at 5:55 PM
Categories: Blogs, GIS
A Book Roundup
Briefly noted: Mike Parker’s Map Addict (see previous entry) is reviewed on the Collins Maps blog. GIS Pathway reviews Gretchen N. Peterson’s GIS Cartography: A Guide to Effective Map Design. James Fee notes the upcoming publication of PostGIS in Action by Regina Obe and Leo Hsu. Buy GIS Cartography at…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, May 13, 2009 at 3:27 PM
Categories: Books, GIS
‘GIS Alley’: Fort Collins, Colorado
Truth be told, I’d never heard of the name “GIS Alley” before today, but it refers to the large group of geospatial companies located in and around Fort Collins, Colorado. Here’s a puff piece in the Fort Collins Coloradoan by the director of the Rocky Mountain Geospatial Cluster, which uses…   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, April 23, 2009 at 8:59 PM
Categories: GIS, Industry News
Free Mac GIS Software
The Mac isn’t exactly known as the most GIS-friendly platform out there, but Leszek has compiled a list of free, Mac-compatible GIS applications (most of them are cross-platform rather than Mac-only)….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, April 8, 2009 at 9:53 AM
Categories: GIS, Macintosh
April Foolery
Apart from some rather obscure industry in-jokes and an atrocious pun, the focus of this year’s geospatial-industry silliness seems to be Google Street View and its impact on privacy. Google Earth Blog announces that the next-generation Street View will include 3D modelling and thermal imaging, while El Reg makes the…   Read more →
2
Posted on Wednesday, April 1, 2009 at 11:03 AM
Categories: Censorship, Security & Privacy, Driving Directions, Fun, GIS
Field Guide to Humanitarian Mapping
The need for accurate and up-to-date maps during a natural disaster or other humanitarian crisis is obvious. Teaching humanitarian aid workers how to make use of maps and mapping software is the idea behind the Field Guide to Humanitarian Mapping, a 118-page PDF document published by MapAction, an NGO…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, March 29, 2009 at 4:44 PM
Categories: Books, GIS, Google Earth
GIS Book Roundup
Briefly noted: Geoweb Guru reviews Scott Davis’s GIS for Web Developers; on Vector One, Jeff shares his notes on three recent books from ESRI Press (Building a GIS by Dave Peters, the second edition of Getting to Know ArcGIS Desktop, and the third edition of GIS Tutorial for Health). Previously:…   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, March 26, 2009 at 12:20 PM
Categories: Books, GIS, Health
Silverlight: ArcGIS API, Virtual Earth Map Control, WorldWide Telescope
A flurry of announcements last week related to Silverlight, Microsoft’s rich media browser plugin. Some will be of interest largely to geospatial professionals or web developers, like the public beta of the ArcGIS API for Silverlight or the Virtual Earth Silverlight Map Control. Me, I’m delighted to see that Microsoft…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 3:06 PM
Categories: Astronomy, GIS, Hacks & Mashups
GIS for Dummies
GIS for Dummies is now out (see previous entry); Leszek has some information about the author, Michael DeMers, an associate professor of geography at NMSU and the author of several other books on GIS, including the textbook Fundamentals of Geographical Information Systems. Via Slashgeo. Buy GIS for Dummies at…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, February 25, 2009 at 7:10 AM
Categories: Books, GIS
Map Use: Reading and Analysis
ESRI Press has just published the sixth edition of Map Use: Reading and Analysis, which it acquired from its previous publisher. From the press release: “Replete with nearly 500 maps, photographs, tables, and charts to illustrate the text, this informative volume from ESRI Press teaches the basic concepts of…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, February 17, 2009 at 7:54 PM
Categories: Books, GIS
Geospatial Science at RMIT
The Age has a brief piece on the geospatial science program at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology — “apparently the only dedicated cartography degree in Victoria and one of only two in Australia.”…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, February 16, 2009 at 10:25 AM
Categories: Education, GIS
A Brief Book Roundup
Briefly noted: GeoWeb Guru has a review of Geography Mark-Up Language: Foundation for the Geo-Web by Ron Lake et al. (via Slashgeo); Google Earth Blog reviews Josie Wernecke’s KML Handbook (previously); Vector One reports on the first A-level GIS textbook in the U.K., GIS for A-Level Geography. Buy Geography…   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, January 29, 2009 at 8:47 AM
Categories: Books, Education, GIS
‘Data for Decision’: GIS on Punchcards
“Data for Decision” is a 1967 National Film Board of Canada film that explains the work of the Canada Geographic Information System — one of the earliest GISes in history, if not the earliest — in analysing the huge volumes of data from the Canada Land Inventory. It’s been…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, January 27, 2009 at 8:21 AM
Categories: GIS, Video
Making Maps with Unfit Data
