I’m preparing for some conference presentations I’ll be giving in a couple of weeks. One of the subjects I’m covering is spatial data transformation, or traditionally known as ETL (Extract/Transform/Load) tools. I’ve written many times before that in the geospatial industry, data is the fuel. We, as users, have access to some amazingly powerful GIS software tools.
Clearly, the geospatial enabler is data. Without it, it’s like having a fishing pole without a pond; a tool without a purpose.
If you look at emerging geospatial technologies, where’s the data coming from? Yes, crowd-sourcing, GPS/GNSS, and imagery are, and will continue to be, volume sources of geospatial data.
From an infrastructure perspective (civil engineering), 3D laser scanning is a particularly interesting source of high-volume geospatial data. Ground-based and airborne 3D scanners create insanely huge volumes of data. Although an emerging technology, these scanners (LiDAR technology) have been around for many years.
I recall using this technology on projects 8 or 9 years ago to scan accident scenes and infrastructure such as bridges. The scanning time was amazingly efficient. In some cases, the scanning data collection sessions were done in a couple of hours. During that period, literally millions of data points were collected. For the first time, the ratio between labor expended on data collection and labor expended on data processing was extremely skewed towards data processing, and that was the headache.
While scanning time was very short, data processing time to produce a deliverable was brutal, literally taking weeks. Granted, that was 8 or 9 years ago. Advanced software tools have made data processing more efficient today, but dealing with huge volumes of data is still a challenge. Some people say that scanning may eventually replace traditional surveying equipment that shoot and record one coordinate at a time. A land surveyor, on a really strong day, may be able to shoot and record upwards of a 1,000 coordinates. With a scanner, that same person could shoot and record millions of points in a day.
Data, Data, Data
Ground-based and airborne LiDAR technology are clearly on the uprise. Last year, while most conferences were struggling to maintain the 2009 levels, even failing, the
SPAR 2010 3D imaging conference was up 23%, according to their reports. The
International LiDAR Mapping Forum conference also reported record attendance figures. Although the conferences are still in niche-mode (less than 1,000 attendees), the growth is steady.
If you step back a bit and look at the big picture, the game is in data processing. Yes, equipment manufacturers will crank better and cheaper scanners, but turning those 3D point clouds into useful products is where the action is.
You can see this with SAFE Software’s recently announced
FME 2011 product. While historically focused on GIS and CAD interoperability, SAFE obviously sees the upside in the point cloud business as a major part of FME 2011 is focused on dealing with the massive amounts of data created from 3D laser scanning.
Keeping it Simple
Changing gears…
With all this geospatial technology advancing faster than a rabbit on a motorcycle, it’s hard to slow down and look at the simple uses of GIS that still offer a lot of value. As much as most of us are pushing hard to implement more and more spatial data technology, it’s just as important that we introduce people to GIS, even a very simple version of it.
This week, a reader asked me about the best way to display a map from a bunch of lat/lon coordinates (little or no attributes) in a spreadsheet. No complex attribute tables, no strange map projection, just a spreadsheet of lat/lon coordinates.
This challenge gave me reason to revisit Esri’s freely available ArcExplorer software. It wasn’t my first choice, but it’s where I‘ll likely end up. I haven’t touched ArcExplorer (I know that’s not the name of the current software, read on) for quite some time (as in a couple of years or more). I use ArcGIS, AutoCAD and a half-dozen other spatial data software tools.
When presented with the challenge, my first inclination was to push her towards arcgis.com in order to steer her away from having to download, install and maintain desktop software. No go. After a quick post to a support group, I’m told there’s not an easy way to add this data to an arcgis.com map. My other thought was Google Earth. Naah.
I subscribed to Google Earth Pro for a year and it really is sort of cheesy, to me. Maybe it’s because my view is distorted from my experience with GIS software in the past, but it seems to me that Google Earth is still primarily eye-candy, and what I really wanted was an easy-to-use, light-weight GIS. However, I do hope that they continue pushing that technology forward.
All along, I thinking my ultimate back-up plan would be to recommend ArcExplorer. I went to download it and remembered it’s now upgraded to ArcGIS Explorer. I remember reading and posting that news awhile back, but hadn’t taken the time to download and preview it. It’s a much different animal than ArcExplorer, and I like what I see so far. I haven’t tried to import any data yet, but from the menu selection, I can see it will accept the simple ones such as shapefiles, raster imagery, ASCII, and GPS exchange files. Most simple data sets can be converted to one of these formats using freely available software tools.
ArcGIS Explorer Opening Screen
This will be an interesting experiment, and one I will update you on, likely next week, as I try it with a sample data set from the reader.
I really like the opportunity to introduce someone to GIS, even at just a simple level because I believe will open their eyes to other possibilities in the future. It empowers them to think more GIS-centric.
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