mar-apr (1)

Integration of GIS and e-Government- Prof. Mohamed Aziz

Integration of GIS and e-Government- Prof. Mohamed Aziz

1616

MARCH - APRIL 2006 VOL 2 ISSUE 2

www.gisdevelopment.net

22 LAND AMINISTRATION

SYSTEM - A TOOL OF

E-GOVERNANCE

El-Ayachi Moha, Semlali ElHassan, Ettarid Mohamed,Tahiri Driss

32 DEVELOPING AN

ENTERPRISE GIS

Angela Ionita

38 SOLUTIONS FOR CENSUS

OPERATION

Aymen A. Solyman

CATI N 2006L

2 n d I N T E R N AT I O N A L C O N F E R E N C E O N P O S I T I O N I N G, N AV I G AT I O N A N D T I M I N G

7-9 June 2006Hotel Grand AshokBangalore, India

[email protected]

knowledge for change

GOLD SPONSORS ORGANISERS

SUBMISSION DEADLINES

Abstract submission 10th April 2006

Acceptance 20th April 2006

Full paper submission 15th May 2006

Submit Abstracts at [email protected]

DEPARTMENTS

EDITORIAL 07 NEWS 08 EVENTS 50

E-GOVERNANCE

16 INTEGRATION OF GIS AND

E-GOVERNMENT

Prof. Mohamed Aziz Integration cases are seldom lim-

ited for governmental authorities

that succeeded...

22 LAND AMINISTRATION

SYSTEM - A TOOL OF

E-GOVERNANCE

El-Ayachi Moha, Semlali ElHassan, Ettarid Mohamed,Tahiri Driss The objectives of the majority of

countries are to conduct new

reforms enabling their systems...

28 E-LEARNING FOR GIS

Thilo Kaufmann, Volker

SchwiegerThe Knowledge pertaining togeoinformation techniques and therequired basics is essential....

ENTERPRISE GIS

32 DEVELOPING AN ENTERPRISE

GIS

Angela Ionita

The basic idea of an enterpriseGIS is to address the needs ofdepartments collectivelyinstead of individually.38 SOLUTIONS FOR CENSUS

OPERATION

Aymen A. Solyman The preparation of the next cen-

sus operation began in 2003...

42 ENTERPRISE GEODATABASE

IMPLEMENTATION

A. Deva Kumar VarmaThis philosophy underlies the new

paradigm that is rapidly taking

shape with...

CONFERENCE REPORT

48 SEMINAR ON SPATIAL DATA

INFRASTRUCTURE

Abu Dhabi, UAE

G I S D E V E L O P M E N T - M I D D L E E A S T | M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6 Vo l . 0 2 I s s u e 0 2

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38

1166 Integration of GIS and e-Government I Prof. Mohamed Aziz, Kuwait University

‘e’ has now become an inseparable part of governance around the globe. Without e-Governance, governments tend to lag behind and lose whatever power they have. Itis no more merely computerization drives, but far beyond that. Governments fromnational to local level, are talking of delivering services and addressing concerns viathe e-route. And GIS is increasingly forming a part of the entire movement.

e-Governance has become the hot word for decision makers everywhere, from the Eastto the West and from the North to the South. As per the UN Global e-Government Survey 2005, e-services have continued to expand around the world. Website assessment in 2005 indicated that of the 191 Member States, 179 were online in someform or another in 2005, compared to 178 in 2004 and 143 Member States in 2001. Thisis definitely encouraging.

In the Middle East region, e-Governance is very much in the vogue. A number of reasons are there for the Middle East region in particular, for this to happen. The fastpaced infrastructure development; the economic boom; the emphasis on high end utilities; and the advanced Spatial Data Infrastructure status in the region are pointingtowards a bright future for e-governance in the region.

It is important that the geospatial initiatives of the region are aligned to the governance activities. It is the proper amalgamation of these two that can do wonders.What shall be interesting to understand is - how much of the entire e-Gov cake of Middle East belongs to the geospatial community.

7G I S D E V E L O P M E N T - M I D D L E E A S T

From the Editor Geospatial sciences and

e-Governance

[email protected]

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

8 G I S D E V E L O P M E N T - M I D D L E E A S T

EGYPT

EgyMaps toempower Bawaba The BAWABA website offersmany governmental servicesto the citizens online, whichhelp them carry out manyactivities smoothly. EgyMaps(a partnership between QSITand Connection) is poweredby GIS technology. The web-site enables users to searchfor the location of any placeor address, and display thelocations on a map. EgyMapsalso provides users with driv-ing directions between anytwo places in Greater Cairo.In addition, EgyMaps offersnumerous specialized Guidessuchas Entertainment,Touristic, Financial, Medical,Commercial, etc.

Integration betweenBAWABA and EgyMaps willbe embodied through linkingbetween the governmentalservices in BAWABA and geo-graphic services in EgyMap,Thus, when a user selects aservice in BAWABA, anoption is available forhim/her to display the loca-tion of the selected service, aswell as other governmentalbuildings and ministries inthe surrounding.

www.qs4it.com

IRAN

GIS maps forTehran released LeadDog Consulting, LLCrecently announced therelease of a detailed TehranGIS vector map. Tehran City

Streets is available in allmajor GIS formats. An IranMajor Roads and Highwaysproduct is available at a1:250,000 scale with majorroads, administrative bound-aries, buildings, infrastruc-ture, and other points ofinterest. LeadDog Consulting,LLC is a global provider of GISstreet maps for Iraq, MiddleEast, Africa, Mexico, and therest of Latin America.

www.goleaddog.com

Digital airphotographytechnologyserviceSpecialists in the Iran's mili-tary forces, geographicaldepartment have acquireddigital air photography technology. GeographicalDepartment’s Manager Brig.General Dr. Essa Gol Verdisaid. The Department will beable to capture large data inan hours flight from the dif-ferent layers of ground cover

in black, white, RGB and ultra red bands using thistechnology.

"Iran's first relief map hasbeen published by the Min-istry of Defense," he added."For the production of thesemaps, satellite imagesreceived from Iran's earthstation, Sepehr has beenused," he emphasized.

www.isna.ir

KUWAIT

GIS to be used astool in Kuwaitieconomy The Kuwaiti government isaiming towards transform-ing Kuwait into a financialand economic centre throughinvestments and ensuringreturn of Kuwaiti capital intothe country, said Minister ofCommerce and Industry DrYousef Al-Zalzalah in aninterview with Arab Times.He said the geographical

location of Kuwait allows itto be the main entrance forIraq, indicating there is ahigh possibility of establish-ing Kuwait as main gatewayfor the Iraqi reconstructionprocess and as a commercialpassing point to Iraq. Al-Zalzalah in a meeting withthe Public Authority forIndustry (PAI) officials mean-while, said, “Providing

investment informationthrough an internationalinternet-based network willhave a huge impact onattracting foreign investors.”

i-mate announced the launch oftheir latest Pocket PC PDA, the i-

mate PDA-N in the Middle Eastmarket. The i-mate PDA-N is aWindows Mobile 5.0 based Pock-et PC with all the latestMicrosoft tools plus built inGPS navigation capabilityand Wi-Fi. It has 64k fullcolour touch screen, andmetal grey finish. ThePDA-N has a 300MhzPDA processor and 128MB ROM

plus full memory expansion via theSDIO/MMC card slot. Thedevice also comes with a

full range of applicationsincluding Windows Media

Player, Internet Explorer, MSNMessenger, Word Mobile, Excel

Mobile and PowerPoint Mobile.The new i-mate PDA-N offers Ara-

bic applications like Arabic soft key-pad, Arabic dictionary and Islamic

prayer alerts and Qiblah direction.www.ameinfo.com

First Pocket PC with inbuilt GPS

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

News: Middle East


It will enable the foreigninvestor to get the necessaryinformation through theinternet, he added indicating“PAI and the IndustrialImports Development Centrehave undertaken to ensuredevelopment of this net-work.”

In this context Geographi-cal Information System pre-pared by the PAI will providegeographical informationabout Kuwait’s industrialsector and its basic infra-structure, explained Al-Zalzalah. The system willalso list the functions provid-ed by the industrial sector tothe Kuwaiti and non-Kuwaiti investors, he added.

www.arabtimesonline.com

QATAR

EADS to opentraining centre inDoha The European AeronauticDefence and Space Company(EADS) signed an agreementin February to establish acentre for training, researchand development at QatarScience and Technology Park(QSTP).

The facility will be calledthe EADS Competence Centreof Qatar (EADS QCC). The con-tract to establish the centrewas signed between DanielDeviller, EADS Chief Technol-ogy Officer and Dr EulianRoberts, Chief Executive,QSTP. EADS QCC will delivertraining and certificationprogrammes for non-destructive testing (NDT)

technologies, and interna-tionally-accredited trainingcourses in aircraft mainte-nance. It will also focus onresearch and developmentprogrammes in cooperationwith universities in Qatar.EADS QCC marks EADS'smaiden presence in Qatar.

It will contribute to theavailability of techniciansand testing facilities in theaviation and petroleumindustries, both of which aregrowing at an unprecedent-ed rate in the Middle East."EADS and Qatar have a long-lasting and trustful relation-ship.

Our cooperation is materi-alised with the establish-ment of our CompetenceCentre. We are today veryproud to invest in such achallenging project and towork hand in hand with ourQatari partners," said Dev-iller. The centre, to be locatedat the Qatar Science andTechnology Park, would beopened in mid 2007.

www.thepeninsulaqatar.com

UAE

DubaiMunicipalityexpands DVRSDubai Municipality hasexpanded the subscriberdatabase of the Dubai VirtualReference System (DVRS),which was launched by thecivic body in 2002. The DVRScomprises of a control roomwith central server at theDubai Municipality head-

quarters and five continuousoperating reference stationsat Qusais, Sheikh Zayed Road, Merqab, Lusayili, andHatta to provide effectivesolutions for engineers in thefield of surveying and con-struction as well as all usersof the Global Positioning Sys-tem or GPS in the emirate ofDubai.

"The DVRS has beenachieving continuous suc-cess through out the yearssince its inception, as a large number of companiesand government establish-ments have been benefitingfrom it through the engi-neers in our Survey Section,"said Eng. Yousuf Al Mar-zouqi, Head of Geodetic andHydrographic Survey Unit inthe Planning and SurveyDepartment.

"The satellite-aided systemhas replaced the old systembased on a control point net-work. It also reduced the useof manual control points upto 90% annually, resulting inan increased percentage ofaccomplishment in dailytransactions by our employ-

ees with excellence, speedand precision," he said. Al Marzouqi said there hasbeen an increased demandfor availing the service fromdifferent companies andestablishments. "In responseto these demands, we haveincreased the capacity ofRouter (the system to verifythe authenticity of the per-son who accesses the DVRScontrol room using GPS) from30 users to 120 users.

This will expand theopportunities to benefit fromthe services of the currentsystem in the Emirate ofDubai.

In addition to that, wehave changed the centralservers with more advancedones that will facilitate bene-fiting from the data of thesystem, which are stored inthe processor of the GPSobservations inside and out-side the Emirate of Dubai," hesaid. It is possible to obtaindata from this system by reg-istering and subscribing theservice and get Dubai VirtualReference System data, inaddition to this, it offersremarks and suggestionsthrough the Municipalitywebsite, www.dm.gov.ae.

The system can be utilizedfor accomplishing differentengineering tasks thatinclude demarcation of plots,service lines of telephones,electricity, water, and detailsurvey. Ariel mapping andhydrographic survey are alsothe features, in addition tolaunching control points forsurvey.

ww.ameinfo.com

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Ras Al Khaimah'sgovernment todigitise all maps Ras Al Khaimah's e-Govern-ment Authority has appoint-ed FedEx Kinko's as a keypartner, responsible for con-verting all hardcopy docu-ments into a digital format.The move to convert all exist-ing maps and documentsinto a digital format is part ofefforts to implement Ras AlKhaimah's e-Governmentinitiative.

"We are confident of com-pleting this project success-fully in partnership with thee-Government Authority,"said Radwan Malas, GeneralManager of FedEx Kinko's,UAE.

Dr Hashem Ar-Refaei,Director-General of Ras AlKhaimah e-GovernmentAuthority and IT Adviser tothe Government of Ras AlKhaimah, said "This will notonly make the life of the resi-dents of Ras Al Khaimah eas-ier but will also attractinvestors to Ras Al Khaimahin droves. The successfulcompletion of this work willresult in the streamliningand conversion of all govern-ment processes into an elec-tronic format, enhancingoverall efficiency and fastdelivery of government serv-ices to the general public."

The contract awards FedExKinko's the responsibility ofdigitising and archiving allgovernment documents,records and maps into anelectronic format and archiv-ing and referencing theminto an electronic library so

that they can be accessedand used when needed.

www.tradearabia.com

Satellitetransmitters forroute mappingTwo of the four wildhoubaras who were caughtalong with falcons in Febru-ary 2005, south of Abu Dhabiare currently wintering inthe UAE. An official from theNational Avian ResearchCentre (NARC) in Sowaihan,which is part of the Environ-ment Agency, Abu Dhabi,said that four young femalehoubaras had been fittedwith Argos satellite transmitters to study theirmigration route and identifytheir region of origin. The official pointed out thatthe first houbara was killedsoon afterwards and the sec-ond one was also hunted inOman in April, while she wasbeginning to migrate.

He highlighted that thesatellite transmitters sendregular signals revealing thecomplete post and pre-breed-ing migration routes of thetwo other houbaras. Bothfemales crossed the straightof Hormuz, stopping over inIran and continued to thenorth following the Afghanborder, crossing Turk-menistan and Uzbekistan up

to Kazakhstan. They spenttheir breeding season in twodifferent regions of Kaza-khstan, and came back to theUnited Arab Emirates inautumn, following nearlythe same route they travelledin spring. Both of them arecurrently wintering in theUnited Arab Emirates.

www.khaleejtimes.com

Dubai to launchsecond phase ofBuilding PermitCertificationService Dubai Municipality is gear-ing up for the launch of thesecond phase of its BuildingPermit Certification Service,which will be one of thebiggest eGovernment imple-

mentations undertaken bythe Municipality. The com-pletion of this phase willensure 100 per cent onlinetransactions between DubaiMunicipality and buildingcontractors in Dubai. The sys-tem will offer a host of elec-tronic services to clients andwill process large amounts ofdata related to building per-mits and construction activi-ties in Dubai. One of the

innovative features of theservice will be the availabili-ty of information on allmajor construction projectsbeing undertaken in Dubai,in addition to detaileddescriptions on existing andupcoming buildings, whichcome under the purview ofDubai Municipality.

The Building Permit Certification Service will beintegrated with all otherelectronic services of DubaiMunicipality.

The service is integratedwith other services in DubaiMunicipality, such as Geo-graphic Information System,Pre-Qualification, ePay-ments, CRA, Electronic DataManagement System (EDMS)and No Objection Certificates(NOC).