Charlie Frye has an interesting post up on the ESRI Mapping Center blog about the challenge of having to make a map with “unfit” data. “Unfit data will never work to make a good map. It’s a fact,” he writes. “My colleagues on this project, beyond being very good at…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, December 22, 2008 at 8:38 AM
Categories: GIS
MAPublisher 8.0
Version 8.0 of MAPublisher, the suite of cartographic plug-ins for Adobe Illustrator, was released Monday. Costs US$1,249; upgrades as low as US$549. Via MacNN. Previously: MAPublisher 7.0; MAPublisher 6.0….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, December 10, 2008 at 6:06 PM
Categories: GIS, Software
Cartographica: GIS for the Mac
Ogle Earth points to the preview release of Cartographica, a GIS application for the Mac. You’ll have to make do with Stefan’s first impressions; I’m even less of a GIS pro than he says he is, and have no expertise in this kind of software….   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, December 7, 2008 at 7:22 AM
Categories: GIS, Macintosh
Map Blog Update
Understanding Google Maps & Yahoo Local Search is self-explanatory. Renalid is dead; Renaud Euvrard is now collaborating with Audrey Malherbe at their new blog, GeoInWeb (en français, bien sûr). GIS Pathway is a site — it has an RSS feed and is powered by WordPress, so I’m calling it…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, December 3, 2008 at 8:59 PM
Categories: Blogs, GIS, Online Maps
Historians and GIS
A debate on the question of what GIS can offer world history, based on this article by J. B. Owens (PDF), triggered a lengthy discussion on MapHist earlier this month. Unfortunately, the MapHist discussion was sidetracked by a throwaway comment by one of the debaters: “Given the general lack of…   Read more →
Posted on Friday, November 14, 2008 at 11:22 AM
Categories: Books, GIS, Historical Maps
Missoula’s Office of Planning and Grants
Another profile of the GIS going on in a city planning office, this time from the Missoulian, which looks at the City and County of Missoula’s combined Office of Planning and Grants and its senior GIS specialist and mapmaker, Casey Wilson. (The OPG’s maps are available here.) Previously: Ed the…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, September 14, 2008 at 11:38 AM
Categories: GIS
Mapping Hurricane Gustav
Hurricane Gustav Tracking Maps Firstcoastnews.com FLHurricane.com IbisEye MIBAZAAR MSNBC StormAdvisory (click on Gustav) Wundermap Some are better than others; IbisEye, MSNBC and Wundermap are standouts. Via Anything Geospatial, Google Maps Mania, Kottke and La Cartoteca. Hurricane Gustav in Google Earth Google Earth Blog on tracking Gustav in Google Earth: Frank’s…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, August 31, 2008 at 7:18 PM
Categories: Current Events, GIS, Google Earth, Satellite & Aerial, Weather & Climate
New York Ocean and Great Lakes Atlas
The New York Ocean and Great Lakes Atlas, an online atlas of the state’s water resources, was announced yesterday. From the press release: “Currently, more than 200 data sets that contain information on such resources as storm drains, wetland boundaries, underwater vegetation, park locations, and fisheries are available through the…   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, July 24, 2008 at 9:51 AM
Categories: Environment, GIS
B.C. Geodata Available Online, Through Google Earth
As reported last year, the provincial government of British Columbia is making its geographic databases available online and via Google Earth. The announcement was made last Friday; the Vancouver Sun has coverage. Via, and more at, AnyGeo….   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, July 22, 2008 at 4:25 PM
Categories: Energy & Resources, Environment, GIS, Google Earth
Two Upcoming GIS Books
James is looking forward to two upcoming books on GIS from ESRI Press: Building a GIS (Amazon) and The Business Benefits of GIS: An ROI Approach (Amazon, web site)….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, July 9, 2008 at 9:54 AM
Categories: Books, GIS
Three Blogs
Google Earth Design has been around for more than a year, but I’ve apparently missed it until now; the subject of good map design within Google Earth seems a laudable one. Ryan Strynatka writes about his blog, The Fiducial Mark: “It’s basically a geospatial blog about mapping, photogrammetry, and…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, July 9, 2008 at 9:27 AM
Categories: Blogs, GIS, Google Earth
Link Roundup: Early July Edition
Off camping for a few days; here are a few links to tide you over: Roger Hart’s very good blog, GeoCarta, has moved to a new address and a new platform. The Sandusky Library Archives Research Center’s map collection is moving to new map cabinets; I’d be interested in seeing…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, July 2, 2008 at 6:44 PM
Categories: Blogs, Books, GIS, Hacks & Mashups, Industry News, Libraries, Triangulations (Links)
GIS Books
La Cartoteca points to two GIS manuals from the Pragmatic Programmers: Scott Davis’s GIS for Web Developers: Adding “Where” to your Web Applications, which came out last October; and the forthcoming (an online beta is available) Desktop GIS: Mapping the Planet with Open Source Tools, by Gary E. Sherman. Jeff…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, June 22, 2008 at 3:57 PM
