Our Mission is far from Done - Interview with the AGI

Recent changes in staffing and direction have been announced by the Association for Geographic Information. After a long haul and some tough decisions – the AGI looks set to embark in a new direction. GiS Professional recently caught up with key members of the Council to talk to them about the changes and the future for the organisation. GIS Professional editor Stephen Booth met with David Henderson (chair), Graham Wallace (vice-chair), Abigail Page (honorary secretary) and input from Andy Wells (honorary treasurer) ahead of this year’s ESRI UK conference to better understand the changes, the difficult decisions behind them and... (read more)

2016-12-23 12:57:41

Online GIS and a Perfect Storm for Local Government

The author thinks we have been using the wrong metaphors. We shouldn’t allude to aircraft taking off but to storms and perfect ones at that, argues Chris Mewse. Getmapping has been in the forefront of providing aerial imagery and other services for many years, as well as promoting the benefits of collaborative on-line mapping. The potential for the use of digital mapping and GIS in local government has taken a long time to take off amongst the lower tiers like parish and town councils. There have been several delaying factors including the cost of software, cost and licence restrictions on... (read more)

2017-04-10 12:36:34

Attendance up at Busy Bustling Show - GEO Business 2015

A busy two days found your reporters struggling to cover everything at the industry’s annual show. A conference with two streams is always a challenge but we think that below we have covered the most relevant aspect for GIS professionals. We’ve published the session titles in full so you should be able to track them down. With visitors queuing in droves to get in on the first day and attendance up 25%, the second GEO Business event attracted over 2,000 people from 47 countries. With an improved layout and over 180 companies represented the organisers were clearly delighted. Event director... (read more)

2017-04-25 11:56:23

Using Open Geodata in Minecraft

The arrival of free open geodata in Denmark and open source code has sparked a fascinating public experiment involving a popular children’s computer game. But open source with open access means some players can bring you grief! The 1 January 2013 sparked a revolution in Denmark when a vast array of public sector information was made publicly available at no cost for private companies and citizens. The objectives were to eliminate redundant databases, heighten data quality, facilitate links between datasets, improve distribution and ensure effective/coordinated development and usage. Private companies have fully embraced the initiative and are now focusing on... (read more)

2017-05-31 02:48:04

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

Working with the GIS Industry - Benefits of Research and Education

A key component of many MSc degrees offered in Universities in the UK – particularly those that fall under the heading of ‘vocational’ programmes – is the importance of external links – to what some of us might call the ‘real-world’. The reasons behind establishing these links are many, but include: to (a) bring outside expertise into the classroom through the provision of guest lectures; (b) provide a way to help students engage with practitioners in the discipline or profession; (c) broaden student horizons; (d) help students begin to network with professionals and practitioners; (e) provide opportunities for students to... (read more)

2017-12-08 11:40:57

I will be your Champion - GeoPlace Awards 2016

The annual Geoplace event celebrates achievements by local authorities in using addressing to make savings and efficiencies. It was also an opportunity to hear several opinions and thought leaders, including a government minister. It seems incredible but Geoplace is already five years old. Formed out of the former NLPG and OS addressbase products, Geoplace brings together data from Ordnance Survey, the Valuation Office, other government departments and Royal Mail to create a comprehensive address file listing thousands of individual address points. Opening GeoPlace’s 2016 conference in the plush surroundings of Westminster’s QEII conference centre, CEO Richard Mason paid tribute to... (read more)

2016-12-23 12:48:32

Data Sharing Vital to Future Success - GeoPlace 2018

The recent GeoPlace Annual Conference took place on Thursday 10 May at Edgbaston Cricket Club in Birmingham, UK. Although many topics were discussed throughout the day, talk often circled back to needing one central hub of data that everyone has access to if the industry is going to progress, reports Jason Poole. In typical conference fashion, the day started with registration, refreshments, and a chance to look round the various stands at the exhibition (and out the window which overlooked the cricket ground). The Welcome talk was delivered an hour later by Nick Chapallaz, Managing Director, GeoPlace who proudly announced... (read more)

2018-06-21 11:45:15

Reducing Barriers to Geospatial Information - Interview with Charles Kennelly

Charles has been Esri UK’s chief technology officer since 2008. He is committed to ‘reducing barriers’ to the use of geospatial information. Robin Waters met Charles at the bar after Esri UK’s annual conference in London in May where he contributed to opening and closing plenaries as well as to the opening of the track on ArcGIS as a platform. GIS Professional: This is the first Esri UK conference that I have attended and you seem to be able to attract many users despite the age of austerity? Charles Kennelly: We are delighted that there have been nearly 50% more... (read more)

2017-02-27 05:43:35

Spatio-temporal Geography and Medical Data

Authors David R. Green and Jan O. Jansen demonstrate through examples how GIS can add explanatory value to the analysis of medical data. The analysis of spatial data often relies on the use of Geographical Information Systems, with maps being the usual output. However, increasingly, GIS functionality provides more than just a digital mapping toolbox: it can include spatial and network analysis, 3D visualisation, and modelling. GIS can also handle data from many disparate sources, including remote sensing and GPS or GNSS. The latter provides for the accurate capture of spatial locations and an array of attributes including ground-based photographic... (read more)

2017-01-03 04:52:31