"The launch of the secondphase of this project is amajor landmark for DubaiMunicipality and reflects ourcommitment to provide highquality services to ourclients. The services that willnow be available throughDubai Municipality's portalwill significantly help building consultants andcontractors throughout theentire process of the construction project, whilealso providing detailed infor-mation on major buildings inDubai. This project also complements Dubai's effortstowards achieving the high-est levels of eGovernance,"said Abdullah Al Shibani,Director General for Technical Service, Dubai Municipality.

www.ameinfo.com

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Abdullah Al Shibani, Director General for Technical Service,

Dubai Municipality


BUSINESS

Scott Smithappointed COO ofDigitalGlobeDigitalGlobe has hired ScottSmith as the company's newchief operating officer (COO).Smith brings with him over24 years of experience in theaerospace and commercialremote sensing industries.With a background in space-craft and ground systemsdesign, commercial and mili-tary space systems develop-ment, and commercial spacebusiness management hewill be an asset. Prior to join-ing DigitalGlobe, Smithserved as executive vice pres-ident at Space Imaging,where he was responsible forsales, operations and engi-neering functions for thecompany. Smith joined thecompany in 1995 as its spacesegment director. Smith hasalso previously held variousengineering and manage-ment positions for Lockheed Missiles & Space Company.

www.tmcnet.com

Bentley acquiresCook-HurlbertBentley Systems, Inc. hasannounced that it hasacquired the assets of Cook-Hurlbert of Austin, Texas, aprovider of engineeringdesign software for electricand gas distribution net-works. Cook-Hurlbert'sExpert Designer spatial net-work layout and analysissoftware were among thefirst developed specificallyfor utility designers and

engineers. Users of theseopen and integrated soft-ware include many leadingutilities such as BaltimoreGas and Electric (BGE), a Con-stellation Energy Company,and Xcel Energy. Key fea-tures of the Cook-Hurlbertproduct line include func-tionality for process meas-urement and tracking, workorder management andtracking, design layout, esti-mating etc.

www.bentley.com

Preetha Pulusanito retireIntergraph Corporationannounced in February,Preetha Pulusani, Presidentof Intergraph's Security, Gov-ernment & Infrastructure(SG&I) division, has electedto retire after 25 years withthe company.

Ben Eazzetta, previouslychief operating officer ofIntergraph's SG&I division,succeeded Pulusani as theSG&I division presidentreporting to Reid French, theCompany's chief operatingofficer. "On behalf of our Board ofDirectors, our shareholdersand all of the people of Inter-graph, I want to thankPreetha for her invaluablecontributions to the Compa-ny," said R. Halsey Wise, pres-ident and CEO of Intergraph.

"Preetha has devoted 25years to building our Compa-ny, and Intergraph is a bettercorporation as a result. Much of her exemplarycareer has been devoted tobuilding our Company's lead-

ership in the geospatial technology market."

Ms. Pulusani joined Inter-graph in 1980. After holdingnumerous managementpositions, she was appointedexecutive vice president ofIntergraph's Mapping andGIS business in 1998 and lat-er named president inNovember 2001. In May 2005,Ms. Pulusani was namedpresident of Intergraph'sSG&I division.

Ms. Pulusani is expected toremain with Intergraphthrough late summer of2006.

www.intergraph.com

Frost & Sullivanawards NAVTEQfor technologyinnovationFrost & Sullivan has selectedNAVTEQ as the recipient ofthe 2006 Technology Innova-tion of the Year Award for itsdevelopment of its digitalmap database that enhancesthe utility of geographicinformation, location-basedsolutions and navigation systems. Frost & Sullivan presents this Award eachyear to a company that hasdemonstrated technological superiority.

www.prnewswire.com

News: World

Rolta International, Inc., ranked one of the top GISServices Companies in the world, and Orion TechnologyInc., a leading provider of web-GIS software and integra-tion services, announced a partnership agreement. Underthe terms of the partnership, Rolta International, Inc. willprovide implementation services for Orion Technology'sOnPoint Suite of web-GIS products to Utility and Govern-ment organizations. "We are elated to announce the part-nership with Rolta. They have a wealth of experience thatwe look forward to optimize and we are confident thatthis relationship will see a number of opportunities forour companies to benefit" commented Faizal Hasham,Director of Sales and Marketing for Orion Technology.

Orion's flagship product OnPoint allows users to pub-lish their GIS data securely and quickly over the web.OnPoint's "no programming" solution provides enhancedweb-GIS capability, reporting, querying and generatingURL functions. It also allows users to connect to externaldatabases throughout their organization, turning theirweb-GIS into a true enterprise solution.

www.roltaus.com

Rolta and Orion Technology join hands

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

12

APPLICATION

GPS-enforcedspeed limitsWith the increasing popu-larity (and commensuratelydecreasing cost) of GPS tech-nology, Canada is investigat-ing in-car electronic variablespeed governors designed tothwart drivers bent on ignor-ing posted limits. Vehiclesincorporating GPS-enabledsat-nav systems alreadymonitor speed, direction andlocation in real-time. But inthis variation, the same basictechnology is augmentedwith a digital speed map thatactively enforces the postedlimit, greatly retarding avehicle's rate of accelerationafter the speed limit is met.Capping it altogether wouldlikely prove the simple mat-ter of a few programmer key-strokes. Presumably, suchsystems would gain legalacceptance by designatingcertain domains for theiruse-- school and constructionzones, perhaps.

www.audio.autoblog.com

Tracking foodfrom farm to forkA prototype EU-funded proj-ect uses the Internet andsatellites to trace the geo-graphic origin of foodthroughout the supply chain.GeoTraceAgri will providefood processors with precisetracking information aboutfood products, the project'sresearchers said in markingthe completion of the proto-type. From 1 January 2006new EU food laws introduced

mandatory traceabilityrequirements throughoutthe bloc. Processors musttrack ingredients from theirimmediate suppliers and theproducts to their retail or dis-tribution points. The require-ment has pushed companiesto search for technologicalsolutions allowing them totrack and record items.

The system could also beuseful for ensuring the credi-bility of the EU's geographi-cal indications certificationsystem, which protects pro-ducers of traditional foods.GeoTraceAgri will provideinformation accessible inreal-time. The system willcover all stages of productionfrom "farm to fork", includingstorage, processing and dis-tribution, according to ISTResults, the reporting sectionof an EU-funded researchnetwork.

www.foodproductiondaily.com

Length of GreatWall of China?Precisely how long is theGreat Wall of China? Becausehistorical records and meas-urements differ, officials inChina have decided to surveythe length of the Great Wall,using the latest techniquesand a budget of 200 millionyuan (approximately US$ 25million). Hong Kong's Ming-pao Newspaper reports thatThe Information Center forBasic Geography of China'sState Bureau of Surveyingand Mapping will use state-of-the art techniques such asaerial mapping via remotesensing, GIS, and GPS to

measure the exact lengthand orientation of the GreatWall, built during the MingDynasty (1368-1644 CE).Zhang Ji, vice secretary-gen-eral of the Great Wall Associ-ation of China, said thatwhen the measurements arecompleted, a 3-D image of theWall will be posted on theInternet.

According to the HongKong newspaper, there arestill no definitive data on theGreat Wall's exact length.The present figure of 6300kilometers (approx. 3800miles) provided by the GreatWall Association is based ondocuments from the MingDynasty. During the post-1949 Communist era, localgovernments have undertak-en their own surveys, buttheir findings, which reveal alength of over 7000 km(approx. 4500 miles), differfrom the official one due tounclear regional boundaries,the paper reported. For thenew survey, an airplaneequipped with a remotesensing camera will takephotos of the Wall while flying along it.

www.english.epochtimes.com

Cadastre agencyto have digitalinfo systemBulgaria's Cadastre Agencyis preparing a digital infor-mation system that would beused for the drawing up ofthe real estates maps. Acadastre map to comprise 8%of Bulgaria's territory is nowready, it emerged from aseminar of the agency in Feb-

ruary. The Cadastre agencyhas already digitalized itsdatabase for tillable landsand woods and is about todraw up their maps, TsvetanBoev, Executive Director ofthe Cadastre Agency said.Some 70% of the informationfor the real estates in Sofiahas already been digitalized.The cadastre maps and regis-ters for five pilot regions areready - those include Assen-ovgrad, Balchik, Dupnitsa,Samokov and Smolyan.

www.evroportal.bg

Staffs researchmaps out ahealthier future Groundbreaking researchwhich looks at obesity andlinks it with distance to thenearest fast food outlet is tobe carried out in Stoke-on-Trent. Researchers fromStaffordshire Universityhave secured around£300,000 to map lifestylebehaviour in the City andlink these to health out-comes. Staffordshire Univer-sity geographers GrahamSmith and Jon Fairburn willlead the mapping phase ofthe project.

Graham said "We will beusing sophisticated softwareknown as GIS which allowsus to map and analyse digitalmap data. In this way we cancalculate precise distances tothe nearest green space orbus stop. We can look at thedensity of food outlets (e.g.fast food, corner shops,supermarkets) in a neigh-bourhood.”

www.innovations-report.com

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6G I S D E V E L O P M E N T - M I D D L E E A S T

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PRODUCT

ArcGIS 9.1Business AnalystreleasedESRI announced the releaseof ArcGIS 9.1 Business Ana-lyst desktop analysis soft-ware with 2005/2010 demo-graphic data. New featuresand data contained in ArcGIS9.1 Business Analyst helpscompanies, agencies, andorganizations perform accu-rate marketing analysesfaster and more efficiently.ArcGIS 9.1 Business Analystincludes: Complete integra-tion with the ArcGIS 9 frame-work; Routing and drive-time tools based on ArcGISNetwork Analyst; Enhancedreporting capabilities with abatch framework and a cus-tom report wizard and manyother features.

Companies, agencies, andorganizations can use ArcGIS9.1 Business Analyst to: Pro-file customers and con-stituents; Find similar cus-tomer and constituent seg-ments; Craft messages toincrease response from tar-geted customers and con-stituents; Analyze and selectthe best locations for expan-sion; Perform competitiveanalyses; Evaluate store/siteperformance.

www.gisuser.com

Vexcel announcesVxEos MODISGround StationSystem Vexcel Corporation annou-nced the immediate avail-ability of its VxEos MODIS

ground station offering.Modeled after Vexcel'srenown APEX ground sta-tion, the VxEos is a cost-effec-tive, scaled-down MODISversion capable of receivingand processing the directbroadcast downlinks fromthe EOS Aqua and Terra, andfuture NPP / NPOESS, satel-lites. The VxEos includes a2.4m X-Y antenna in aradome, X-band feed, LNA,programmable downcon-verter, MODIS receiver, datacapture system, data process-ing and visualization work-station, integrated NASAGSFC L0 to 1B and L2 proces-sors.

The included VxEos groundstation management soft-ware suite runs under Linuxand MS Windows and fea-tures utilities to schedule,track, receive, process andvisualize MODIS data in auser-friendly graphical envi-ronment. Optional peripher-als include NOAA AVHRRreception, a 6 TB networkedattached storage device anda 160/320 GB Super DLT tapedrive for archiving.

www.gisuser.com

Leica GeosystemsannouncesCyclone 5.4 Leica Geosystems annou -nced the availability ofCyclone 5.4 software tostreamline workflows in thefield and office for High-Defi-nition Surveys. Cyclone 5.4provides a unique new set ofvisualization tools that allowusers to select from anunequalled pallet of display

methods. A new "See-through" mode allows usersto see-through walls for easi-er viewing. A "Silhouette"mode enhances object edgesto speed a user's comprehen-sion of objects such as piping.New point thickness andrealistic shading controlsprovide even more visualcues for faster navigation.Another valuable new fea-ture allows users to importand "Drape" high-resolutiondigital photographs over thescan data set, indexing thephotographs to the underly-ing point geometry for evenmore visually descriptiveviews and models.

www.leica-geosystems.com

ArcGIS 9.2 toSupport SVGFormat ESRI announced support forthe Scalable Vector Graphics(SVG) data format on top ofthe upcoming ArcGIS 9.2software platform. ArcGIS 9.2is currently in beta andexpected to become commer-cially available later thisyear. "We have engineeredour geographic informationsystem (GIS) software so itsupports many open stan-dards," says Jack Danger-mond, president, ESRI. "Thismaximizes our users' returnon their investment in build-ing geographic informationsystems. We are researchingnew ways to expand geo-graphic knowledge to meetthe needs of individuals andorganizations in virtuallyany industry. Support of theSVG data format on top of

the ArcGIS 9.2 platform isjust another step in thiseffort. The power of opensoftware and data is the abil-ity to quickly and easilyexchange, share, and distrib-ute information to anyoneand in any format."

www.esri.com

u-blox announcesassisted GPSservices u-blox AG, Swiss provider ofinnovative GPS receiver tech-nology, announced the provi-sion of Assisted GPS ("A-GPS")services that supply instantlocation information, reduc-ing GPS receivers' Time ToFirst Fix ("TTFF") to just a fewseconds. A-GPS uses mobilephone networks to accesssatellite location data trans-mitted to and collected by aglobal monitoring networkof u-blox GPS receivers. Thecollected data is stored at a u-blox aiding server, which, inturn, makes the data avail-able to users with mobilephone connectivity.

The A-GPS system suppliesthe satellite location datastored at the server to theGPS receivers contained inusers' mobile phones. Thebenefit of A-GPS is that usersreceive this location informa-tion instantly rather thanhaving to wait for the GPSreceiver to acquireEphemeris data for visiblesatellites, which can takefrom 30 seconds up to severalminutes depending on condi-tions. The A-GPS service isideal for emergency call pur-poses, where a users' position

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6 G I S D E V E L O P M E N T - M I D D L E E A S T

14

must be established immedi-ately, or in weak signal envi-ronments, such as inner cityurban canyons where high-rise buildings obstruct directviews to satellites makingautonomous satellite acqui-sition very difficult. The com-munication is based onTCP/IP using Internet andwireless (WLAN or cellulardata network like GPRS) tech-nologies. The system isextremely cost-efficient asthe data packets are verysmall in size and transmittedthrough existing communi-cation networks.

www.biz.yahoo.com

New version ofUniversalLocationIntelligencePlatform MapInfo Corporation intro-duced Envinsa Version 4.0, acomprehensive unified loca-tion platform. Envinsa v4.0enables organizations to cen-trally manage locationanalysis capabilities andapply them throughout theorganization. Envinsa v4.0includes a host of new loca-tion intelligence capabilities.A retailer can use Envinsav4.0 to calculate the "drivetime" to specific stores, help-ing it determine where toplace a new location basedon the distance or time peo-ple are willing to travel.Envinsa v4.0 also supportsnew data sources such asOracle 10g. Companies canperform powerful locationanalysis against this data tobetter understand location

relationships and patterns.For instance, an insuranceagent can query its databaseto determine the exact dis-tance a property is from acoastline and using the samedata, an assessor can analyzehistoric claims to adjustfuture rates. Anotheradvancement with version4.0 is expanded support forinteroperability standardssuch as the Open GeospatialConsortium specifications,including certification forWeb Mapping Service 1.1.1.

www.mapinfo.com

Applanixshipping L2Cready GPS boards Applanix has announcedthat it is now shipping L2Cready L1/L2 GPS receivers inits Position and OrientationSystem (POS) products. ThePOS products are used as acomponent for the compa-ny's air, land, and marineintegrated inertial/GPSgeospatial solutions. Thenew GPS receivers have beenbuilt with the future capabil-ities of GPS in mind, allowingL2C functionality to be acti-vated via a simple in-fieldfeature upgrade. Users cannow be ready to take fulladvantage of the L2C capabil-ities when available, withoutthe need to invest in addi-tional hardware.

Anticipating the addition-al workload of more complexsignals during acquisitionand tracking, the L2C capablereceivers contain hardwareand firmware to support thelonger codes of the new GPS

signal format. The L2C GPSsignal has been designed forcivilian use, and offers astronger and more robustcarrier phase differentialsolution for precise RTK posi-tioning than current genera-tion codeless L2 can provide.Used in conjunction with theoriginal L1 GPS carrier signal,ionosphere delay and otherdistortions become more cor-rectible, resulting in greaterposition, navigation and tim-ing accuracy, and reliability.The L2C GPS signal will alsooffer better L2 signal to noiseratios because receivers cantrack the L2C code directly,and makes it easier to resolveand dramatically reducemultipath effects (incorrectposition readings resultingfrom signal reflections).

www.applanix.com

Ordnance Surveybrings Pictometrytechnology toGreat BritainOrdnance Survey UK is offer-ing business and govern-ment customers across GreatBritain the chance to go"beyond the image" with anintegrated system for view-ing, measuring and planningthe built and natural land-scape. Pictometry technologycombines packages ofoblique and vertical aerialimages with a viewing soft-ware application designed toenable accurate measure-ments. It is based on theidea of viewing the size,shape and design of featuresfrom a range of differentangles, including the four

points of the compass. Access to multiple perspec-tives is particularly useful foremergency services, insurers,town planners and othersrequiring a detailed view ofthe elevation and surround-ings of buildings.