Categories: Books, GIS
Introductions to GIS and GPS
GIS: An Overview is a very basic introduction, but it seems to me that that sort of thing is necessary. Via About.com Geography. PC World’s How to Buy a GPS Device is slanted very heavily towards car-mounted GPS navigation systems, which I guess are the most common, and barely mentions…   Read more →
Posted on Saturday, April 5, 2008 at 11:57 AM
Categories: GIS, GPS
Designed Maps
The ESRI Mapping Center blog reports on a new book from ESRI Press: Designed Maps: A Sourcebook for GIS Users. It’s by Cynthia Brewer, who also wrote Designing Better Maps: A Guide for GIS Users (see previous entry). The goal of the book is to offer a graphics-intensive presentation…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, February 25, 2008 at 8:15 AM
Categories: Books, Cartography, GIS
Cadastral GIS Horror Stories
On the Surveying, Mapping and GIS blog, Dave Smith recounts some GIS horror stories involving cadastral data errors — and the ludicrous things that are done to resolve them. “If you have discrepancies, data gaps, quality issues, other issues, I cannot stress it enough to county tax departments — work…   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, February 14, 2008 at 9:12 PM
Categories: GIS, Surveying
Ed the Map Maker
This is an article celebrating 40 years of service by Ed Maslonka, the cartographer of Grand Island, Nebraska, but it also offers a taste of what goes on, mapping-wise, in municipal planning departments….   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, February 14, 2008 at 9:08 PM
Categories: GIS, Surveying
Turners Falls High School and the U.S. Community Atlas
The Springfield Republican reports on a GIS project conducted by students of Turners Falls High School, which is part of ESRI’s U.S. Community Atlas program. The students produced a number of maps of the towns of Gill, Montague and Erving, Massachusetts. From The Republican: “They had mapped and described…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, January 13, 2008 at 12:00 PM
Categories: Education, GIS
Why Paper Maps Are Still Produced
Vector One asks why so many paper map products are still produced: Paper maps are still produced for a number of reasons. The primary reason that this is the case is due to the fact that paper maps are associated with user needs. While communication purposes are high on the…   Read more →
Posted on Friday, January 4, 2008 at 12:29 PM
Categories: GIS
Roger Tomlinson: The Father of GIS
Today’s Globe and Mail has a profile of Roger Tomlinson, whose work with the Canadian government in the 1960s to develop the first national computerized GIS system has apparently earned him the title of “the father of GIS.”…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, December 17, 2007 at 8:55 PM
Categories: GIS
A Map Blog Update: GeoWeb, Cartographismes and More
The GeoWeb 2007 conference, which takes place later this month and deals with “the convergence of Web technologies, XML, Web services, and GIS,” has a conference blog. The blog associated with Krygier and Wood’s excellent book, Making Maps (reviewed here), has moved to a new address. Other new blogs: Cartographismes,…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, July 8, 2007 at 8:03 PM
Categories: Art, Blogs, Conferences, GIS, Online Maps
GIS and Geography at Dartmouth
Alumni magazine Dartmouth Life has an article about geography and GIS at Dartmouth College, which “remains the only college in the Ivy League with a distinct geography department.”…   Read more →
1
Posted on Sunday, May 6, 2007 at 2:36 PM
Categories: GIS
GeoThought by Peter Batty
Former Intergraph CTO Peter Batty now has a blog: GeoThought. Via All Points Blog and Anything Geospatial….   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, April 24, 2007 at 10:44 AM
Categories: Blogs, GIS
GeoGratis: Free Canadian Topo Data
Further to the previous report that the government of Canada would make digital topographic data available for free: here is the official announcement and here is the site where you can download that data. It’s called GeoGratis — cute. Via Maps-L; thanks also to Drew for the tip. Previously: Government…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, April 4, 2007 at 2:18 PM
Categories: GIS, Topo Maps & Trails
Two Geospatial Industry Blogs
Two new blogs from the geospatial industry: ESRI Support Center News (via James, who notes that it “seems to be in a holding pattern”); and MapInfo’s Location Intelligence Blog (via All Points Blog)….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, March 14, 2007 at 10:18 AM
Categories: Blogs, GIS
Landsat Image Mosaic of Antarctica
The Landsat Image Mosaic of Antarctica “combines nearly 1100 hand-selected Landsat satellite scenes that are being digitally woven together to create a single, seamless, cloud-free image of the Antarctic continent — the most detailed color representation of this vast and frozen landmass ever produced,” according to the press release….   Read more →
Posted on Monday, March 12, 2007 at 8:52 PM
Categories: GIS, Satellite & Aerial
