Making Geospatial Opportunities Accessible to All - Interview with Dr Suchith Anand

Suchith Anand served as the founding chair of the ICA Commission on Open Source Geospatial Technologies. He is currently serving as the chair of Geospatial IG of Research Data Alliance (RDA). He is working for the establishment of Open Source Geospatial Labs/Research Centres in key universities worldwide as part of the GeoForAll initiative with the mission to make geospatial education and opportunities accessible to all. He is currently working as an Independent researcher for the Global Open Data for Agriculture and Nutrition (GODAN) initiative. Before joining GODAN, he worked at the University of Nottingham where he established the first Open... (read more)

2017-10-10 09:03:30

Reimagine INSPIRE by Leveraging Open Data and Web GIS

The Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe (INSPIRE) Directive has made good progress toward implementation by all member states. On the occasion of the INSPIRE Conference 2017 and in keeping with the theme INSPIRE a Digital Europe: Thinking Out of the Box, it seems fitting to comment on the current state of the directive compared to global geospatial technology trends. INSPIRE represents the most complex spatial data infrastructure project ever attempted, with the goal of aligning the 28 member states of the European Union (EU). It may prove helpful to reflect on what works; what has changed; and what needs... (read more)

2017-08-17 01:18:17

GIS and Humanitarian Work Come Together – Interview with Jus Mackinnon

Our editor Robin Waters interviews Jus Mackinnon, a founder of CrisisMappersUK, who is a self-taught GI enthusiast with a background in aviation and a passion for humanitarian relief work and crisis mapping. On the Juscomms.com website, Jus Mackinnon describes her company as a full-service, multi-disciplinary business consultancy providing expert services to the private, public and third sectors. Maps, mapping and GIS creep into the site in the context of airfield management and humanitarian crisis mapping. But if you talk to Jus you will be rewarded with a passionate discussion of many of the issues that have exercised the GI industry... (read more)

2016-12-16 03:28:48

Africa Rising - Geospatial Must Underpin Economic Development

In November last year, Andrew Coote of ConsultingWhere visited Addis Ababa for the joint Global Spatial Data Infrastructure (GSDI) and AfricaGIS conferences. GiSPro originally commissioned him to write a GSDI-focused report. But with colleague Phil Knight they realised that a wider focus on the rising use and importance of geospatial technology on the world’s most misunderstood continent would perhaps be a more valuable contribution. The quality and diversity of the projects described by African geospatial scientists in Addis Ababa was humbling. For too long, western eyes have often viewed Africa with a mixture of pity and despair, perhaps conditioned by... (read more)

2017-05-31 03:28:35

Survey and GIS in San Diego

Everyone forms their own impressions of San Diego, but for surveyors and GIS folks in the Summer, it means the largest geospatial event in the world, the ESRI Survey & Engineering GIS Summit combined with the ESRI International User Conference. The 28th annual User Conference (UC) came in early August with the theme ‘Building New Opportunities’, the bulk of the Survey Summit running as prelude the previous weekend. The summit drew over four hundred attendees, a roughly 8% increase over last year. Both conferences featured a trade show. The summit also includes the Survey and Leadership Forum, actually, a Special... (read more)

2008-11-11 12:00:00

UAVs vs MAVs

James Eddy, technical director of Bluesky International and Industrial Associate at the University of Leicester explores the growing phenomena of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in the UK and discusses the potential impact on the aerial mapping, surveying and GIS sectors. For many years unmanned aircraft were flown by model aircraft enthusiasts. Basic models cost less than a hundred pounds with more upmarket systems for a thousand or more. Now unmanned aircraft (UAs), unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), unmanned aerial systems (UASs), remotely piloted aircraft (RPAs), drones – whatever term is in favour this week, are increasingly used for professional applications for data... (read more)

2017-04-10 02:58:06

Geospatial and Health Care - UNCAP Conference 2015

A conference in Nottingham around emerging geospatial technologies offered some interesting solutions for supporting and caring for Europe’s ageing population. But we need to make sure we get the standards right as several speakers emphasised, reports Stephen Booth. Most of you reading GiSPro are geospatial buffs. You understand the benefits digital mapping linked to databases of information can deliver. Some of you are even geospatial evangelists – constantly encouraging others and seeking new areas of human activity where our technology can bring benefit. Whilst only being a commentator in that latter category, I did promise readers in the last issue... (read more)

2016-12-23 10:24:47

GIS Investigation of Mass Dolphin Death

Crime Scene Investigation Using Advanced GIS Analysis

In the summer of 2015, more than 300 dead dolphin calves were found along the Bulgarian Black Sea coast. As no governmental institution investigated this strange case, an international team of scientists was brought together to collect and analyse various types of data. Using the MOTHY model and the available data, more than 50,000 points were reconstructed in reverse time from 252 different representative trajectories of dead dolphin bodies floating in the sea. To determine the exact place of death of the dolphins, advanced geographic information system (GIS) analysis was performed on the available time-aware data. This unique interdisciplinary approach... (read more)

2016-06-22 03:55:49

Why a Smart City is the Only Possible City

There are not so many people around thinking about the area they dwell in. I mean really thinking about efficiency, economy, aesthetics, and standards. We rarely even raise our heads up and turn our eyes away from our smartphones to contemplate the scenery or enjoy the view in a city – and more often than not it’s justified. City of the Past In the past, cities were organized next to water supplies with the distance not exceeding one mile from a river or lake, which made water delivery possible. With the invention of the automobile, cities stretched to indecent distances,... (read more)

2019-06-05 05:51:24

Open Geospatial in Bonn Attracts 900 GI People - FOSS4G 2016

With a theme of Building Bridges, FOSS4G 2016 attracted some 900 delegates to hear and discuss the latest developments in open source geospatial software around four key topics: Land Information, Disaster Management, Remote Sensing for Earth Observation and Open Data. Codrina Ilie reports. Between the 24th and the 26th of August 2016, the city of Bonn, Germany was host for approximately 900 GI people, arriving from more than 50 different countries to attend the Open Source Geospatial Foundation (OSGeo) annual global conference Free and Open Source Software for Geospatial – FOSS4G 2016. This year, OSGeo celebrated its 10th successful flagship... (read more)

2016-12-23 05:16:21