It enables users to see fea-tures and visualise andmeasure the spatial relation-ships between them. Usersdo not require specialistknowledge to operate thesystem. Pictometry fits wellwith Ordnance Survey's coredatasets. It is positionallycorrect to the entire OS MasterMap intelligent dataportfolio of Topography,Imagery, Address and Inte-grated Transport NetworkLayers.

Open Spatial Incannouncesavailability ofMunsys SEOpen Spatial Inc announcedthe release of Munsys 9.3Standard Edition, a solutionfor small utilities and localgovernments to managetheir engineering data. Mun-sys Standard Edition (Mun-sys SE) is optimized specifi-cally for the Locator spatialfunctionality provided inOracle 9i and Oracle 10gStandard Editions. It usesOracle's Locator functions tostore, retrieve and analyzeutility data in an Open GISformat offering the customerinfrastructure informationmanagement solution. Mun-sys SE runs on the full rangeof Autodesk's CAD products.

www.openspatial.com

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6G I S D E V E L O P M E N T - M I D D L E E A S T

16

If it is supposed that both GIS and e-Government are a logical result of

the information technology and computer, it is noticed that both technologies are heading into different directions except for afew international applications, which areintegrated partially or fully.

Integration cases are seldom limited for governmental author-ities that succeeded in establishing stable hierarchy for GIS thatdepend on service database in the form of various applications.One of these applications is setting up a public site that providesservices to citizens, the most important of which are tourist andguidance services, and even real-estate services.

If previous experiments were reviewed in the field of e-Gov-ernment, it is found that the main trend is to change the dailycorrespondences systems between governmental authoritiesand citizens from paper-based to digital-based, and develop theperformance level while removing all traditional obstaclesfaced by the citizens. It is noticed that most accomplished tasksin this field, 90% of which depend on operational, functional,financial, administrative systems, which completely lack GIS,

e-Governance

G I S D E V E L O P M E N T - M I D D L E E A S T M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

INTEGRATION of GIS and e-Government

To execute dailygovernment electronic corre-spondences by the e-Government network, many spatial data mustbe available such asaddresses, detaileddata about landparcels, ownershipdocument for of theconcerned people,and spatial specifications forthe concerned locations

PROF. MOHAMED AZIZ | Kuwait University


which is comprehensively not ideal fromthe e-Government angle since it does notdepend on the spatial dimension of data.

Due to the success of governmentalauthorities in establishing GIS centreswhile facilitating and creating spatialdigital databases, it is feasible to accom-plish integration among different activi-ties of e-Government and GIS. However,the integration methods between bothtechnologies differ in different countries.Here we attempt to categorise integra-tion between both technologies and forman ideal curriculum to be applied in theState of Kuwait when conducting thepopulation census.

RESEARCH TOPIC AND

IM PORTANCE

This research revolves around the techno-logical and information integrationbetween GIS and e-Government. Theimportance of this research is highlightedby the following points:

The great divide between GIS and e-Government especially in Arab coun-tries despite the presence of commonaspects such as databases, informationtechnology, operational systems, andcomputer technology.

The lackadaisical attitude in executing the e-Government project in many Arabcountries due to lack of information andspatial infrastructure that contribute inaccomplishing the e-Government project,since it is a service systems that needspatial connection for different servicepatterns and its relation to other factorssuch as population, resources, housing,and others.

In establishing GIS there are some obsta-cles that hinder the benefit flexibility. Oneof them is the lack of data communicationmechanism among different authorities(due to their dependence on traditionalsystems).

The success of a number of non-Arabcountries in accomplishing integrationbetween both technologies due to tech-nological agreement and the need of peo-ple to get flexibility in dealing and civiliza-tion in communication. In addition, peo-ple's awareness level is increasing when

dealing with information technology espe-cially the internet; therefore, it is neces-sary that Arab countries follow applicabletechnological levels so that they reachcivilization and development.

STUDY METHODOLOGY

The study depends on the descriptiveapproach and the comparative analyticalapproach for a number of applied sys-tems to integrate between both GIS tech-nology and e-Government, reflecting itsadvantages and disadvantages, present-ing an applied model to deal with disad-vantages, and making full benefit ofinternational models.

DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS

First: Reasons for integration

between GIS and e-Government

technologies

Integration is dependent on each other tofill in any shortages in data or flexibilityreach in data processing. If the e-Govern-ment task is to set bi-communication net-works among governmental and privateauthorities and citizens to process admin-istrative and service data and to do thedaily correspondences, the task of GIS isto provide spatial databases to all thestate's natural, human, and economicalresources needed by the different servicesystems in the e-Government. This is toprovide services that go in line with itsreal, not default spatial properties, whichwill facilitate a direct benefit for the citi-

zen and supports national projects deci-sion makers. In other words, if the abovetwo tasks were gathered, we will havewhat is called Integrated GIS or Open GIS.

Integration purposes can be elaboratedas follows:

The Geographic Location represents thenatural spatial reference of the areas inwhich the natural, human and economicresources that form the backbone in GISand that is needed by e-Government sys-tems especially the services systems.

The geographical location has an impor-tant function in prompting Public Informa-tion Databases as one of the e-Govern-ment requirements. It is called in this fieldthe Geographical Address.

The integration process among publicdatabases and among administrative sys-tems, an important requirement of the e-Government systems.

The Spatial Information represents thesuccess key for the e-Government due toits role in supporting methods of gather-ing field data through communicationchannels..

If the e-Go vernment systems includedthe geographical locations of commercialmalls and public service centres with theircoverage areas, it becomes easy to pres-ent commercial and other services in away that agrees with the reality and meetsthe requirement of the sought benefits.

Second: Integration patterns

between both technologies

Integration between both technologiesdiffers from one country to another.Some technologies follow State-wideIntegrated GIS and e-Government, andthe German model, which depends Open-GIS Web Services that represents anapplied model for all electronic services inReal Estate. The model has been appliedin Munich to serve all users in Germany.The Province-wide Integrated GIS and e-Government is like the Finnish model,which focuses on applying integrationbetween the GIS and e-Government inKouvola province in south east Finland.Some are still limited in ambition and

There aresome obstacles that hinder the benefitflexibility

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6


operate on one level in the state especial-ly Municipality Integrated GIS and e-Gov-ernment which displays a personal anddistinguished effort in Kuwait Municipal-ity for Parcels Information Systems in theform of a service page for citizens so that they can refer for informationregarding their real estate properties,obtaining ownership certificate and oth-er related data automatically and fromany place without a need to refer to themunicipality.

Another model of a limited cooperatingauthorities is the Applied Circle Integrat-ed GIS and e-Government among whichthe model of Los Angeles city in the Stateof California.

It is a model of cooperation between theTraffic Department and the City Munici-pality since it offers Real-time TrafficMaps along with citizens' services con-cerning all city affairs such as electricity,telephones, delivery services, securityservices, and others.

While we anticipate to have the firstmodel in the Arab World and even moreto reach a new pattern that can be calledArab Integrated GIS and e-Government toinclude all the natural, human, and eco-nomic resources, besides public servicesand daily correspondences systems, it isclear that the second and third patternsare the most common in Arab countriesthat accomplished giant steps in the fieldof e-Government and GIS.

In studying the different patterns, theirdifferences can be concluded based onthe following criteria:

The availability of spatial data infrastruc-ture.

The degree of coordination among governmental authorities.

The degree of coordination between governmental authorities and the privatesector.

The technical standard of the private sec-tor in the field of both technologies.

Clear vision and future requirements.

Nature of dealing with decision makers.

Third: Integration mechanism


Some might wonder about the startingpoint of integration? Should GIS startfirst, and then they are followed by the e-Government? Which is considered a partof the other? And when integration iscomplete, what should it be called? Isthere a name that can join both technolo-gies in an integrated image while reflect-ing their roles?

All these questions and more can formthe basis for integration mechanismbetween both technologies. Ahnon(2004) confirms that governmental firmsthat succeeded in establishing geograph-

ical information system are closer thanother firms in accomplishing the e-Gov-ernment project. In other words, hebelieves that the geographical informationsystem comes first, and then the e-Gov-ernment can be accomplished. This is truebecause geographical information sys-tems are service systems that provide thespatial information infrastructure neededby all the different governmental services.Teege (2004) clarifies that both the geo-graphical information system and the e-Government system are to be designed inparallel so that each system considers theother system's requirements duringdesigning phase, and when they integratein providing the services sought. He viewsthe geographical information system asthe blood bank and e-Government is theblood circulation that benefit from thecontents of the blood bank to spread it allover the body. If the blood circulationstops, which is the e-Government in thiscase, the blood bank will be useless.

It is noticed that both technologies go in

line from the beginning since the e-Gov-ernment represents an executive mecha-nism to facilitate all the state's affairsespecially services. This cannot bereached without the spatial informationinfrastructure provided by geographicalinformation systems. Therefore, the e-Government must not only be limited onadministrative operational systems of thestate, but it must go further to connect allfunctional and operational services inboth time and place factors so that it pro-vides citizens what is called Total e-Gov-ernment through Web-enabled Services.Hence, the ideal mechanism betweenboth the geographical information systemand the e-Government can be explainedas follows:

Preparing a spatial database that includeall human, natural, and economicresources in the country which depend ona National Data Directory, Unified Geo-graphical Coordinates, and Geocoding ofdifferent Spatial Phenomena throughLocal Addressing.

Setting a mechanism for informationupgrading that agrees with differentmajors so that each department upgradesits spatial information related to its tasksdepending on the Data Directory.

Providing a Real-Time CommunicationNetwork between the Spatial InformationDatabases and other authorities to facili-tate spatial information databases andallow continuous upgrading of data.

Designing Ministry Homepage for eachministry that include administrative, serv-ice, and daily correspondences systemsamong governmental authorities to mergelinking functions for these subsystems tobe linked with spatial information data-bases. For example, real estate recordsystem must include not only descriptivedata such as name of owner, land area,registration date, and etc. but it also mustinclude spatial linkage of the property sothat nearby properties can be inquired,nature of usage, and similar properties interms of specifications and contents.

Setting constant web-pages for allauthorities on highly efficient servers sothat it will not get slow or might stop whileworking due to large number of users inpeak times. Such web-pages are to beCitizen-Friendly Access Web Services.

It is clear that the services offered by thegeographical information systems for thee-Government focus on providing a reli-

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Some mightwonder aboutthe startingpoint of integration?

able, accurate, and up to date spatialinformation databases that goes alongwith different applications in the state.

Fourth: the current status of inte-gration between the e-Governmentproject and the National GIS Centre in the State of KuwaitThe State of Kuwait is not different frommost of the other Arab countries whichare keen to reach e-Government status.Many high decrees have been issuedregarding establishing a central execu-tive body of the e-Government project inthe early 2001. Many national awarenessdebates and conferences have been helddirected to both governmental authori-ties and the private sector based on dif-ferent fields, how far it is useful, somewere allocated for the educational sys-tem of the country, and other were allo-cated to make through integration andcooperation channels between both the

government and private sectors.However, the real accomplishments

were made by many governmentalauthorities on individual basis to reachthe e-Government, especially in provid-ing services. One of the most importantministries in this field is the Ministry ofInterior, Public Authority of Civil Infor-mation, and Kuwait Municipality, whileother authorities are still revolvingaround the real starting point.

Although there are three authoritiesthat applied e-Government on differentlevels, the authority that makes good useof the geographical information systemand accompanied databases is the Infor-mation Systems department at KuwaitMunicipality represented in the plot sys-tem, which joins the mechanism of the e-Government, the nature of the providedservices for citizens, the mechanism ofthe geographical information system inthe form of spatial information databases

of plots along with printing of maps andanswering inquiries. In addition, there isa comprehensive public system that pro-vide tourist information about the Stateof Kuwait, its civil and modern aspects bydepending on public geographical mapsthrough the small legend and the limited-ness of spatial details.

On the other hand, the researcher was

There is a comprehensivepublic systemthat providetourist information


successful in forming the National Com-mittee to facilitate geographical informa-tion system in the State of Kuwait basedon a degree issued by Kuwait Universitypresident. The committee includes allministries and government firms in theState of Kuwait to establish the NationalCentre for Geographical Information Systems.

The committee was able to prepare theproject in its final form and obtainedKuwait University Council approval. Theproject will be presented to the Council ofMinisters so that it is approved (God Will-ing). The project idea and the methodolo-gy of designing the national spatial data-base were presented in the last two con-ferences.

Although, both projects form realnational cornerstones for decision mak-ers in the State of Kuwait, there is still anempty circle among them due to the factthat the e-Government work-team eliminated the idea of integration of bothprojects because the idea of the work-team was that there was no necessitysince the e-Government is an administra-tive system for all ministries depart-ments and offering services on the web without the need for the spatialdimension.

The integration efforts are limited to some aspects represented by the same person in both projects, and thatperson was ambitious to reach completeintegration. The best example is KuwaitMunicipality.

The National Centre for GeographicalInformation Systems will provide a uni-fied spatial national database containingterminology, contents, and differenttypes of files for reading. Then the centrewill maintain its contents to support gov-ernment authorities that view the e-Gov-ernment systems.

But these are limited only to adminis-trative and daily correspondences sys-tems to enlarge its usage circle to the spa-tial aspect. This step is to agree with real-

ity and accomplish the required demandsfor development, especially in largedevelopmental projects.

Fifth: An applied integration model


As an applied model of the applied inte-gration between the e-Government andgeographical information systems tech-nology, we present the proposed project

idea by Kuwait University to the Ministryof Planning regarding the possibility ofexecuting the population census of theState of Kuwait depending on integrationamong the following technologies:

GIS that manages spatial database of thecensus maps using ESRI Software.

GPS technology that organizes the read-ing of coordinates signals of locationsthrough satellites to guide calculators inthe field. In the same time, it actually mon-itors the calculator since it cannot startcalculating before verifying the geograph-ical location of the statistical square. Themounted system allows to open a censusapplication mechanically.

Ipaq PDA that contains GSM/GPRScommunication systems with a process-ing speed of 400 MHz and a 128 MBRAM.

Online data downloading throughGSM/GPRS network.

Mobile Mapping Systems that connect

field divisions with census data tables on

computer laptops.

Automatic Census that is programmedusing Visual Basic Language to allowentering census data after checking thegeographical location, entering the num-ber of the statistical location, entering thenumber of the civil identity card of thehead of the household.

Availability of central server - HP CompaqML 370, Xeon Dual Processor, 4 GBMemory, 73× 3 Ultra SCSI.

Spatial database directly made availableon Oracle 9i Enterprise Edition.

The benefits of the e-Government in thisapplied project are as follows:

- The possibility of providing census dataas soon as the field survey is over insteadof using traditional methods that takemore than a year.

- The possibility of approving the censusdata by governmental authorities as soonas it is over to provide services for citizensthrough e-Government network.

- The possibility of supporting the Higher Council for Planning and Develop-ment with accurate data that improvescredibility more than other types of datathat is gathered in traditional methodsand might include carelessness of surveyor or might include recording morethan one application without going to theactual location.

- The possibility that the National GIS Centre depends on a population,housing, and service database in a flexiblemanner that agrees with its actual geographical locations to allow all GISunits in ministries and authorities to makegood use of it without referring to officialoffices.

- The possibility of supporting public service systems such as electricity, water,telephone, and other services based onaccurate and quick census data that isconnected to its actual location.