The Future of GIS
Catholicgauze stirs the pot with an essay on the future of GIS and its increasing separation from Geography. Key graf: With [Geographic Information Science] focusing only on GIS the whole reason GIS exists, to study spatial phenomenon, is kicked out the door. When GIS is the pinacle of everything geography…   Read more →
2
Posted on Sunday, March 11, 2007 at 11:03 AM
Categories: GIS
GIS and Map Libraries
Geography Matters, the ESRI blog, has a post up on GIS and map libraries: “While not all institutions manage holdings of this size [the Library of Congress’s map collection], libraries and museums are realizing that a GIS can not only help organize their growing collections, but can help make the…   Read more →
1
Posted on Thursday, March 1, 2007 at 8:26 PM
Categories: GIS, Libraries
International Polar Year Maps
The Canadian International Polar Year Internet Map Server maps the research stations, projects and other information associated with the the International Polar Year. The map interface takes a bit of time to load; the data are available as separate downloads. Via Science Library Pad….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, February 28, 2007 at 1:37 PM
Categories: Environment, GIS
Two More Blogs
Stefan has discovered two brand-spanking-new blogs that have started up this very month: the Google Earth Hacks blog accompanies the site of the same name; MapWrapper.com is a GIS blog with an interest in earth sciences and remote sensing. Previously: Google Earth Roundup….   Read more →
Posted on Monday, January 22, 2007 at 10:11 AM
Categories: Blogs, GIS, Google Earth, Satellite & Aerial
ArcGIS Explorer Reviewed
I’ve been following the news about ArcGIS Explorer, ESRI’s putative response to virtual globe software like Google Earth, since it was first announced (James Fee, for example, has blogged about it a lot), but I haven’t blogged about it myself. I generally consider ESRI products beyond my capabilities (even…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, January 3, 2007 at 2:06 PM
Categories: GIS, Software
Ed Parsons Leaves Ordnance Survey
First Chandu, now this: Ed Parsons is leaving the Ordnance Survey; he’s been their chief technology officer for more than five years….   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, December 5, 2006 at 8:25 AM
Categories: GIS
A to Z GIS Reviewed
GIS Monitor reviews a new book from ESRI Press, A to Z GIS: An Illustrated Dictionary of Geographic Information Systems. “With short, clear, and authoritative definitions of more than 1,800 terms written by more than 150 subject-matter experts, this small book is so useful it is addictive!” The reviewer…   Read more →
1
Posted on Tuesday, October 17, 2006 at 9:29 AM
Categories: Books, GIS
U.S. Forest Service Geodata
GPS Tracklog has discovered a clearing house for U.S. Forest Service geodata, and talks about how that geodata can be used (hint: raster images can be viewed in most image viewers)….   Read more →
Posted on Monday, October 9, 2006 at 9:40 PM
Categories: GIS, Topo Maps & Trails
Conservation GeoPortal
The Conservation GeoPortal is an index of conservation maps and GIS datasets. No maps or data is available on the site itself, just searchable metadata; it points to stuff elsewhere online. More here. Via Maps-L….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, September 27, 2006 at 1:36 PM
Categories: Environment, GIS
Free GIS Data GeoBlog
Free GIS Data GeoBlog points to GIS data available for free online; it’s another project by Glenn Letham, whom we’ve heard of before: he’s also behind Anything Geospatial and GISUser.com, among other things. Via Cartography and GPS Tracklog….   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, September 24, 2006 at 10:32 PM
Categories: Blogs, GIS
QGIS
QGIS, an open-source, multiplatform GIS application, has a blog by its developers. Via James Fee, who’s been covering QGIS for a while….   Read more →
Posted on Saturday, August 5, 2006 at 11:06 AM
Categories: Blogs, GIS
Forthcoming Books
Two forthcoming books on the horizon: A to Z GIS: An Illustrated Dictionary of Geographic Information Systems (Amazon), a terminology guide from ESRI Press (press release); and Google Earth for Dummies, which is self-explanatory (via Google Earth Blog)….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, August 2, 2006 at 3:37 PM
Categories: Books, GIS, Google Earth
GIS on OS X
Peter Rukavina explores GIS applications for Mac OS X: “The last time I went looking for a desktop GIS application for my Mac all I found was the beast of a system that is GRASS. … Suddenly it seems that GIS apps for the Mac are all over the place.”…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, July 25, 2006 at 8:19 AM
Categories: GIS, Macintosh
Canada and Open Source GIS
In a Directions article, Kevin Flanders argues that Canada’s disproportionately large contribution to open source GIS projects is a result of federal government funding, which he contrasts with U.S. government contracts to proprietary GIS vendors….   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, June 11, 2006 at 9:57 PM
Categories: GIS
ESRI Blog: Geography Matters
