Open-Source GIS:A Balancing Act Between a Wampeter and Saltpeter

John G. Van Hoesen, Green Mountain CollegeUnfolding the Map: Making Geospatial Information Accessible to the Public

Background 1.0

Wampeter or Saltpeter?

• Vonnegut (1974) “Wampeters, Foma, and Granfalloons”

• Egenhofer and Mark (1995)“Naïve Geography”

• DiBiase (2007) “Is GIS a Wampeter?”

• Goodchild (2007)“Volunteered Geographic Information”

• Turner (2006)“Intro to Neogeography”

• Sui (2008) “The Wikification of GIS…”

(Sui, 2005)

Background 2.0

“Central control of computer databases, such as GIS, tend to increase the power to the bureaucrats, administrators, technical experts and computer

literate groups who use them at the expense of those who lack the expertise to access to these systems”

Arnoff (1989)

“Naïve geography is a necessary underpinning for the design of GISs that can be used without major training by new user communities

such as average citizens, to solve day-to-day tasks”

Egenhofer and Mark (1995)

“Instead of asking how to find the need or data people want, instead ask how to allow the public needs to inform and drive data collection and access”

Huang and Chuang (2005)

Wampeter or Saltpeter?

Background 3.0

“Neogeography is about people using and creating their own maps, on their own terms and by combining elements of an existing toolset. Neogeography is

about sharing location information with friends and visitors, helping shape context, and conveying understanding through knowledge of place”

Turner (2006)

“This new phase of development is the wikification of GIS, which is driven by the massive and voluntary contribution among both amateur and experts using

Web 2.0 technology”

Sui (2008)

“Another source of interest in GIS becoming a tool of participatory democracy has been the need to reinvingorate traditional models of citizen involvement in

making decisions about the use of public , natural resources”

Jankowski (2009)

Wampeter or Saltpeter?

Web TechnologyIntegrated

Community Map Participation

Collaboration

Visualization

Bloggers&

Wikis

Web/OnlineCiGIS,

PPGIS, PGIS

Google Earth, Yahoo

Map, etc

OnlineCommunityFramework

(OCF)

ParticipatoryResearch

Naïve Geography

Three Basic Elements

Web/Online

Phenomenalize

Functionalize

Theorize

Three Basic Functions

Three Basic Phenomena

Three Basic Theories

(Chuang and Huang, 2005)

Open Source Options?

N

The Playing Field 1.0

• MapWindows• QuantumGIS

• Capaware• TerraView• SAGA GIS• Jump GIS

• SavGIS• GRASS • OSSIM• gvSIG• ILWIS• uDIG• fGIS

?

Kristina Lerman; http://www.isi.edu/~lerman

The Playing Field 2.0

Flickr / Picasa

BatchGeocode – (www.batchgeocode.com)

GeoParsing – (http://gutenkarte.org)

GeoRSS Tagging

RSS to GeoRSS ConverterGeoNames – (www.geonames.org)

MapRectifier –(http://labs.metacarta.com/rectifier)

MetaCarta Labs –(http://labs.metacarta.com)

OpenStreetMap – (www.openstreetmap.org)

The GMapCreatorhttp://www.casa.ucl.ac.uk/software/gmapcreator.asp

Ning – (www.ning.com)

Platial Maps – (http://platial.com)WikiMapia – (www.wikimapia.org)

(http://thematicmapping.org)Google Earth/Maps Web 2.0 Applications

GeoWeb Options?

Everyone Assembling the Web:The Difficulty Curve of DIY

Platforms, Tools, and PiecesQUANTITY OF CREATORS

• Web desktops• Badges• Blogs• Wikis• Feeds• Enterprise 2.0

• Simple mashups• Situational Apps• Widgets• WOA

Varie

ty a

nd O

utpu

t

Hundreds of Millions

• Web apps• Enterprise mashups• Composite apps• Office 2.0• SOA

Tens of Millions

Millions

Complexity and Sophistication

(Anyone) (Expert Users) (Developers)

Hinchcliffe (2007)

The Playing Field 3.0

• Desktop GIS vs. GeoWeb?

• WMS vs. Onsite Storage?

• Transport & Delivery?

• Learning Curve?

Decision Making Process

• VCGI WMS Server

http://maps.vcgi.org:8080/wmsconnector/servlet/com.esri.wms.Esrimap?service=WMS&servicename=VGIS_BASEMAP&version=1.1.0&request=getcapabilities

• You could also use VCGI Interactive Viewer

Unfolding The GeoWeb

Future of Mapping

• Web 3.0 Intuitive Interfaces

• Robust Browser Applications

• Embedded PGIS

• Online Storage

GeoWeb Wampeter?

ReferencesArnoff, S. 1989. Geographic Information Systems: A Management Perspective. Ottawa, Canada: WDL Publications, 294p.

Huang, A.W-C. and Chuang, T-R., 2005, Commonsense Geography meets Web Technology: Online Community Mapping. Open GIS & Web GIS 2005 Conference Procedding, pp89-98.

DiBiase, D.W., 2007, Is GIS a Wampter? Transactions in GIS, 11(1): 1-8.

Egenhofer, M.J. and Mark, D.M., 1995, Naïve geography, in, Frank, A.U. and Kuhn, W. (eds), Spatial information theory: A theoretical basis for GIS. Lecture notes in computer sciences, Springer-Verlag, 988: 1-115.

Goodchild, M.F., 2007, Citizens as sensors: The world of volunteered geography. GeoJournal, 69(4), 211-221.

Hinchcliffe, D., (2007), Tracking the DIY phenomenon Part 2: Mass customization, mashups, and recombinant Web apps. ZDNET: http://blogs.zdnet.com/Hinchcliffe/?p=81

Jankowski, P., 2009, Towards particpatory geographic information systems for community-based environmental decision making. Journal of Environmental Mangement, 90: 1966-1971.

Sui, D., 2008, The wikification of GIS and its consequences: Or Angelina Jolie’s new tatto and the future of GIS. Computers, Environment, and Urban Systems, 32: 1-5.

Turner, A., 2006, Introduction to neogeography. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media Short Cuts, 54p.

Vonnegut, K Jr., 1974, Wampeters, Foma, and Granfalloons (Opinions). New York, Dell Publishing.