For complete list of references visithttp://www.mapmiddleeast.org/magazine/2006/mar-apr/index.htm

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

The State of Kuwait is not different from most ofthe other Arabcountries

Prof. Mohamed AzizGeography Department, Kuwait [email protected]

The objective of this paper is to conduct an analysis with an aim to modernize the Moroccanland administration system by taking into account the important recent realizations

22

During the last decade, sever-al countries began to re-

engineer their land administration systems.The re-engineering process focused closelyon legal, organizational, technical, andfinancial aspects. The objectives of most ofthe countries was to conduct new reformsenabling their systems to meet the require-ments of the new society, experiencingenormous international changes and a rapid growth of information technologies.

THE DRIVING FORCES BEHIND RE-ENGINEER ING LAND

ADM IN ISTRATION SYSTEM

The driving forces behind re-engineering (Hammer and Stanton, 1994; Banki, 1997) land administration systems are

LAND AMINISTRATIONSYSTEMA tool of e-Governance

e-Governance


EL-AYACHI MOHA | Assistant Professor, IAV Hassan II, Morocco


the new customer needs, the new global changes, thetechnology evolution, andthe state requirements. Customers are of two kinds:individuals and group ofindividuals. The needs ofboth kinds of customers arespecific and should be dealtwith great attention. Themajor customer demand isthe system efficiency, whichmeans the ability to deter-mine properties and providein a short time the relatedownerships.

The global changes affect,the nature of the land admin-istration system to develop.Serious efforts must be con-ducted to improve the certainty of landrights and the security of tenure. The sys-tem should serve the on-going reformsaround the world and serve the urgentrequirements of land and territory plan-ning to support international companiesusing land in Morocco.

The current technology has seen majorincreases in different domains. The landadministration system is concerned bythese new technological improvements.Varieties of instruments have recentlybeen introduced that will in the futureaccelerate the processes of surveying,land titling, registration, and mapping.GIS help in modernizing all operationaland functional processes of the system.

In Morocco, the State as a primarylandowner needs to establish an efficientsystem to increase the security on landand facilitate land administration. Thiswill allow monitoring of land market,improvement of planning in urban andrural areas, regulation of legal frameworkand statutes of land, and introduction of new technology to maintain landreform such as redistribution, consolida-tion, valuation, and assessment. In addition, the multipurpose cadastre will

ensure within the society an optimumlevel of quality and establish a uniformland information system based on prop-erties and parcels.

ANALYSIS OF THE ONGOING

MODERNIZATION SCENARIOS

The decennial action plan

1996-2005

The National Agency of Land Conserva-tion, Cadastre, and Mapping for ANCFCCis the fundamental agency in adminis-trating and managing land related datain Morocco. The decennial action planestablished in 1995 was very ambitiousand constituted an important referenceregarding the diagnostic and analysismatters. From the strategic point of view,it presented a series of recommendationsas ambitious orientations; however, theywere forever reliable to the structure andthe spirit of the former system.

We should deal with various questionsregarding the future of land administra-tion system in Morocco (El-Ayachi, 2005). What is the future role of this system in promoting the national devel-opment? What is the nature of its contri-

bution if the former structure continuesto be submerged only by the titling purposes?

The vision of a fore guard

Moroccan cadastre

In 2001, a study was conducted to mod-ernize the cadastral system in Morocco(Chakir, 2001). The Author proposed threelevels: national, regional, and local level.The national level is concerned withquestions related to regulation, coordina-tion, supervision, and technology. Theregional level supervises and coordinatesthe regional activities. The local level isresponsible for producing cadastral dataand maps. The study requires the cre-ation of Regional Directories and LocalDelegations as the basis for the modernsystem. At the local level, the formerstructure will be transformed radically toset up the new administration. The newstructure, as inspired from the model ofAustralian Land registration in Victoria,includes four units (Figure 1). The struc-ture at the local level as recommended(Chakir, 2001) did not preview the multi-purpose aspects of land administration.It's only dealt with cadastral aspects. It is

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Fig. 1 Local delegation adapted from Chakir (2001)

Accountingand personalmanagement

Administrativ

e and

Financial U

nit

Land Regist

ry Unit

Supervising andcontrolling private

companies’s projects oncadastral affaires

Titling andregistrationactivities

Providing userswith cadastraldata and land

informationCenter of

Documentation and

Land Information

Land’s Cadastre Unit

LOCALDELEGATION

LOCALDELEGATION


also proposed to create aregional directory to coordi-nate regional tasks andsupervise the local activities.This will be time consumingespecially if the system dealsonly with titling and regis-tration matters. In Morocco,the development of a newvision is needed to imple-ment a multipurpose systemto meet user needs in severaldomains requiring land andcadastral information.

Strategic vision 2006

The vision 2006 proposed anew strategy, which aimed to simplifythe organizational procedures to enablethe achievement of surveying activitiesby private companies and allow theANCFCC to control and maintain thequality of its services and products. It pro-vides a framework of improving national,regional, and local activities by unifyingthe former components, decentralizingresponsibilities, and concentrating prac-tical actions at local levels. The visionreinforces the process of computing alladministrative, procedural, and technicaltasks of entities of the ANCFCC. The objec-tive is to generalize the establishment ofgeographical information systems deal-ing with geodetic, mapping, and cadas-tral information. The conducted projectsas template solutions will be analyzed toadopt and generalize convenient solu-tion. This strategy will not be realizedwithout making new technical and pro-cedural standards to unify processes andfacilitates the control and maintenanceof its products.

NEW CONCEPTUAL FRAM EWORK

FOR NEW STRATEGY

Analysis of international

experience

A multipurpose cadastre was defined as a

real world environment gatheringparcels data and implemented accordingto three steps (Mclaughlin, 1975). It shouldestablish a cadastral survey base consist-ing of two interrelated elements: a spatialcontrol framework and a graphical base.Secondly, a cadastral survey system isbuilt to allow creating and maintaining aseries of cadastral maps showing the size,shape, and location of parcels.

Thirdly, a cadastral records system mustbe developed to contain two kinds ofinformation concerning public and pri-vate ownerships legally recognized inlands and historical development ofthese rights. In 1980, the Committee onGeodesy of the National Research Councilasserted that there is an urgent need toimplement a multipurpose cadastre forUSA. The established report defined thesystem as a framework supporting con-tinuous, readily and comprehensive landinformation at the parcel level. At theEuropean level, the diversity of the devel-oped systems illustrates the richness ofthe various experiences of land adminis-tration systems.

ANALYSIS OF THE MOROCCAN

CONTEXT

In order to develop a new approach ofmodernization, we examined opinions of

the principal operators in landadministration. Several studiesare undertaken and supervisedto achieve this goal. The studiesconcerning the effect of the landstructures on national econom-ics in the fields of agriculture,urban and regional planninghave permitted to raise threeneeds. First need is to use aunique framework for reinforc-ing partnership among various

institutions involved in landmanagement (Bouraza andHagouni, 1999). Second crucialneed is to establish a NationalCouncil of Standardization to

promote and supervise technical aspectsof a modern land administration system(Boukbech and Essaadi, 2001). Finally,there is a need to create a NationalAgency of Land Promoting to ensurelong-term reconstitution of real estatebelonging to the State (SEH, 2003). Otherresearches were conducted to analyze thecontribution of the new technologies inmodernizing the Moroccan system(Amine and Elboulmani, 2001; Ouiouf andBni, 2002). These studies are undertakenwithin the Urban Agency of Casablancacity, the Service of Cadastre of Anfa(Casablanca), and many private compa-nies (Elfatihi and Mjouel, 2002).

A survey was remarkably required toillustrate the different visions of variouspartners. The questionnaire examinedthree principal elements, which are thecadastral specificities and missions, theorganizational aspects, and the modern-ization strategy. The results of this surveywere very interesting in terms of a seriesof emerged suggestions and require-ments. A conceptual framework concern-ing organizational and technical aspectswere designed.

SUM MARY ANALYSIS OF THE

SURVEY RESULTS

The survey has the aim to examine the

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Fig. 2 Components of the multipurpose system model

Land Information System (LIS)

Integrated Land Administration System(ILAS)

Large-scale maps

Regular cadastral sections

Fundamental geodetic network


attitude of various actors in the field ofland, cadastre, and mapping. A summaryanalysis of the survey results allowed usto affirm that the commitment of severalpartners is an obvious condition for anyapproach of reforming and modernizingland and cadastral frames. Any reformbased on an organizational transforma-tion of a supervising institution such asthe ANCFCC cannot satisfy the objectivesof developing our cadastre. Any solutionproposed in this way can make improve-ments inside a concerned institution butcannot solve the overall problems relatedto the land administration and manage-ment. In the same way, initiatives takenalone from various administrations aim-ing to overcome their problems alwaysremain inefficient.

The survey permits to conclude thatthere is a need to process for a large co-operation gathering various actors toconceive legal and technical tools asessential requirements for developingthe country. Thus, it is not necessary toadopt a vision of change of an organiza-tion or an administration or proceed tothe implementation of new structureswithout designing a convenient strategyand solution. The future solution shouldbe made together ensuring the commit-ment and agreement of various partners.One may conclude that the concept ofcadastre was largely dominated by theconcepts of titling and registration asintroduced by the settlers. The descrip-tion of the whole land to develop a publicinventory serving for several interestsand purposes is far from being conceivedfor Morocco (El Ayachi, 2005).

AN INTEGRATED LAND

ADM IN ISTRATION SYSTEM FOR

e-GOVERNANCE PURPOSES

Paradigm of an integrated

multipurpose model

From the analysis of the visions and sce-narios developed in Morocco, the two

approaches in North America, the state-ments of the new visions cadastre 2014,and the current, nature, and needs of theMoroccan system, the following compo-nents are proposed to serve as the basis ofa new vision to develop and implement amultipurpose land information system(Figure 2). Developing the systemrequires contribution of many depart-ments to perform fundamental compo-nents of the system. Both governmentaland private institutions are involved con-currently to integrate all items of the newsystem. The implementation of eachcomponent belongs to a specific institu-

tion at national, regional, and local level. The multipurpose system will provide

not only land ownerships and propertyinformation but also a large variety ofland information such as land use, landzoning, infrastructure information, build-ing, properties, and addresses. The multi-purpose system model describes fivecomponents: a Fundamental GeodeticNetwork (FGN) as a reference framework,a series of regular cadastral sectionslocated and monumented as a basiccadastral grid for cadastral overlays, aseries of large-scale maps of natural andphysical features, an Integrated Land

Administration System (ILAS) dealingwith the multiple forms of land informa-tion, and a computerized Land informa-tion system (LIS) (El-ayachi, 2005).

Components of the

infrastructure model

The fundamental network is a geometricfoundation that allows a proper spatiallinkage between features across an area.All the locational data will be shared andintegrated to serve the multiple purposesof the system. The cadastral data andrelated information will integratenumerically the modern system. To servethese needs, all surveyed properties andparcels must be tied to the cadastral sec-tions to permit adding safely all naturaldetails to the existing cadastral maps.

While this foundation is established fora long-term use, its control points mustbe compiled accurately and progressive-ly. The ongoing GPS network must be tiedto the first or second order of the existinggeodetic network. When the transferringparameters are compiled, we can densifythe GPS network and provide locationalinformation of the new control points inboth the Lambert and Cartesian systems.Once the required density is achieved, thecadastral sections are created and tied tothe new control points.

In the framework of the new model, thevalue of land information depends of thecosts of producing the basic data. To savetime, money, and energy it is a necessarymission to conceive best practices and todevelop convenient technical solutions.This is assured by developing large-scalemaps presenting natural and physicalfeatures related to land data withrespects to the various user needs. Thus,the creating of large-scale maps at a scaleof 1/5000 and more will have its signifi-cant justifications regarding the newrequirements of both the society and thegovernment. Firstly, these maps will bethe foundation upon which most, or all,other geospatial information overlays are

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Any solutionproposed inthis way can make improvementsinside a concernedinstitution


built. Secondly, we observe intensifyingpressures on land information for plan-ning and development projects especiallyat the local levels. Thirdly, the so-calledRegional Centers of Investment, require alarge inventory of land to assist policymakers and to evaluate land informationneeded in various development projects.

The basic unit of the large-scale mapsshows the contents of the basic cadastralsection that cover an area of 4.5x3.0 km2.However, a realistic approach should bemade based on the nature of each zoneand on the kind of projects to be conduct-ed. For every urban zone, maps at a scaleof 1/1000 must be generated. In case ofpopulated cities, maps at a scale of 1/500are needed. These maps are added to thecadastral overlays to display the proper-ties and parcels they cover, then to besubmitted to the local rules in term ofrestrictions and obligations regulatingland uses. In the areas including subur-ban zones, towns, and villages, the use ofmaps at scales from 1/2000 to 1/5000 arepractically sufficient. The local conditionsconcerning the social and economicalaspects of lands determine on the otherhand the choice of the scales to adopt. Inforests and widely cultivated areas, thecorresponding maps scales are from1/5000 to 1/10000.

The success of the new strategy willdepend widely on the effective and greatcontribution of the cadastral services atthe local level to produce and update allland data and ownerships. The local levelis a basic mean of assembling communi-ty, local administration, private compa-nies, and investors around lands and landrights. This enables local authorities tobetter making decision on the land man-agement and administration. The main-taining of the multipurpose system, atthe local level, will be assigned to eachLand Facility via its Office of Land Admin-istration System. Every Office will dealwith the former functions related to sur-veying works. It will create and maintain

the cadastral sections according to theregional guidelines to facilitate collectingand updating data by the public and pri-vate agencies. The establishment of ageneral land inventory will be performedat this level requiring national standardsand regulation.

The development of computerized landinformation system belongs to the locallevel. They provide cadastral overlaysconcerning the cadastral sections, theproperty boundaries, the parcels withineach property, the land tenure, andadministrative boundaries concerningcities, circles, and districts. They will

make efforts to develop a land informa-tion system as a basis for implementingthe multipurpose land information sys-tem with respect to regional and nationalguidelines. The local authorities will haveto cooperate with the provincial boards,city and commune councils, and localrepresentatives of various departmentssuch as housing, equipments, education,forest, environment, and agriculture.

CONCLUSION

The main objective of the cadastre inMorocco is to define accurately and safelyproperties, land tenure, and their physical

and locational characteristics. However,as the land titling system is voluntary, anew multipurpose system must be devel-oped to enable progressively a systematicdefinition of land. The new system aimsto support land planning purposes, landadministration, land taxation, and agri-cultural development projects. The oldsystem is characterized by a long timeconsuming, high registration costs perproperty, and absence of an exhaustiveoverview of existing parcels and proper-ties within an area.

The multipurpose land information sys-tem will be a comprehensive systemoffering several advantages in managingall kinds of land information. Its develop-ment does not mean the creation of anew system, but the perspective is to re-engineer the existing frame and upgradeit to improve managerial, functional, andoperational procedures. Naturally, a pro-gressive approach is necessary to makethe first steps of building the new systemless expensive. We should focus on theenhancement of its technical proceduresby the mean of developing guidelinesand standards and introducing new tech-nologies. The primary tasks necessary forfuture system implementation is toestablish systematically and graduallyregular cadastral sections and large-scalemaps. The same sections are tied to theglobal geodetic network and will servetechnically as the basic reference forcadastral and surveying operations.