Via James and Glenn, I discover ESRI’s new public (and possibly collaborative) blog about the GIS industry, Geography Matters. Still in its early stages; ought to be interesting to see how it develops….   Read more →
Posted on Friday, June 9, 2006 at 8:10 PM
Categories: Blogs, GIS
Forbes Profiles ESRI
For people in the geospatial industry, ESRI is omnipresent; for people outside the industry, ESRI is scarcely on our radar, despite their dominance of the GIS software market. For those of us in the latter category, this Forbes article, profiling ESRI owner Jack Dangermond and examining how ESRI is responding…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, June 5, 2006 at 11:56 AM
Categories: GIS
e_Perimetron
e_Perimetron is a new quarterly web journal, the focus of which is the application of geospatial technologies to old maps. The first issue, for example, has articles that transform old maps to conform to known coordinates, assign projections to portolans, and so forth. The question under study, I guess, is…   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, June 1, 2006 at 8:11 AM
Categories: Antique Maps, GIS, Georeferencing, Scholarly Journals
GIS Portal for McAllen, Texas
The city of McAllen, Texas has launched a GIS portal, The Monitor reports….   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, May 21, 2006 at 9:35 AM
Categories: Cities, GIS
Lists
On Here Be Dragons, a list of resources for making custom maps for Garmin GPS receivers. On Very Spatial (via), a list of desktop GIS applications….   Read more →
Posted on Monday, May 15, 2006 at 6:47 AM
Categories: GIS, GPS
Mark Monmonier
Directions reports that the keynote speaker at this week’s NEGIS conference was professor and author Mark Monmonier, which led me to his web site. Coincidentally, a copy of his classic book, How to Lie with Maps, arrived from Amazon this week; it’s the next mapping book in my reading queue….   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, May 11, 2006 at 10:52 AM
Categories: Books, Conferences, GIS
Think Globally, Act Regionally: GIS for the Social Sciences
Think Globally, Act Locally: GIS and Data Visualization for Social Science and Public Policy Research, is a new textbook from ESRI Press. Authored by San Francisco State University urban studies professor Richard LeGates, the book is part of a project to introduce spatial analysis to the social sciences, especially urban…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, May 8, 2006 at 10:55 AM
Categories: Books, GIS
GIS Internet Resources
Via Ogle Earth, a collection of online GIS resources on the web site of the U.S. Army’s Topographic Engineering Center….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, April 19, 2006 at 8:01 AM
Categories: GIS
Book Review: Making Maps by Krygier and Wood
Making Maps: A Visual Guide to Map Design for GIS by John Krygier and Denis Wood Guilford Press, 2005. Softcover, 303 pp. ISBN 1-59385-200-2 I love this book. It’s just so neat. Although Making Maps is aimed at a GIS audience (just look at that subtitle), this is not a…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, March 29, 2006 at 9:21 AM
Categories: Book Reviews, Cartography, GIS
Triangulations: March 27
Jeff Thurston’s contribution to the debate over free geodata looks at the question of scale: if you want geospatial data to be free and updated regularly, consider the huge amount of territory that has to be mapped. Wired’s piece, Map Mashups Get Personal, looks at Platial, a service that…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, March 27, 2006 at 11:03 AM
Categories: Blogs, Books, GIS, GPS, Hacks & Mashups, Topo Maps & Trails, Triangulations (Links)
B.C. Base Mapping
Here’s an article from itbusiness.ca about British Columbia’s Base Mapping and Geomatic Services branch, a part of the provincial government’s Integrated Land Management Bureau. The article covers some of the applications of the branch’s data at a fairly general level. The branch’s web site has only a little available for…   Read more →
1
Posted on Monday, March 20, 2006 at 9:34 AM
Categories: GIS
Triangulations: March 20
An article about GPS and geocaching in South Africa points out the extreme markup for GPS devices in that country: they cost twice as much as they do in the U.S.. The proposed INSPIRE directive, which would ostensibly standardize the sharing of geographical data among European countries, is raising…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, March 20, 2006 at 6:57 AM
Categories: Blogs, GIS, GPS, Triangulations (Links)
Link Roundup for February 17
I’m still up to my neck in Olympics nonsense, but I’ve got a few links to share with you that have been accumulating in my “post these soon” file. For all you tube map fanatics, a London Underground Map where the stations have been relabelled with anagrams of their names….   Read more →
Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 at 9:53 AM
Categories: Collecting, GIS, Mass Transit, Triangulations (Links)
Link Roundup for February 7
Significant Blogspot outages rendered several favourite mapping blogs unavailable for portions of last weekend, including Cartography and GeoCarta. The city of North Platte, Nebraska, its police department, and surrounding Lincoln County all use different GIS and CAD software to generate city maps; a move is underway to have them all…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, February 7, 2006 at 7:07 AM
