There is no way to create a complete geographic map of the world (or even a country) without contributions from multiple sources. These can be data from explorers, geologists, mineralogists and satellite data.
The evolution of the Geographic Information System (GIS) has enabled the professionals to store, utilize, manage, manipulate and analyze geographic data. The spatial data infrastructure of GIS often transcends the boundaries of the subject and finds its way into other disciplines.
Therefore, the true definition of GIS is heterogeneous in nature. It encompasses an incredible number of tools and technologies. The most prominent example is the integration of local intelligence sciences with it.
Together they utilize several sources of analyses and visualization. It has been making scientific inquiry easier than it was before. GIS provides a way to relate all spatial-temporal locations with reference to a “real” location on earth.
One of the defining traits of GIS is its ability to utilize information from various sources. It includes individual disciplines and myriads of local sources. For example – data sources can consist of milestones, surveyor data, CAD models, film frame number or stream gage station.
As a result, the units of spatial-temporal data also vary considerably. Therefore, whether you are trying to utilize the data of your investigations to create a standard model, with inputs from GIS or you are trying to collate several data sources, you might want to seek a GIS-oriented software that can help you manage the bulk of different data you are collecting.
The proper GIS application can help you convert your raw data into actionable information.
How is this information system relevant to so many fields and professions?
GIS might sound like a single platform, but it has several individual databases. These databases do overlap at times. For example – GIS has a topographical database of mountain ranges, crop database of countries, epidemic map database and databases for immunization according to the countries!
It is possible that one source powers several databases, mainly when the results are related. For example – the primary source of data for a topographical database are the topographical maps, but satellite images and aerial photos serve as secondary sources of information.
Overlaying information from multiple sources helps in the verification process. Apart from the sources, the scale of a map is essential for determining the accuracy of the data. It is a form of quantitative analysis that prevents the propagation of data discrepancies through GIS ops.
How have digitized helped geologists?
Scientists and GIS contributors spend the lion’s share of their time capturing data and entering the processed data into the system. Before the advent of software programs for data processing, this was a genuinely laborious process.
Becoming a GIS practitioner was a challenging task that only the most patient scholars took up. Right now, there are several ways to enter data into the GIS database. As a result, multiple GIS professionals are contributing to the same data from various data sources which make the information more accurate.
The presence of a digitizer ensures that any map can transform into a digital map. The tools support the scanning of points, lines and polygon boundaries of a map. Modern technology has also made it possible for GIS users to create 3D maps of any location using the information from the datasets and the 2D maps.
GIS can directly collect survey data from COGO and GNSS to create accurate 3D spatial-temporal models of specific locations.
Why is GIS reliable and accurate?
Since GIS utilizes several data sources, the accuracy of the final model depends on the correctness of the data. People are not ready to settle for anything lesser than perfect. As a result, there is rampant use of GPS-derived positioning, areal and satellite imagery, powerful processors and integrated web-cloud platforms.
Geology is shifting towards a more computational era, where the software programs are taking care of data collection, management, security, and verification. GIS is utilizing these trends to serve a more significant section of the society with more accurate representations.
Remote sensing has always played a key role in GIS. It includes data from field studies, SONAR data, satellite images, satellite data and electromagnetic imaging. Even Radar contributes to remote sensing data that can improve the accuracy of GIS and its subsequent models.
Having GIS-friendly software to help you out not only helps you manage your data but also enables you to edit it. Every data needs “topological” correction before it goes into GIS and editing it before inserting it into the database can save you a lot of trouble and time.
The correctness of data is essential since several national and international surveys depend upon GIS for updated information. There must be no undershooting or overshooting or other scanning errors in it.
How does GIS establish spatial-temporal relationships?
GIS is a robust system that can recognize spatial relationships correctly. If you have data from a recent survey, you can take help of a GIS-integrated software to find the real point of reference in the data or to establish a relationship between the datasets.
For example – if you have the data on the varying levels of rainfall across the state in the last one month, the integrated software program can help you create a map quickly by using isopleths lines to indicate the rainfall volumes across several locations.
Therefore, almost all geographic maps representing the elevations, inclinations, climatic changes, temperature drops, and energy resources use geographic information system integrated software applications for accurate rendering. The topological relationships are spatial-temporal in nature, and they have room for the complexities that may come during modeling.
Water, elevation and other details: How to make your map or model more realistic?
Having the necessary resources will enable your team to create hydrological modeling, geometric networks, and cartographic modeling as well. In case of hydrological modeling, all you need is the digital elevation model of a particular area.
The detail gives a good idea about the streams, lakes, rivers, and islands of an area. Slope determines a good portion of the water flow on the earth’s surface. Therefore, DEM is an excellent source of the data that can create useful hydrological models.
Vegetation type, the roughness of terrains and the soil type are the other factors that you can add to your hydrological model to make it realistic. Geometric networks represent connected traits for further spatial analysis. They are very similar to graphs.
They find maximum use in public utility networks and model road networks. A dedicated overlaying of several datasets can create a cartographic model. Several thematic layers are representing the same area. Each subterranean layer has some significance in the given location.
A cartographic modeling method uses map overlay methods. It is very similar to the visual experience of stacking several types of maps of the same region, one on top of the other.
How is GIS revolutionizing 2D maps?
Traditional maps are two-dimensional representations of the real world. The lack of a third dimension limits their accuracy. Even today, people often struggle to understand the actual elevations and depths of terrains from 2D geographic representations.
Graphic display techniques include shading depending on the altitude, use of contour lines and shaded relief to represent the shape of a land surface. For graphically demonstrating an area, you will need the region’s digital elevation model.
Most graphic techniques use the overlaying method first to create a sense of the altitudes of the areas and the other more exceptional aspects.
How does data mining help with the creation of accurate geographic representations?
It brings us to the concept of geographical data mining in spatial-temporal data. It is a partially automated process that searches for relevant but hidden patterns among data in large databases. Several applications and tools dedicatedly help us mine for data from the digital databases like GIS.
One of the most dominant trends includes the presence of specialized algorithms that enable efficient analysis of spatial data. The mining process includes environmental monitoring and collection of data.
Environmental monitoring has dedicated data management systems that have broad categories of data and volumes of data that geologists can potentially explore. As we have mentioned before, GIS transcends the boundaries of disciplines. Here, you can see how the presence of powerful algorithms can help in the comparison of spatial and temporal datasets.
The applications of GIS arebeyond measure. While some city councils utilize the GIS data for jurisdictional purposes, the EPA can use another database for voicing their concern for the ecology.
Precisely, the geographic information system provides an integrated and streamlined way to update all kinds of geological and statistical data without leaving the field. This database system can create a robust enterprise-level decision support system when you use them in combination with enterprise solutions.
There are several reasons why leading companies, organizations and even research teams find the GIS indispensable. It finds applications in real estate, community service, environmental service, archaeology, climatology and several other disciplines across the world.
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I have been amazed by the usefulness of some of the newer GOS solutions available to the consumer.
I am also shocked to see GOS solution for consumers Thanks to you Modern Life Blog