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This enableslocal authorities in making better decisions on the land management

El-Ayachi Moha Assist. Professor, IAV Hassan II

Semlali El Hassan Professor, IAV Hassan II

Ettarid MohamedIAV Hassan II

Tahiri Driss IAV Hassan II

28

The Knowledge pertaining togeoinformation techniques and

the required basics is essential to a largecommunity of geoscientists.These basic techniques are taught at the Institute for Applica-tions of Geodesy to Engineering (IAGB), University Stuttgart, in

courses of studie like Geodesy and Geography(in German lan-guage), Technique and Management of Real Estate (in Germanlanguage) and Infrastructure Planning (in English language).The IAGB tries to evolve new ways by combining the existingexercises and additional e-learning, which it offers for selfstudy. Through implementation of e-learning, new and attrac-tive possibilities for learning processes can be achieved: learn-ing can be independent from time and location, as well as anindividual self-directed lerning tempo is also possible. So the e-learning quality of teaching should be upgraded.

GEOINFORMATION RELATED E-LEARNING

The current status of geoinformation related training and edu-cation courses are manifold and can be summarised in the inter-national context as software training, software developmentand customization, school-level, under graduate level, post-graduate level university and for professionals. Furthermore, allthese types could be offered as face-to-face training as well asdistance learning (Rhind 2005).

Typical example for distance learning is the ESRI Virtual Cam-pus for software training or the UNIGIS-consortium for academ-ic teaching. A combination of face-to-face and e-learning isoffered by platforms like GITTA (Bleisch and Nebiker 2004),GEOINFORMATION.NET (Plümer and Asche 2004) or GIMOLUS(Müller and Kaule 2004). Also in a current research of EEGECS(2004) it was established that the most commonly used sce-

e-Governance


THILO KAUFMANN | IAGB, University of Stuttgart, Germany

The combination of physical teaching ande-learning seems to be very successful andmay be one academic teaching-model forthe future. The additional idea is the cre-ation of an universal e-learning systemthat may be used for vocational training

e-Learningfor GIS


nario is a combination of face-to-face ande-learning. According to this study thelevel of interactivity can be classified intoe-mails, readable digital documents,interactive digital documents, conferencesystems and video conferencing. In thispaper the authors present e-learning incombination with face-to-face learningas interactive digital documents integrat-ed into an e-learning platform.

E-LEARNING AT IAGB The first step towards e-learning activi-ties at the IAGB was taken between 2001and 2003, within the e-learning project –’gimolus’ (GIS- und modellgestützte Lern-module für umweltorientierte Studi-engänge / learning modules for GIS andmodelling in environmental courses),funded by the German Ministry of Educa-tion and Research.

In cooperation with other institutions,like the Institute for Landscape-Planningand Ecology (head of project), an internet-based e-learning platform for GIS andmodel-based studies was created (Müllerand Kaule 2004; www.gimolus. de).Together with the Institute for Pho-togrammetry (IfP) at the University ofStuttgart, the basics of GIS for the envi-ronmental disciplines involved into theproject were treated (Kaufmann andWeippert 2002).

Within an XML-based mod-ule text components andgraphics, WebGIS realizations,animations using Macrome-dia Flash and Multiple-Choice-Tests using PHP-language can be integrated by theauthors. Based on this e-learn-ing platform, the IAGB devel-ops e-learning modules up tonow.

E-LEARNING PLATFORM

GIMOLUS

The graphical user interface(GUI) of this e-learning plat-

form “gimolus” is structured into the gen-eral system navigation, the module navi-gation, and the module content itself asillustrated in figure 1:

Using the system navigation, the stu-dents can navigate to one of the 70 exist-ing modules. Furthermore, user specificadjustment (e.g. font size) may be real-ized and online-help is integrated.

The module navigation normally con-sists of five parts (introduction, manual,content, material, assistance). These are structured into chapters, subchaptersand pages.

A student would not have the possibili-ty to change among the modules whileworking with one module, because thehierarchical navigation structure in andamong the modules should be kept. Thestudent should always know “where I amin the learning environment?”. The navi-gation within the module itself can bedone by the module navigation describedor by a forward/backward button frompage to page.

In the core content different compo-nents like graphics, text information,tables, multiple-choice-tests, animations,and videos are integrated. These shouldsupport the interactive knowledge trans-fer as well as the independent treatmentof application-oriented exercises.

INTEGRATION OF E-LEARNING

MODULES INTO CURRICULA

The IAGB has developed different mod-ules within the fields of GIS, cartography,and geodata acquisition, for differentinternational and interdisciplinary cours-es. An overview of the courses for whichthe IAGB offers e-learning modules is giv-en in table 1.

An important factor for the success ofan e-learning offer is the setting, thatmeans by which didactic concept mod-ules are integrated within teaching activ-ities (Petschenka and Kerres 2004). Foreach new topic within the exercises on“Thematic Cartography” a physical exer-cise is carried through, in which declara-tive knowledge (e.g. basics of animatedmaps) and necessary, procedural knowl-edge (e.g. introduction in animation soft-ware) are imparted. Physical teaching isfollowed by the respective e-learning

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

system navigation

modulnavigation

content(incl.graficstext,screenvideosanimationsetc.)

Fig. 1 E-learning platform gimolus (e.g. module "Animated Maps")

IAGB hasdeveloped different modules

G I S D E V E L O P M E N T - M I D D L E E A S T

module. This integrated module repeatsdeclarative knowledge, comprises knowl-edge questions and in some cases has fur-thermore a main focus on practical soft-ware training. Therefore in some mod-ules the students have to perform proj-ects (contextual knowledge), which final-ly have to be send to a tutor, whoacknowledges the work and givesremarks for improvement. This conceptof integration of physical and e-learningis illustrated in Figure 2 for the exerciseson “Thematic Cartography”.

In the exercises on “Thematic Cartogra-phy”, in which 79 students of geography,geodesy and geoinformatics participatedin summer term 2005, the term beganwith an introduction to the e-learning-system. Then students use the module„Basics of Mapping“, that firstly repeatsthe declarative knowledge and comprisesknowledge questions, which are multi-ple-choice tests. In the 2nd exercise,knowledge about the cartographer’s visu-al resources and appliance of ArcGIS-Software are integrated. In the followingself-study a thematic map has to be creat-ed. This project may be supported bymodules, in which screen-videos are inte-grated. In the 3rd exercise, an animatedmap is to create a support for thedescribed module “Animated Maps”. Thisintegration of modules into teachingactivities is supplemented by evaluationsof the target groups, the modules itselfand system platforms to assure the quali-ty of the e-learning offer sustainably.

REALIZATION EXAM PLE OF MODULE

"ANIMATED MAPS" For better understanding the module“Animated Maps” are explained, whichare used within the exercise “ThematicCartography”. Working with this module,the user should get the theoretical basicsabout dynamic visualization. Based onthis knowledge, the user should learn tocreate independently a cartographic ani-mation by using the software Flash. As a

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TTaabbllee 11:: Courses with IAGB e-learning modules

ID Course Language Study Course

1 Thematic Cartogra-phy

GermanGeodesy and Geoin-formatics,Geography(both diploma)

2Acquisition and Man-agement of PlanningData

GermanTechnique and Econ-omy of Real Estate(diploma)

3 GIS-based DataAcquisition

EnglishInfrastructure Plan-ning (MSc)

3 Data Managementand Analysis

GIS and cartography Geodata acquisition

- Basics of mapping 1,2,4

- Cartometry 2,4 - Shape of the earth 2,3

- GIS-tutorial 1,2,3 - Coordinate systems and projections 2,3

- Data processing 2,4 - Coordinate transformations 2,3

- GIS-based location planning 2,4 (*) - Terrestrial positioning methods 2,3

- Map visualization 1 (*) - GPS-positioning 2,3

- 3D-visualization 1 (*) - Galileo-positioning 3 (*)

- Animated maps 1

TTaabbllee 22:: E-learning modules for GIS, cartography and geodata acquisition ( (*) modules in development)

Evaluation of target group

Evaluation of target group:

Daily usage of computer & internet 6.5

Experience with e-learning 1.9

Expectance regarding this e-learning offer 5.3

evaluation of module (e.g.: module "Animated Maps"):

Relevance of the topics 5.3

Learning success 4.5

Understandability of content 5.0

Assistance regarding structure 5.1

Assistance regarding content 5.5

evaluation of e-learning-platform:

Increases my pleasure 4.7

Increases my motivation 4.4

Got the necessary technical assistance 4.7

Got the necessary help domain 4.6

TTaabbllee 33:: Results of evaluation

30


result of these objectives, thestructure of the module is giv-en in three chapters:

1. Theory (e.g. workflow of ananimation process, visualiza-tion rules).

2. Software training (incl.screen videos)

3. Application (incl. best-practise-examples)

Exemplarily, an animationabout urban growth for partsof the region of Stuttgart hasto be created. This kind of ani-mation is based on a so-called“Alphablending” procedure,by which colour values areslowly faded in. Best-of-examples, screenvideos of the working steps, FAQ`s as wellas tutorial help are means to support theusers during their project work withinthe modules.

It is to annotate that it makes sense tocreate a module on animated maps as thetopic itself is multimedia-based andinteractive. Because of this backgroundand as a result of consequent integrationinto curricula this module won in 2005the 2nd prize in the e-learning contest“self-study online” at the University ofStuttgart, whereby within the pro-gramme “self-study online” more than100 projects competed for the prize.

EVALUATION OF TARGET GROUPS,MODULES, AND SYSTEM PLATFORM

Within the exercises on “Thematic Car-tography” in 2005 an evaluation was car-ried through for students of geography,as well as geodesy and geoinformatics.For this purpose, a special questionnairewas used, which was adapted to a proto-type evaluation in 2002/2003 as well asexperiences during the last term. Thequestionnaire was filled-in by the stu-dents while using the modules. Theresults of the questionnaires are illustrat-ed in table 3, which shows values fromone to seven for each question. One

stands for “I completely disagree” andseven for “I completely agree”. The valuesbetween indicates steps between theextreme values, thereby four indicatesthe medium value.

At the beginning of the exercises on“Thematic Cartography” the target groupwas evaluated for their experiences andexpectations.It can be summarised thatdaily usage of computer and internet areself-evident, but experience with e-learn-ing is low. The requisites for a successfulimplementation of e-learning are good,because expectation regarding this e-learning offer is very high. Furthermoreeach module (in this case “AnimatedMaps”) was evaluated and the averagevalues are fairly good (around 5). Basedon additional comments from studentsthe current module version were upgrad-ed to improve learning success of stu-dents. By the end of term the whole e-learning-platform were evaluated,whereby the test group had a positivejudgement of the system as well as theygave helpful feedback.

Furthermore it is annotated that theevaluation will be carried through for alonger time and the feedbacks of theusers as well as the evaluation resultswill be used to upgrade the e-learning-offers sustainably.

CONCLUSION

The development of e-learning modulesis an ongoing task at IAGB. Any furtherdevelopment is a result of the positiveevaluation of the existing modules aswell as of the ‘gimolus’ platform. Thecombination of physical teaching and e-learning seems to be very successful andmay be one academic teaching-model forthe future. The novel idea, is the creationof an universal e-learning system thatmay be used for life-long learning andvocational training. Within a currentdiploma thesis modules for different tar-get groups like students, pupils andgeoinformation related companies aredeveloped. We believe a first step in thedirection of the system implementationhas commenced..

For complete list of references visithttp://www.mapmiddleeast.org/magazine/2006/mar-apr/index.htm

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Thilo KaufmannIAGB, University of Stuttgart, [email protected]

Volker SchwiegerIAGBUniversity of Stuttgart, [email protected]

Fig. 2 Combining physical exercises and self-study (e.g. within the exercises "Thematic Cartography")

32

As it is mentioned in a recentpaper [1] „...enterprise GIS

programmes are still relatively new, andmany organizations have just began makingthe leap. Smaller communities and organiza-tions have also started realising the benefitsof implementing enterprise GIS. As with anynew, rapidly emerging technology, the nextfew years should be interesting as weaddress current problems, find new prob-lems and continue to push the envelope ofenterprise GIS” Although Geographical Information System (GIS) is oftenviewed as a technology project and an arena or the technicallysophisticated computer professional, the development of a successful enterprise GIS is dependent more on proper manage-ment participation and supervision than on the technical solution. Therefore GIS implementation should be regarded as

continuous innovative process, combining technology, data,processes, human resources and partnerships.In recent years many large companies, organizations andmunicipalities have switched from independent, stand-aloneGIS systems to more integrated approaches that share resourcesand applications.

The basic idea of an enterprise GIS is to address the needs ofdepartments collectively instead of individually. The develop-ment of one comprehensive infrastructure minimizes potentialconflicts and misunderstandings and can result in significantcost savings and performance improvements. In a review of theidentities of GIS, Chan and Willimson [2] summarize four per-spectives on the nature of GIS: identificational, technological,organizational and productional. In a diffusion study the identi-ficational perspective describes features of GIS and distinguish-es GIS from other types of information systems that may orhave been adopted by an organization.

These unique features include: data of entities and relation-ships managed within a spatial framework; and ability to per-form spatial analysis.

Rogers [9] defines diffusion as the process by which an innova-tion is communicated through certain channels over timeamong members of a social system, GIS adoption is typically a

Starting from the fact that GIS should be considered as continuous innovative process,which combines technology, data, processes, human resources and partnerships. The paperrepresents a point of view pertaining to frame of work in order to develop an enterprise GIS

ANGELA IONITA | Romanian Academy


Enterprise GIS

Developingan Enterprise GIS


contingent innovation-decision [8] as itsadoption decision by an organizationnormally proceeds that of the individualsowing to the high capital outlay required.As mentioned in [1], this type of decisionby an organization involves interactionamong complex sets of personal, organi-sational and cultural interests. Further,adoption does not necessarily lead to successful utilization resulting in benefits. They suggest that diffusionshould be an umbrella concept encom-passing the processes of awareness raising, adoption, implementation, routinization and utilization and an eval-uation of outcomes.

The basic mandate for any enterpriseGIS application is to ensure that alldepartments within an organizationhave access to geospatial information, sothat they can operate at maximum effi-ciency. Some of the benefits, an enter-prise GIS can provide, are greater consis-tency and accuracy from improved sys-tem-wide management, more efficientuse and sharing of data, reduced redun-dancy of data across the system, betteruse of departmental GIS resources andreduced maintenance and support costs.

COM BIN ING TECHNOLOGY, DATA

AND PROCESSES

One of the biggest benefits of an enter-prise GIS is that priorities can be estab-lished and decisions made about the bestway to use company resources. Data isone of the most significant investmentsin any GIS programme, so any approachthat reduces acquisition costs whilemaintaining data quality is important.With so many day-to-day operations ofmunicipalities and public utilities requir-ing the use of geospatial data, a systemneeds to be in place for sorting and priori-tizing the requests. If funds are limited,acquisition can be geared toward datathat fulfills the greatest number of needs.Many GIS goals can be accomplished byusing commercial, off-the-shelf applica-

tions, but there are occasions, where customized applications must be devel-oped. With an enterprise GIS programme,it may be possible to develop a customapplication and then make minor revi-sions to meet the needs of individualdepartments.

A large category of enterprise GIS isBusiness Intelligence (BI) that enablesbusiness to run more efficiently by gath-ering data from across the enterprise andprocessing it for use by managers andanalysts in decision-making. BI is grow-ing due to its great potential to stream-line and enhance business processes.Despite its potential, BI face two keyproblems, with attendant opportunities:

BI has done a great job with data efficien-

cy, delivering the right data to all the play-ers in the enterprise. The next opportunitylies in decision effectiveness throughadvanced analytics. As a result, use ofadvanced analytics is not widespread andmanagers do not give it the credibility itdeserves. The greatest opportunity for BItoday is to place easy to use and powerfulanalytical tools in the hands of businessmanagers.

BI category has not provided businessleaders with geographically enabled toolsthat easily support the management style.The dynamic, fast-paced environment ofbusiness extends from the individualneeds through the market and regionallevel, to the executive suite. Every day,managers from central and local publicadministration are confronted with high-impact decisions that require immediateresolution. These decisions must bebased on the best information and analy-

sis available formatted to support the intu-itive decision style native to many business leaders. The key opportunity forBI is to provide a platform that allowsmanagers to:

a. Visualize their business networks in adynamic and highly communicative interface, and

b. Reveal key relationship in a way thatfosters intuitive and fact-based decisionmaking, without needing analysis, expertise or data "geeks" [5].