Categories: Blogs, Cartography, GIS, Groups & Societies, Triangulations (Links)
AHA: GIS and History
At last weekend’s meeting of the American Historical Association, there was a session on GIS and History, the papers presented at which are available as PDF files (on the page, click on the name of the presenter). Historians regularly import methods from other disciplines to solve historical problems, and this…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, January 10, 2006 at 12:30 PM
Categories: Conferences, GIS
A Roundup: Society, Journal, Blog, Podcast
A few quick links for the Map Site Directory: Via MapHist, I’ve learned about the British Cartographic Society and its journal, The Cartographic Journal. ArcDeveloper is a new blog that should be of interest to ESRI GIS developers. Via Spatially Adjusted. Another geospatial podcast, based in Australia and featuring content…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, December 18, 2005 at 5:09 PM
Categories: Blogs, Cartography, GIS, Groups & Societies, Podcasts & Audio, Scholarly Journals
Free Australian Maps, Images and Data
The Australian government makes satellite imagery, geology maps (1:250,000 scale) and spatial data available free of charge. Via Glenn’s GISUser Weblog. See previous entry: Satellite Images and the Weather….   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, December 1, 2005 at 3:23 PM
Categories: GIS, Satellite & Aerial, Topo Maps & Trails
VanMap: Vancouver Map System
VanMap is a GIS viewer for the city of Vancouver, British Columbia; it’s got a surprising number of layers, more of which were added last September. (Use “VanMapLite” if you’re having browser difficulties with the main interface.) Via Vector One, where Jeff Thurston notes, “Of note is the inclusion of…   Read more →
1
Posted on Sunday, November 20, 2005 at 4:54 PM
Categories: GIS, Vancouver
Designing Better Maps Reviewed
GIS Monitor reviews Cynthia Brewer’s Designing Better Maps: “Brewer’s advice is authoritative, practical, and useful to novice and experienced mapmakers alike. She focuses on just a few key questions — how to design a map so that its layout matches its purpose … and how to effectively use type,…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, November 8, 2005 at 9:11 AM
Categories: Books, GIS
SlashGISRS
SlashGISRS is a Slashdot-style community focusing on GIS and remote sensing. Looks very promising. (And it’s run by a Canadian non-profit organization: there are no limits to my country’s geographic conspiracy.)…   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, October 6, 2005 at 11:09 AM
Categories: GIS
Open Source GIS Guide
GIS Unshackled: A Guide to Open-Source Tools: a look at some of the open-source software packages, from databases to scalable vector graphics, that can be used in lieu of established commercial software. Via Very Spatial….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 at 5:33 PM
Categories: GIS, Software
Katrina Maps and Photos: Behind the Scenes
Tyler Mitchell talks about the behind-the-scenes work to process approximately 1,500 NOAA images from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and upload them to the Katrina Image Warehouse, using open-source software; the basics were up and running within 48 hours. Via Glenn’s GISuser Weblog. Previous entries about Tyler Mitchell’s work: Open…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 at 2:11 PM
Categories: GIS, Hurricanes 2005, Software
Map Events in Colorado
Denver is going to be a busy place for map lovers this month. The International Map Collectors’ Society’s symposium takes place between September 18 and 23, and is held in conjunction with the Rocky Mountain Map Society’s antique map fair, which takes place just before the symposium on September 17…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, September 7, 2005 at 9:31 AM
Categories: Collecting, Conferences, GIS, Groups & Societies
Ten More Mapping Blogs
I posted links to a lot of new blogs next month, but Cartography’s roundup of cartography and related blogs last week brought a grand total of seven more blogs to my attention. Plus, I was already aware of Ed Parsons’s blog — he’s the CTO of the Ordnance Survey —…   Read more →
2
Posted on Tuesday, September 6, 2005 at 8:03 AM
Categories: Blogs, GIS, Podcasts & Audio, Software
Spatially Adjusted
Another blog to tell you about, and I can’t believe I missed reporting this one earlier: Spatially Adjusted, a GIS blog by James Fee, with a lot of stuff on ESRI and other software….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, August 31, 2005 at 5:43 PM
Categories: Blogs, GIS
Preservation and Accessibility
According to this article, the USGS’s shift from paper to digital maps is generating all sorts of potential problems. Some of them are typically bureaucratic: figuring out which agency is responsible for archiving and preserving which data (and paying for it). But accessibility is a big one: not just whether…   Read more →
1
Posted on Tuesday, August 2, 2005 at 11:02 AM
Categories: GIS, Libraries
Question: Best GIS PHP Module?