"For geospatial technologies, to taketheir place in the business mainstream,the destination must be usability. Busi-ness analytics, though powerful, aremeaningless unless decision makers caneasily interact with the information theyneed to do a better job"1 and "spatialinformation brings a rich view of fast-breaking trends that impact a business"says Henry Morris, group VP for applica-tions and information access at analystfirm IDC.

According to [6], the success of an enter-prise GIS can be measured according toperformance and service. Specific per-formance metrics include the availabilityof data and other resources and the relia-bility of the system and system usage;service metrics include funding stability,productivity, and degree of data sharingand collaboration [11].

THE FRAM E OF WORK

An analysis of major stakeholders in GISarea reveals several fundamental prob-lems for implementing an integrated GISto support efforts institution-wide. First,the stakeholders are working with differ-ent deadlines and different goals. Envi-ronmental monitoring and infrastructurereference databases (e.g., utilities, struc-tures, roads) emphasize longer-terminstitutional and regulatory concerns,such as change control, updates, consis-tency of data format, and documentationof data sources. Research projects oftenplace a higher priority on short-termgoals of rapid analysis and publication,

A large category ofEnterprise GIS is Business Intelligence

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6


with much of the knowledge held in theminds of individuals. Data documenta-tion, consistency of data format, andlong-term archiving may not be a highpriority. Once, a given research project iscompleted and summarized, data arestored in an ad hoc fashion and often areeventually lost. However, these disparateapproaches have many common needs,such as data quality standards and ageoinformation management plan.

With proper design, enterprise GIS canpromote data sharing while protectingdata security and while promotingincreased integration of operations andresearch efforts for the benefit of theinstitution. Enterprise GIS can enable allstakeholders to work more for the good ofthe institution, by helping project andoperations workers to provide completeand accessible data.

In [6] the perspective on evolution ofenterprise GIS is characterized as follows:"The use of enterprise GIS is a naturalresult of the evolution in geospatial datasharing within institutions, but thischange can be painful. A natural part ofevolution is resistance to change, and ismanifested in unique ways at each insti-tution.

This resistance is affected by differentstakeholder roles and stereotypes (e.g.,operations vs. research). In addition, thetypically excellent working relationsamong GIS professionals at the grass-roots level can be limited by organiza-tional divides". An enterprise GIS designfor an organization must meet the needsand missions of a broad spectrum ofstakeholders. In the final analysis, "thechallenge lies in striking a balance in thedegree of centralized storage, administra-tion, and procedural control while serv-ing the needs of the GIS community forstreamlined data documentation, access,and compatibility. Beyond the sharing ofgeospatial data, the enterprise facilitatessharing of information and GIS resourcesas well".

HUMAN RESOURCES

The key to the success of any enterpriseGIS is the people involved and, an adequate training and support for it.With a good training and support programme, the number of knowledge-able GIS users within an organization will expand. Without such a programme,the good intention ends up with a handful of GIS experts and a failed effort at extending GIS throughout theorganization.

A training programme can help poten-tial users learn how to work within theenterprise GIS structure, develop new

skills and keep up to date on technologi-cal changes. Individual users typically dothings a little differently from their col-leagues, and these differences are ampli-fied as new users add their own idiosyn-crasies when it comes to using GIS. Formalized training will help ensure consistency in training across the enter-prise GIS.

After people have been trained, theywill need sufficient support to enablethem to do their jobs effectively. The keyto user support is providing a timelyresponse so that problems can beresolved and users can get back to work.

PARTNERSHIP

Partnerships are often established as aresult of or in support of an EnterpriseGIS, because the enterprise GIS presentsmany opportunities for partnership andcorporate re-engineering. Informationaccess enables groups to do things in newways, provide new services and informa-tion products and lessen reliance on "tra-ditional" approaches.

Partnerships are an effective way ofachieving consensus. Instead of eachorganization acting independently, part-nerships create a sense of shared respons-ability for the product and its use. Part-nerships broaden the basis of support forprojects and help to ensure that they sur-vive to meet the needs of society.

Partnerships can encourage a clear divi-sion of responsibility even when the dataneeds are shared. Another aspects of part-nerships refer to the data. Data are valu-able because of their use. If data are moreaccessible, standard, better maintained,etc. They are more widely used and,therefore, more valuable. A partnershipapproach creates more valuable data.

According to FGDC, the key elements ofa partnerships refer to four aspects: shar-ing of responsibilities, sharing costs, shar-ing benefits and sharing of control.

In general, the partnership objectivesare: improving the use of data, improvingthe development of data and mainte-nance, improving awareness and educa-tion. In order to develop a partnership arecommonly required three pieces:

An analysis of the business basis forbeing involved that reflects the advan-tages of the involvement for that partner;

A "philosophical" basis - an agreement inthe vision, that there are advantages topursuing a partnership;

An agreement document/understandingwhich provides the relationship basis anddescribes the responsibilities of the part-ners.

CHALLENGES AND POTENTIAL

SOLUTIONS FOR ROMANIA

The challenge we faced was to manage

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If better maintainedand standarddata are moreaccessible,they would be more used


geospatial information across 53 depart-mental units and more than 200 process-es. And we discovered that in our case,geospatial information meant 389 layerswith more than 4000 distinct character-istics... and that managing it meant dataand system functions seamlessly inte-grated with those typically found in ERP,CRM, Document Management and othersystems in a way totally transparent forthe user", says Ioana Raicu, ManagementInformation Director at Bucharest CityHall, about the most ambitious single ITproject launched by a Romanian publicadministration. While this level of com-plexity on the problem side might notcome as a surprise for anyone familiarwith the operations of major municipali-ties around the world, the decision of thisparticular municipality to go ahead anddevelop a state-of-the-art informationsystem with such a daring goal, on thesolution side, could be somewhat surpris-ing for those familiar with the relativesluggishness of public administration inadopting cutting edge technology andpractices.

But if you take a closer look at thegeospatial solution market in Romania,you could conclude that such solutionsare quickly becoming standard and thatthis is one of the most demanding GISmarkets in the world. Bucharest City Hallis not the only customer expecting whatwas formerly known as GIS to get out ofits departmental and technological boxand merge into the mainstream manage-ment and workflow information systems[3]. When the Romanian national powergrid operator, Transelectrica, started amajor upgrade of its information systemsin 2002, the ultimate priority for thisgiant company was to become interna-tionally competitive, by massive costreductions, and to align its operationswith the European UCTE standards andrequirements.

All of which Transelectrica could notaccomplish without an effective manage-

ment of enterprise wide geospatial infor-mation along its entire life cycle,enabling hundreds of users to manage anetwork of 8800 km of power lines and76 power stations. The solution, currentlyin its rollout phase, is based on integratedgeospatial resources, power modeling,outage and work order management sys-tems and MIS [7].

Another exemple is represented byAPATERM [4]. APATERM provides utilityservices to Oradea, a city of approximate-ly 230,000 inhabitants on the westernborder of Romania. The utility's complexinfrastructure encompasses citywide

water, heating, sewer, and storm-waternetworks. The challenge of managingsuch an elaborate infrastructure, withalmost 1,800 kilometers of pipes, led company management to considerimplementing geospatial technology.After evaluating the available technolo-gies, APATERM contracted the develop-ment of a network maintenance systemwith Intergraph Computer Services (ICS) Romania Ltd., a Team GeoMedia Registered Solutions Provider.

In order to develop a geospatial solutionthat is fully capable of becoming thebackbone of an enterprisewide informa-

tion system, ICS Romania decided to com-bine GeoMedia with the customer's existing environment, which includedMicrosoft Windows, SQL Server, and several custom applications. The firstmajor step toward this goal was toredesign the main database to meet therequirements of the new functionality ofthe system. Professionals then deployedGeoMedia Professional and GeoMediaPublicWorks Manager for the creationand maintenance of geospatial data.

The new system began to look like asolution when core business processes innetwork maintenance were automatedwith the help of Web-based custom applications that were developed on topof GeoMedia WebMap. During the testingphase, APATERM management realizedthe full potential of spatially enabledinformation and decided to expand thissystem for use by the entire company.The inherent scalability of GeoMediaWebMap and Web-based applicationsmade this possible. The initial deploy-ment was finalized in late 2002. The newsystem now supports multiple majorfunctions, including network design andmodeling, real-time monitoring of criticalparameters, outage management, andpermit processing. Possibly the mostimportant gain for APATERM is the ability to generate management infor-mation, which is primarily a result of spatial analysis capabilities. Strategicdecisions, as well as routine work orders,are now based on spatially enabled information generated by this systemand displayed on management controlpanels that are powered by GeoMediaWebMap.

According to APATERM's technicaldirector, Constantin Tomulescu, "Both themanagement team and the staff havefully accepted this new system becauseof its ease of use. ICS Romania's expertshave successfully customized Intergraphproducts and integrated them into oursystem, responding to our needs and

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

ICS Romaniadecided tocombine GeoMedia with the customer's existing environment


improving our business processes."In 2003, project managers decided to

extend the system by gradually transfer-ring more of the department-centricexisting applications into the new integrated work environment. They willaccomplish this task by rewriting theapplications as Web-based applicationsthat are integrated with GeoMediaWebMap.

Besides the three showcase projectsalready mentioned, ICS Romania has hadthe opportunity to implement some oth-er similarly large and daring solutions:

The Romanian Railways Company hasstarted operation of IRIS (Integrated Rail-way Information System) in 2002. Thissystem is used nation wide (5000 users)and integrates GIS and ERP for railwayinfrastructure management.

CNLO, the largest Romanian coal miningcompany with a yearly output of 35 milliontons of coal, is currently deploying its newsystem for integrated management ofcadastral, topographical and geologicaldata with ERP.

The National Agency for MineralResources has benefited from a World

Bank financing project which translated

into a state-of-the-art information systemthat allows this agency to manage theRomanian Mining Cadastre and MineralTitles Registry.

CONCLUSIONS

Such high demands need a matchingoffer from local providers of geospatialsolutions. Selling GIS software is only thetip of the iceberg, since in projects of suchcomplexity and magnitude the mainadded value comes from the provider'sability to analyze and model the cus-tomer's daily activities, its workflows andbusiness processes, how they all interact,or to solve problems like integrating CRMand ERP with automated mapping andspatial databases in a single functionalsolution.

Most of the times, the customer'srequest is no more or less than to inte-grate data pertaining to many businessprocesses into a single database thatwould feed information to a variety ofautomated systems and applications, inorder to provide a geographical and rela-tional inventory for all infrastructureassets, maintaining geographic and sur-

vey maps for the entire network, manag-ing workflows, maintenance operationsand other projects and, of course, moni-toring costs.

Solving all these requirements calls fordeveloping a geospatial solution, asopposed to delivering mere GIS software.Recent projects have shown very clearlythat geospatial solutions play the role ofthe missing functional link between vari-ous enterprise information islands andthat geospatial information should belooked at as the foundation of an effec-tive management and decision informa-tion system. While effective, such solu-tions have also proved rather difficult todevelop.

It takes years of expertise in complexproject implementations to be able tosolve demands as the ones in the exam-ples above.

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

ANGELA IONITASenior Researcher, ResearchInstitute for Artificial Intelli-gence, Romanian Academy

[email protected]

1. Campbell, H. and Ian Masser, 1995, „GIS and Organizations”,London, UK; Bristol, PA: Taylor & Francis;2. Tai On Chan, Ian P. Williamson, 1999, „The different identitiesof GIS and GIS diffusion”, International Journal of GeographicalInformation Science, 13(3);3. Foca, M., (2004), in “How far would you go with your GIS”,Romanian IT&C Directory, Oct. 2004, pp. 31 4. Global Link, 2003, Intergraph Mapping and Geospatial Solu-tions, „Romania Water Utility improves services city wide”,International Newsletter, Issue 1 20035. Nicholas Jacquez, „From Business Data to Marketplace Intelli-gence TM” , The White Paper, available at: www.terraseer.com6. Keating, G.N., Rich, P.M., Witkowski, M.S, 2003, „Challenges forEnterprise GIS”, in URISA Journal, Vol. 15, No. 2, available at:http://www.urisa.org/Journal/Vol15 No2/Keating.pdf

7. Loghin, Cristina, 2004, „Transelectrica a pariat pe GIS”, in Mar-ket Watch IT7C, April 2004, pp.2-38. Rogers, E.M., 1983, „Diffusion of Innovation”, 3rd ed. New York:The Free Press.9. Rogers, E.M., 1993, „The diffusion of innovation model”, in Dif-fusion and Use of Geographic Information Technologies, I. Mass-er and H.J. Onsrud eds. Dordecht /Boston/London: Kluwer Acade-mic Publishers10. James L. Sipes , 2005, „Spatial Technologies: Software Strate-gy: Options for the Enterprise - Organizations increase efficiencyby sharing resources and applications” available at:http://gis.cadalyst. com/gis/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=14105511. Witkowski, M.S., P.M. Rich, and G.N. Keating. 2004. EnterpriseGIS design. New Mexico Geographic Information Council, FallMeeting. (November 20, 2003)

References

38

Census operation is a veryimportant event in the history

of a nation. The operation covers every bit ofland and property in rural and urban areas ofa country. In Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA),the Central Department of Statistics (CDS)conducts census operation every 10 years.The last census operation was conducted in(1992) . The preparation of the next census operation began in 2003 andexpected to be finished by the end of 2006. Census informationmust be shared by all divisions within the organization to sup-port mandated functions and also to supply other ministriesand organizations in KSA with this information. The key factors

of implementing an Enterprise GIS solution are cooperation,management, knowledge, funding and experience. This articledescribes the system developed for KSA census data distribu-tion.

GIS AND CENSUS DATA

When we look at major forces of the 21st century like populationgrowth, economic development and consumption of naturalresources, we see that all of them have a spatial component.Data produced by the census is a primary source of informationneeded for effective development, planning and monitoring ofpopulation, services distribution and socio-economics.

The census database contains a lot of attribute informationwhich can be linked to spatial data by spatial referencing. Relat-ing the spatial component along with non-spatial attributes ofthe existing organizational data enhances user's understandingand gives new insights into the patterns and relationships inthe data that would otherwise not be found, and to enhance the

Enterprise GIS


Solutions for census operation

The census database contains lot of attrib-ute data which can be linked to spatialdata by spatial referencing. The articletries to describe the system developed forcensus data distribution

AYMEN A. SOLYMAN | GIS Expert, GTZ, Germany


decision-making process. Taking intoconsideration that many potential usersof spatial information don't know aboutGIS technology, the development of anEnterprise GIS solution would serve twocrucial purposes. Firstly, it would allowthe users to operate the system withouthaving to know the underlying intrica-cies of GIS and RDBMS technology. Secondly, it would allow sharing of infor-mation and technical experiencebetween a wide range of users.

ENTERPRISE GIS Over the past few years, the terms Enter-prise GIS and Enterprise-wide GIS arebecoming more common in the GIS com-munity, in organizational strategic plansand requests for services. Enterprise GIS is not a method to provide automatedmap plotting capabilities to the entire organization. Enterprise GIS is thesum of a coordinated GIS effort and itsfederated systems working together to support and promote coordinated geo-spatial data development and accessacross jurisdictional and organizationalboundaries.

The vision and promise of EnterpriseGIS is its ability to be an essential or core technology that integrates informa-tion across the many "islands of computer information systems" thatexist in any organization. The criticalcapabilities associated with EnterpriseGIS include:

Integrating geographic data acrossdepartments and serves the entire organ-ization

Providing desktop access via LAN andWAN connections to anyone who needsaccess, i.e. Enterprise GIS fully supportsclient-server operability

Providing access to other information systems in the organization by using amap or application as the integrator of theorganization's information; and

Communicating with other entities outside of the enterprise itself.

SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE DESIGN

While designing any Enterprise GIS solu-tion to meet the client's requirements,the most important factors to be includedare: functional module, graphic userinterface, downloading time, system per-formance and the cost of the solution.

The system must be portable and

extendable to accommodate futurechanges in hardware, software and net-working. Keeping in view these factors,the solution KSA has developed is basedon two components: the server side andthe web client side, which runs in thebrowser. The server is a set of applica-tions that serve the requests made by a

client. It is divided into two sections: themap server which is responsible for creat-ing maps from the spatial database basedon client requests and sends them back tothe client, and the other section is thedata server which is responsible for man-aging tabular data at the server side andsending the information to the client. Theweb client is partitioned into two parts,the map console (map area, map tools,dynamic legend and the query items) andthe side information table.

At this solution, the client is a thin clientuser, i.e. the analysis procedures isprocessed on demand on the server side.Data transmitted to the web-client are instandard HTML format embedded withtypical PNG (Portable Network Graphics)-8bit image format (35K-45K) that can beviewed in any standard web browser. Theadvantage of this approach that there isno need to download any plug-ins on theclient side.

The performance of the system is meas-ured by the ability to respond to requestsfaster, and the reliability of the system.Typically, the response to a certain querymust not take longer than 25 seconds. Theoverall system performance is dependanton the combination of client, server andnetworking performance, not the individ-ual components, and is controlled by theweakest component within the totalsolution.

It would allowsharing ofinformationand technicalexperiencebetween awide range of users

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Fig. 1 System Design Architecture


In this phase of the project, one servermachine is used for the functionality ofthe web server, map server and data server, which are installed together. Inphase two of the project after the comple-tion of the census data project, it isplanned that the web server, applicationserver and data server will be on separatemachines.

The diagram below illustrates a generalview of the system design architecture.

DATABASE DESIGN

The database design is the foundation forbuilding any enterprise GIS solution. Theenterprise GIS database design must bethorough, well documented, permit mod-ifications and allow continual updates.Many enterprise GIS efforts suffer fromeither the complete lack of a databasedesign or one that is so rigid that it can-not grow. It must be noted that the data-base design is a factor that affects theperformance and download time of thesolution. The database design definesthese components.

Spatial database content, structure andformat.

SQL server attribute data content, struc

ture, format and constraints.

Relationships between spatial data andcensus data.

Relationships between attribute datatables in the existing RDBMS.

Updating processes for both spatial andcensus data.

Data dictionary for both spatial and cen-sus data.

The design of the database includesthree major elements.

Conceptual design, which is independentof hardware and software and could be alist of utilization goals.

Logical design, which is the specificationof the database vis-à-vis a particular soft-ware.

Physical design, which pertains to thehardware and software characteristicsand requires consideration of file struc-ture, memory, disk space, access andspeed. The database in the solution canbe classified into two categories - tabulardata and geospatial data.

Tabular Data(attribute data)

The database containing the KSA censusinformation is classified into four maincategories.

PPooppuullaattiioonn:: The database stores dataabout the population categorized intoSaudi, non-Saudi and total population in

each province. In each table in the popula-tion database, the data are classified intocategories based on the age range ofboth males and females.

EEdduuccaattiioonn:: The database stores dataabout the number of educated peopleaccording to the level of education ineach province.

SSoocciiaall:: The database stores data aboutthe marital status of Saudi, non-Saudi andtotal in each province.

SSeerrvviicceess:: The database stores data aboutthe different services available in eachprovince including information about agriculture, education (primary-intermedi-ate - secondary - high - others), health, administration, public and socialservices.

Geospatial DataThree initial data layers were determinednecessarily to build the foundation for

the census data solution.IInntteerrnnaattiioonnaall BBoouunnddaarriieess LLaayyeerr:: The poly-gon layer contains the internationalboundaries of KSA. The source of this lay-er is the General Directorate of MilitarySurvey.

PPrroovviinnccee BBoouunnddaarriieess LLaayyeerr:: The polygonlayer contains the boundaries ofprovinces in KSA. KSA consists of 13provinces and 118 governorates. Thesource of this layer is the CDS. The map-ping unit was produced based on the set-tlement GPS points.

GGrriiddss LLaayyeerr:: The polygon layer containsthe grids of 1:250,000 maps produced bythe Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Fig. 2 Census Indicators

The databasedesign is thefoundation forbuilding anyenterprise GISsolution


Resources-Aerial Survey Department.

The design specifications are docu-mented in a data dictionary that containsa description of each data layer, the datatypes used to model geographic features(point, line, polygon), tables structure,field definitions, coding schemes, andother information.

SYSTEM IM PLEM ENTATION

Based on the user needs assessment anddatabase contents, the census indicatorsare classified into nine categories.

Population (distribution, density) and eachsub-category is classified into Saudi, non-Saudi and total

Education status (Saudi, non Saudi andtotal)

Social status (Saudi, non Saudi, total)

Education services (primary, intermediate,secondary, high and others).

Health services

Agriculture services

Social services

Administrative services

Public services.

The results of any query can be visual-ized in a number of ways that enhancethe user's understanding and interpreta-tion of the data, some of which are:

Compare multiple attributes of a featureby depicting the attributes as elements ofbar or pie chart;

Compare one feature to another by therelative size of each feature's chart; and

Shade each category in a graded

sequence of a user-defined colour ramp.

As shown in Figure 2, the user canchoose a specific category such as the dis-tribution of population of Saudi for a spe-cific age range. Figure 2 shows:

A thematic map classified into five equalcategories according to the values of thequery item (1);

A dynamic legend at the right side of themap console indicating the color and thevalue of each category (2);

A dynamic bar chart showing the percent-age of values to the total in each province(3);

A table containing the values of theselected query item in each province (4);and

A table containing the provinces with maxvalue, min value, mean value and the totalvalue (5).

For statistical operations, the user can choose any two items from the population data to compare by relatingthe relative size of each feature's chart asshown in Figure 3. For example, the usercan choose to compare the number ofmale of Saudi (query item1) to the totalnumber of population (query item2). Figure 3 shows:

A chart map displaying a relative bar or pie chart of query item1 to query item2 in each province (the user canchoose to display the results as pie or barchart); and

A table containing the values of queryitem1, query item2 and percentage ofquery item1 to query item2 in eachprovince.

The solution allows users to print themap results in the standard template ofthe organization. Also the map can beexported as image to be used in otherapplications.

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Fig. 3 Statistical Operations

Aymen A. Solyman GIS Expert, GTZ, [email protected]

The database stores data about the population categorized into Saudi, non-Saudi and total population in each province

42

organizations spend thousands ofdollars in the collection and com-

pilation of spatial data. To reduce overallcosts, effective data sharing among theorganizations is widely recognized as a strat-egy - one with the side effect of enhancingorganization's operational efficiency, effec-tiveness, and decision-making ability. This philosophy underlies the new paradigm that is rapidly tak-ing shape with the growing adoption of GIS technology by largeorganizations. Though it goes under different names, by far thebest suited is Enterprise GIS (E-GIS). The key concept underlyingEnterprise GIS systems is data sharing, unlike in traditional sys-tems where the views varied from reluctance to almost a taboo.

Emergence of such systems reflects a major shift in manage-ment perspective regarding data related issues like sharing,ownership, custodianship, etc. In an enterprise environment,data plays an important role. An introduction to configurationand implementation of spatial databases is presented in thisarticle. Since the focus is more on practical aspects rather than atheoretical treatment, the discussion is based on ArcSDE soft-ware, part of the ESRI ArcGIS family of software products, wide-ly used for implementing enterprise spatial databases.

ENTERPRISE GIS SYSTEMS

An Enterprise GIS system in reality is an aggregate of three sub-systems viz., mapping, spatial analysis, and data management.E-GIS systems differ in scope and services from that of a tradi-tional one. Under traditional environments system downtime,or its poor performance, is not critical to the enterprise's busi-ness. But, GIS Systems at the enterprise level support its corebusiness and any downtime or performance issues can be criti-cal affecting the enterprise's business.

GIS Systems at the enterprise level support core business and any downtime or performanceissues that can be critical, affecting the enterprise’s business. Consequently, GIS Managersneed to ensure optimum system functionality at all times and adopt a proactive approachin managing enterprise spatial databases

A. DEVA KUMAR VARMA| Doha, Qatar

Enterprise GIS


ENTERPRISEGeodatabase Implementation


ENTERPRISE SPATIAL DATABASE

Enterprise spatial databases tend to becentralized and grow rapidly. Spatialdatabase environments of the 1990s with10 - 20 GB vector data have now grown toover 100GB, while the raster have grownfrom 100-200 GB to several terabytes inthe same period. To provide data to manyhundreds of users at performance levelsreasonable enough to do their business atall times is a potential challenge even to askilled GIS professional. It is here theimportance of configuring and managingan enterprise GIS database assumes sig-nificance.

ENTERPRISE GEODATABASE

For delivering successful E-GIS databasesolutions one of the preferred candidatesaround the world is ArcSDE software.Though many have heard of ArcSDE notall might have had the opportunity to useit, or even less, utilize to implementationan Enterprise-GIS database.

ArcSDE is an application server thatfacilitates the storage and managementof spatial data (raster, vector, and survey)in a DBMS. Spatial data managed by ArcS-DE in a DBMS for an enterprise is calledan Enterprise Geodatabase. A Geodata-base - short for geographic database -simply put, is a series of standard DBMStables, indexes, etc., which works in con-cert with higher-level logic resident inthe application tier to support geographicanalysis and display functions. At themoment, ArcSDE supports four commer-cial databases IBM DB2, Informix,Microsoft SQL Server , and Oracle .

ArcSDE brokers all types of databasetransactions for GIS clients. It does the jobso nicely that GIS happily ticks awayoblivious of DBMS flavours that host thespatial data. This single feature enabledGIS to pull down barriers to spatial data-base integration and leverage the exist-ing IT infrastructure. E-GDB is preferredby enterprises due to its ability to inte-grate and leverage their IT infrastructure.

E-GDB may sound prohibitively expen-sive to some, in terms of hiring and main-taining staff with expertise in ArcSDE /DBMS.

In such cases, there is a simple solution,use the free ESRI software "ArcSDE forCoverages". It is easy to implement andmakes your transition to ArcSDE as pain-less as possible. Space constraints limitthis discussion to ArcSDE, interestedreaders may refer ESRI documentation.

ARCSDE STORAGE MODEL

Before proceeding further it is prudent tohave some basic understanding of howArcSDE stores spatial data in the geodata-base (GDB).

Storage Formats

ArcSDE offers three types of spatial stor-age formats, (refer to table-1). ArcSDE'sdefault data storage format, and thefocus of this introductory treatise, is com-pressed binary with LONG RAW columntype.

Irrespective of the logic at the applica-tion level storage is implemented by theunderlying DBMS. It means that the datais stored ultimately as the rows andcolumns of table(s). ArcSDE maps the log-ical elements of a feature class in theDBMS as follows.

Features as Rows

Attributes as Columns

Feature class as Tables

Users view a feature class as a singleentity, or more precisely, as a single table.But in the Geodatabase, ArcSDE stores itas half a dozen separate tables.

ARCSDE DATA DICTIONARY

ArcSDE creates and maintains two sets oftables. One set of tables, called Geodata-base System Table, is created on behalf ofusers to store their data. Another set,called ArcSDE System Table, is created forits exclusive use and contains informa-

Many haveheard of ArcSDE, not all mighthave had theopportunity to use it

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Spatial Storage Type Column Data Type

Compressed Binary as LONG RAW or as Binary Large Object (BLOB)

Spatial Geometry SDO_GEOMETRY

OGC well known binary LONG RAW

TTaabbllee 11:: ArcSDE Spatial Storage types

Table Name Meta-data held

STATES Meta-data on the state of versions

STATE_LINEAGES Meta-data on versions' state lineages

MVTABLES_MODIFIED Meta-data on versions' state and table Ids modified

VERSIONS Meta-data on versions

TTaabbllee 22:: ArcSDE System tables maintaining information on versioned state tree


tion / metadata about users' tables. Thesetwo sets of tables together form the ArcS-DE data dictionary. Typically, one seldomneeds to know about ArcSDE SystemTables except for the four tables in Table -2, particularly if the Geodatabase is ver-sion enabled - which is the norm not anexception for an E-GDB.

These tables are important as theymaintain transaction information of theversioned Geodatabase's state tree andare highly active in an OLTP applicationsenvironment.

In an active Geodatabase theSTATE_LINEAGES table can grow rapidlywith rows reaching as many as a millionwhile the VERSIONS table grows the leastwith rows as few as a 100.

Geodatabase System Table consists ofseveral tables created by ArcSDE to holdits users' data. Major ones are listed inTable-3. No part of the data dictionary

should be changed directly using SQLbecause they are not designed for suchoperations. Any attempt to do so mightcorrupt the Geodatabase and result inirreparable damage.

IM PLEM ENTING AN E-GDBE-GDB implementation is nothing butArcSDE installation and configuration.Though installation is straightforwardconfiguring ArcSDE and its companionDBMS pose the real challenge, demand-ing close attention and expertise. In thissection, major aspects of ArcSDE installa-tion are discussed - intending it to be agood practical guide for beginners in E-GDB implementations.

Several steps are involved in the imple-mentation of E-GDB. Even before think-ing of the different steps involved, theDBMS to work with ArcSDE must be iden-tified. By far one of the RDBMSs widelyused with ArcSDE in an enterprise envi-ronment is Oracle.

Hence, in our E-GDB implementationthe chosen DBMS is Oracle and it is pre-sumed that an ArcSDE compatible Oracledatabase is already up and running. Theimportant steps in the implementation ofan E-GDB are:

Configure Oracle for GIS

The aim of the whole exercise is toachieve optimum performance. Perfor-mance is key to the success or failure of E-GDB and, it depends on how well Oracle

is configured and tuned for ArcSDE.Inherently, ArcSDE is both CPU and diskintensive. The latter poses a serious chal-lenge and should be adequatelyaddressed to achieve goal of every E-GDBviz., to provide data access at reasonableperformance. CPU is not considered as itfalls outside the purview of this article.

Reducing disk contention

Balancing disk I/O across file systems bypositioning "hot" (frequently accessed,)with "cold" (least accessed) will minimizedisk contention. Sometimes it is difficultto judge the hot and cold files beforehandbut after the database has been in use forsome time they can be identified fromthe established usage patterns. The fol-lowing table (Table-4) provides guide-lines on reducing I/O contention.

Oracle Parameters

For ArcSDE, ESRI recommends locallymanaged tablespaces and a data blocksize of 16 KB. Since tablespaces are locallymanaged each datafile should be allotted1MB extra space for management over-head. ESRI do not recommend automaticsegment space management because ofthe potential impact it has on a spatialquery when fetching each Oracle blockbut recommends

SHARED_POOL_SIZE at least 128MB /200MB for highly active Geodatabases

START_TRANSFORMATION_ENABLEDshould be FALSE

OPTIMIZER_MODE set to CHOOSE

To disable parallel execution on ArcSDEschema

Design database file position

Database file positioning is crucial to per-formance and demands skill in its plan-ning and design. Once designed, ArcSDEcan be easily instructed how and inwhich database files to create its tablesand indexes.

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

Table Name Data stored

Business table Attributes

Feature table Geometry

Spatial index Grid tiles and Envelopes (spatial extents)

Network Connectivity and flow direction

Topology Error Topology errors

Logfile Logfile metadata

Versions Changes made to versioned users business table

Raster Store images

Geocoding index Locator related indexes.