Marco Fioretti is looking for GIS PHP modules. He writes, “I have an urgent project to work on which includes processing GIS data with PHP, and I’d really like to start with something which is already tested.” My original post about the Image_GIS libraries, which he found, now points to…   Read more →
1
Posted on Thursday, July 21, 2005 at 6:50 PM
Categories: GIS, Questions, Software
Using MapServer with Chameleon
Speaking of Tyler Mitchell, he’s got an article on Directions explaining Chameleon, a collection of PHP scripts that, he says, allows non-programmers to build web mapping applications using MapServer through its MapScript API….   Read more →
Posted on Friday, July 15, 2005 at 8:18 AM
Categories: GIS, Online Maps, Software
Open Source Geospatial Tools; Web Mapping Illustrated
I’m overdue in posting this one, which comes to us thanks to James. Tyler Mitchell, whose Web Mapping Illustrated, a guide to free mapping software, is now shipping, had an article up on O’Reilly last month that I think serves as a précis for the book: An Introduction to Open…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, July 5, 2005 at 7:48 AM
Categories: Books, GIS, Software
Whither GIS?
A Directions magazine editorial, An Open Letter to GIS/Geospatial Software Companies, argues that between data providers providing mapping data to companies like Google, who then build hackable web tools, that are then used by GPS users to build custom maps or by hackers who mash the mapping data with other…   Read more →
2
Posted on Wednesday, June 15, 2005 at 4:32 PM
Categories: GIS
The History of GIS
“Yet his search for the dark, hidden ancestors of modern mapmaking illustrates something simple and true: maps — like technological progress itself — are not inherently benevolent.” The history of GIS is controversial: some argue it emerged from the military during the Cold War, and had dark purposes; others maintain…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2005 at 10:58 PM
Categories: GIS
Social Mapping and the Cartographic Modeling Lab
If you’re interested in social mapping (see previous entry), you shouldn’t miss this AP wire story about the work done by the University of Pennsylvania’s Cartographic Modeling Lab. The focus of the story is their work to correlate childhood obesity with “food opportunities” — corner stores, fast-food restaurants — on…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, May 30, 2005 at 10:55 AM
Categories: GIS
Journal of Maps: No Ordnance Survey Data
Another unfortunate result of the Ordnance Survey’s copyright on its mapping data: the Journal of Maps announced last week that, because of the Ordnance Survey’s restrictive licencing, “we are currently unable to accept any maps based upon OS data.” (See previous entry: Journal of Maps.)…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, April 27, 2005 at 11:33 AM
Categories: Cartography, GIS
More on Open Geodata and the Ordnance Survey
Mapping Hacks has a report on the Forum on Open Geodata that took place earlier this month (see previous entry), where the argument was put forth that the Ordnance Survey should open up its data for the economic spinoff benefits it would engender. This is a departure from the usual…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, April 27, 2005 at 11:18 AM
Categories: GIS
The Big and the Little
Yesterday’s Guardian had a piece exploring the dichotomy between ground-level, do-it-yourself, open-source mapping projects done by people walking about with GPS units, and the massive geodata owned by government agencies. So why would anyone want to make their own map, especially when abundant geodata already exists? The main reason is…   Read more →
1
Posted on Friday, April 8, 2005 at 1:36 AM
Categories: GIS
Forum on Open Geodata
More on the attempt to produce GIS data for the UK independent of Crown copyright (see previous entry: there will be a Forum on Open Geodata on April 14 in London; see the link for speakers and details. From the page: “This forum will be a discussion about different applications…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, April 5, 2005 at 1:20 AM
Categories: Copyright, GIS
OpenOSX GrassPro
GRASS, the open-source GIS software, has been available for Mac OS X before; on Friday, OpenOSX announced GrassPro, which, in addition to GRASS 6.0.0, adds several related utilities. Panther and X11 required….   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, April 5, 2005 at 1:14 AM
Categories: GIS, Macintosh
Boston GIS Office and Atlas
The Boston Phoenix has an interview with the manager of the Boston Redevelopment Authority’s Office of Digital Cartography and GIS, Carolyn Bennett; the discussion ranges from GIS in general, to the nature of the Office’s work, to one of their projects, the Boston Atlas….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, March 2, 2005 at 9:28 PM
Categories: Boston, GIS
Journal of Maps
Richard writes to draw our attention to a new online scholarly journal, the Journal of Maps, which launched last year and had their first issue this month. From their about page: The Journal of Maps is a new inter-disciplinary online, electronic, journal that aims to provide a forum for researchers…   Read more →
3
Posted on Sunday, January 30, 2005 at 10:52 AM
Categories: Cartography, GIS, Scholarly Journals
OpenStreetMap
OpenStreetMap “is an effort to produce free (CC-licensed) streetmaps of the world.” It’s in “pre-pre-pre alpha” at the moment. The idea is to get free data by running around with a GPS, analysis of aerial photography or other methods since map data is expensive in Europe and elsewhere. We are…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, January 26, 2005 at 10:41 AM
Categories: Copyright, GIS, GPS, Online Maps
London Free Map
The University of Openness (previous entry) has a new project to make copyright-free street maps of London; the page explains the details and MO, but it looks like it’ll involve an awful lot of GPS tracing and GIS data processing from diverse sources and by divers hands. It must be…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, November 22, 2004 at 2:26 PM
Categories: GIS
Getting Out the Vote with GIS
Wired has a story about how GIS is being used to increase voter turnout. Now, get-out-the-vote organizers have started overlaying information from registered voter lists, attaching data such as voter history, party registration or time in the community to every physical address on a map. Downloaded to PDAs, the information…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, October 5, 2004 at 12:19 AM
Categories: GIS
Ordnance Survey Invents Toids, Reticulates Splines
The Ordnance Survey is developing a new mapping system that will have a profound impact on everything from insurance rates to trip planning. The key? Something called a toid, says the Grauniad: The word toid does not yet appear in any dictionary, but it will soon. Toids are the central…   Read more →
Posted on Friday, September 10, 2004 at 7:59 AM
Categories: GIS
MAPublisher 6.0
MAPublisher 6.0 was announced today. It’s a collection of Adobe Illustrator plug-ins that allow you to import GIS data into that software. Manipulating proper data with a proper graphics program, apparently. (via MacCentral)…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, April 6, 2004 at 11:38 AM
Categories: GIS, Software
Generating GIS with PHP
Image_GIS is a PHP package that allows you to generate on-the-fly maps in PNG or JPEG image formats from geographical datasets. Don’t worry if you don’t know what this means: essentially it means you can transform raw GIS data into a map in a web-ready format. (Thanks again, Huw.)…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, March 9, 2004 at 9:53 AM
Categories: GIS, Online Maps, Software
Fighting Crime with GIS
“[D]atabases of all types of crime, plotted on detailed local maps, have become a powerful new crime-fighting tool,” says a BBC report on the use of mapping technology by police in Britain. One example given: tracking arson by teens in the Midlands. (Thanks, Huw.)…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, March 9, 2004 at 9:47 AM
Categories: GIS
Community Mapping Assistance Project
Non-profit community groups do not have the same research resources that governments and corporate entities do. As far as mapping and GIS data is concerned, the New York Public Interest Research Group is trying to change that with its Community Mapping Assistance Project. The project’s director, Steven Romalewski, wrote me…   Read more →
2
Posted on Tuesday, March 2, 2004 at 10:41 AM
Categories: GIS
Geospatial Data
North American geospatial data is available free from a couple of government sites. For the U.S., there’s the USGS GEO-DATA Explorer (via MetaFilter), and, for Canada, there’s GeoGratis….   Read more →
Posted on Monday, February 9, 2004 at 10:04 AM
Categories: GIS

Note: Entries from 2003 were not categorized and will not appear in the category archives. Please consult the monthly archives.