TTaabbllee 33:: Major Geodatabase System tables

ESRI does not recommendautomatic segment space management


DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS

Standard GIS storage recommendationsfavor keeping index and log files separatefrom vector and tabular business tables.For performance reasons position thebusiness, feature, and spatial index tablesseparately. Positioning indexes andtables separately into different table-spaces achieves no performance gainsbut is done for management reasons.Position tablespace datafiles based on itsusage pattern. For multi-versioned highlyactive editing Geodatabase, databasefiles of VERSIONS tablespace may be sep-arated and splattered across availabledisks to avoid I/O contention. Positioningof SIT is unimportant. But its index, S<reg-istration ID>_IX1 is a covering index andOracle always reads it sparing SIT. Hence,a moderate to low I/O disk is preferred forthis index. Oracle Optimal Configurationsuggested by ESRI is as follows:

DISK 0 - Oracle/App Software DISK 0

DISK 1 - SYSTEM, Control File 1

DISK 2 - RBS, TEMP, Control File 2

DISK 3 - REDO 1,2,3, Export Files

DISK4 - Feature Data tables

DISK5 - Spatial Index Data tables

DISK6 - Attribute Data / Business tables

DISK7 - Oracle Indexes

Create database files

The best way to accomplish this task is touse the simple and interactive GUI tool ofStorage Manager provided by OracleEnterprise Manager. Use it to create data-base files as per the developed design.

CREATE ORACLE SDE USER

User SDE is the ArcSDE administrator andits table space is used to store ArcSDE Sys-tem tables. Remember, SDE user space isexclusively for storing ArcSDE Systemtables and other users should not even

attempt to access, let alone store, data-base objects in this space.

SDE user has to be set up with specialdatabase privileges and separate tablespaces, if design criteria so demands. Toease the initial set up process ESRI hasprovided the optional Oracle packagecalled sdesys_util located under %SDE-HOME%\tools\oracle.

The package can automate many of theinitial tasks required in the creation ofSDE user as well as in the installation ofArcSDE. For installing this package log inas Oracle SYS user and then run the fol-lowing commands

SSQQLL>> @@ssddeessyyss__uuttiill..ssppss (user command)Package created (Oracle response)

SSQQLL>> @@ssddeessyyss__uuttiill..ssppbb (user command)Package body created (Oracle response)

Once the package is installed one mayutilize the stored procedures in the pack-age to automate the initial set up process-es. Start by creating the SDE user utilizingthe procedure SDESYS.UTIL_CREATE_SDE.

SQL> EXEC SDESYS_UTIL.CRE-ATE_SDE_USER;The advantage of creating SDE user inthis fashion is the assurance of a properset up because of the compliance checksthe script does on the database beforeopening the administrative account. Thescript also has the option to specify thetablespace locations. Once SDE user is cre-ated the required privileges can be grant-

ed, again, using the stored procedureGRANT_SDE_ INSTALL_PRIV.

SQL> exec sdesys_util.grant_sde_

install_privs;

ArcSDE utilizes the stored procedures inOracle's built-in packages DBMS_PIPE andDBMS_LOCK, therefore execute privilegeon these packages should be granted. Thestored procedure sdesys_util handles itefficiently. GDB set up fails if the privi-lege is NOT granted.

SQL> exec sdesys_util.grant_

pipes_locks;

ArcSDE users (for client log-ins) too can becreated and managed using a similarpackage shipped by ESRI. The package isuser_util and is installed as described forsdesys_util. The stored procedure CRE-ATE_USER_AND_LOGFILES within thispackage creates an Oracle user with the

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

File Type Database Activity Move file to Disk with

Redo log Frequent edits Relatively low I/O

Redo log Little or no edits Moderate I/O

Undo log files Frequent edits Low I/O but separate from redo log files

System data Moderate I/O

Temporary Tablespace High I/O.

TTaabbllee 44:: Suggested design to reduce disk I/O contention

SDE user has to be set up withspecial databaseprivileges

46 G I S @ D E V E L O P M E N T - M I D D L E E A S T

required privileges. The usage of theseprocedures is customisable.

Install ArcSDE

Installing ArcSDE from the CD is astraightforward process well document-ed in the installation manual. A postinstallation phase that follows builds theactual GDB.

Build E-GDB

The responsibility of building the E-GDBis shared between the two modules sde-setupora* (where * is your Oracle version)and DBTUNE.SDE located respectivelyunder $SDEHOME/bin (on Windows%SDEHOME%\bin) and $SDEHOME/etc(on Windows %SDEHOME%\etc)

Sdesetupora* builds GDB by taking itscue from DBTUNE.SDE. This way the E-GDB implementation can be fully con-trolled by configuring parameters inDBTUNE.SDE. The following sequence isestablished in building an E-GDB

Configure DBTUNE.SDE

Execute sdesetupora*

Configure DBTUNE.SDE

DBTUNE (DBTUNE.SDE) may seem over-whelming to the novice but is really sim-ple once its structure is understood. Itconsists of a number of lines each staringwith a parameter but when prefixed by"##" it is called a keyword. Keywords areparameter groups terminating with theword "END". ArcSDE treats all parametersunder a keyword as a logical unit and

keywords provide a convenient way forusers to inform ArcSDE on how/where tolocate several of its tables and indexes.

DBTUNE parameters are customized todefine storage configurations of tables,indexes, and complex objects ArcSDE cre-ates in the GDB. For the sake of simplicity,our E-GDB is assumed to have no com-plex objects. Customizing DBTUNEmeans removing "#" (NOT "##") andreplacing the word "<tablespace name>"in each parameter with the actual namein the database where you wish to storethat ArcSDE table or index denoted by theparticular parameter. In the followingexample, "<tablespace name>" for param-eter B_STORAGE is replaced byDFLT_BUSINESS.

B_STORAGE "PCTFREE 10 PCTUSED 90INITRANS 4 TABLESPACE DFLT_BUSINESSSTORAGE (FREELISTS 4 MINEXTENTS 1PCTINCREASE 0)"

For our kind of GDB, the parametersunder keywords DEFAULTS, LOGFILE_DEFAULTS, and DATA_DICTIONARY aloneneed be edited. Keyword DEFAULTS infact defines ArcSDE's default configura-tion. Description and parameter namesunder DEFAULTS and LOGFILE_DEFAULTSare given below while those underDATA_DICTIONARY are explained intable 2. The list being long, wild cards areused to denote related objects

B_* Business table related

F_* Feature table related

S_* Spatial Index related

A_* Versions related - meta-data on added features

D_* Versions related - met-data on deleted features

RAS_* Raster related tables /indexes

BND_* Raster related tables /indexes

AUX_* Raster related tables /indexes

BLK_* Raster related tables /indexes

LF_* Log file related tables /indexes

LD_* Log file data related tables /indexes

For example, parameters B_STORAGE,B_INDEX_ROWID, B_INDEX_SHAPE, andB_INDEX_USER are all denoted by B_*.

You are free to have your own set upsother than the default. To avoid potentialsyntax errors just copy and paste the key-word DEFAULTS (lines from DEFAULTS toEND both inclusive) and edit the keywordand the tablespace names as appropriate.

LOGFILE_DEFAULTS holds the parame-ter group for users who do not have akeyword of their own. To earmark GDBspace for individual users copy and pastekeyword LOGFILE_DEFAULTS and

1. edit tablespace names

2. replace DEFAULT in keyword with theusername.

For example, if username is "Varma"then the keyword would be LOGFILE_VARMA. Starting from ArcSDE 9 usershave more flexibility in customizing logfiles and its associated parameters.

Execute sdesetupora*

Sdesetupora* physically implements theGDB by reading the DBTUNE file. At theend of its execution it creates a DBTUNEtable and populates it from DBTUNE file.

All subsequent ArcSDE commands referthis table before creating any new tablesor indexes. On successful execution ofsdesetupora* it establishes the GDB asenvisaged in its design.

The successful implementation of GDBautomatically implies the completion ofour E-GDB building process andannounces the system’s readiness to golive and accept client requests to servethe enterprise.

M A R C H - A P R I L 2 0 0 6

ArcSDE treatsall parametersunder a keyword as alogical unit

A. Deva Kumar VarmaGIS Engineers Society, Doha, Qatar

[email protected]

Editorial GuidelinesFFoorr pprroossppeeccttiivvee ccoonnttrriibbuuttiioonnss iinn tthhee ffoorrmm ooff aarrttiicclleess aanndd rreesseeaarrcchhppaappeerrss ttoo GGIISS DDEEVVEELLOOPPMMEENNTT MMIIDDDDLLEE EEAASSTT pplleeaassee rreeaadd tthhrroouugghh tthheeffoolllloowwiinngg eeddiittoorriiaall gguuiiddeelliinneess::

■ Any contribution to us for consideration of publicationshould be original work, should not be published anywhereelse or not be under consideration for future publicationanywhere else, and should have due acknowledgements andreferences, incase the content has references.

■ Once published, the content becomes a copyright of GISDevelopment and thereby any reproduction, re-print orusage of the content would require the author to take duepermission from GIS Development.

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GIS Development Middle East Calendar for Year 2006

Issue Application Technology

January-February Spatial Data Infrastrucutre High Resolution Imaging

March-April e-Governance Enterprise GIS

May-June Infrastructure+Urban Planning Photogrammetry/Lidar

July-August Location Based Services Navigation & Positioning Technology

September-October GIS & Human Resource Development Geodatabase

November-DecemberNatural Resource Management /Land

AdministrationWeb GIS

SSeemmiinnaarr oonn SSppaattiiaall DDaattaa IInnffrraassttrruuccttuurree

48

To create awareness among thepeople a seminar on spatial data

infrastructure was organised for the firsttime in the UAE on 12 February 2006. Thespeakers at the seminar focussed on theneed to establish a national data inventoryand to develop mechanisms for data avail-ablility and their accessibility. The AbuDhabi seminar was attended by high officialsfrom the government of Abu Dhabi and fromother Emirates of the UAE. The seminar was organized by Military Survey Department,UAE; Abu Dhabi Spatial Data Management Establishment Com-mittee, and GIS Development was the co-organiser. The Semi-nar was chaired by Brig. Khalifa Al Romaithi, the Director of Mil-

itary Survey Department and the Chairman, SDI. The welcomeaddress to the distiguished gathering was delivered by Lt. Col.Saleh Al Hubail, Head of Aerial Survey, Military Survey Depart-ment. Lt. Col. Hubail is also the member of Spatial Data Infra-structure Committee.

The seminar was addressed by a number of various distin-guished International speakers who came down from differentparts of the globe to share their experiences in developing of aSpatial Data Infrastructure for a nation.

Mr. Pak Chargarlamudi, Manager Geomatics, NaturalResources Canada; Dr. Steve Blake, Executive Director, Aus-tralian and New Zealand Land Information Council; Major Gen-eral Gopal Rao, Surveyor General of India; Dr. Abdul Kadir,Deputy Director-General of Survey and Mapping, Malaysia; Mr.Robert Samborski, Executive Director, GITA and Mr. Ravi Gupta,Editor-in-Chief, GIS Development.

Brigadier Khalifa Al Romaithi highlighted the various issuespertaining to the implementation of SDI in Abu Dhabi. He spokeabout the legislations required, policies and existing laws forGeo-Information to implement SDI in the UAE. Sharing his

Conference Report


experiences Mr. Pak Chargarlamudi highlighted the framework structurerequired for development of SDI and alsopresented the Canadian perspective andstrategies.

Dr. Steve Blake presented a report onthe long established SDI structure in Aus-tralia and New Zealand and focused on

the strategic planthat is being requiredto maintain develop-ing spatial policy andstrategy for govern-ments. Dr. AbdulKadir gave an insightto the MalaysianGeospatial DataInfrastructure (MyG-DI) and the initiativesundertaken by JUPEMwith its focus inmeeting the chal-lenges of the geo-information commu-nity.

While exchanginghis views, Major Gen-eral Gopal Rao show-cased the overarch-ing framework ofNational Spatial DataInfrastructure (NSDI)for the existing agen-cies. NSDI of Indiaenvisions its activepromotional role forthe use of spatial

data at different levels of the governmentand other stakeholders of NSDI. Mr.Robert Samborski presented how todevelop and document a formal method-ology in the preparation of a businesscase, including Return on Investment inGeospatial Information Technology. Mr.Ravi Gupta summarized the experiences

and the development of National SpatialData Infrastructure in emerging anddeveloping countries. He emphasized, theend user is going to be the gainer withthe new offerings provided by theupcoming spatial data providers.

The seminar was concluded with anopen house Panel Discussion headed byBrig. Khalifa Al Romaithi, which high-lighted many issues and recommenda-tions to be taken care of for such an initia-tive to implement Spatial Data Infra-structure in a nation. Many of the issueswere documented for further review anddiscussion.

The seminarfocussed onthe need toestablish anational datainventory andto developmechanismsfor data availablility

50

March 2006

26 - 29 MARCH MMaapp MMiiddddllee EEaasstt 22000066Dubai World Trade Centre, Dubai, [email protected]

http://www.mapmiddleeast.org

April 2006

5 - 7 APRIL GGIISS RReesseeaarrcchh UUKK 22000066University of Nottingham, United Kingdom http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/

geography/gisruk

20-22 APRIL 99tthh AAGGIILLEE IInntteerrnnaattiioonnaall CCoonnffeerreennccee oonn GGeeooggrraapphhiiccIInnffoorrmmaattiioonn SScciieenncceeVisegrád, [email protected]

http://www.agile2006.hu

25 - 26 APRIL IInntteerrnnaattiioonnaall LLIIDDAARR MMaappppiinnggFFoorruumm CCoonnffeerreennccee Astor Crowne Plaza New Orleans , USA http://www.lidarmap.org/

conference.html

26 - 29 APRIL GGIITTAA AAnnnnuuaall CCoonnffeerreennccee Tampa Convention Center, Tampa, USA [email protected]

http://www.gita.org/events/

annual/29

30 APRIL - 4 MAY AASSPPRRSS AAnnnnuuaall CCoonnffeerreennccee Reno, Nevada, USA http://www.asprs.org/asprs/

meetings/calendar.html

May 2006

1 - 2 MAY EESSRRII BBuussiinneessss GGeeooIInnffoo SSuummmmiitt Boston, [email protected]

http://www.esri.com/geoinfo

3 - 4 MAY MMaapp MMaallaayyssiiaa 22000066Palace of the Golden Horses,Jalan Kuda Emas, The MINES Resort City,Kuala Lumpur, [email protected]

http://www.mapmalaysia.org

14 - 17 MAY CCIIMM CCoonnffeerreennccee aanndd EExxhhiibbiittiioonn Vancouver Conference andExhibition Centre, Montreal, Quebec, Canadahttp://www.cim.org

7 - 12 MAY 22000066 IInntteerrnnaattiioonnaall CCoonnggrreessss ooff IImmaaggiinngg SScciieennccee ((IICCIISS’’0066))New York, USA [email protected]

http://www.imaging.org

June 2006

7-9 JUNE LLooccaattiioonn 22000066Hotel Grand AshokBangalore, Indiahttp://www.location.net.in

[email protected]

12 - 15 JUNE IInntteerrggrraapphh 22000066 Disney Coronado Resort,Orlando, USAhttp://www.intergraph2006.com

July 2006

4 - 5 JULY OOBBIIAA 22000066Salzburg, Austriahttp://www.agit.at/obia

5-7 JULY 1100tthh IInntteerrnnaattiioonnaall CCoonnffeerreennccee oonn IInnffoorrmmaattiioonnVViissuuaalliissaattiioonn ((IIVV0066)) London, [email protected]

http://www.graphicslink.co.uk/IV06

10-12 JULY 1122tthh IInntteerrnnaattiioonnaall SSyymmppoossiiuumm oonn SSppaattiiaall DDaattaa HHaannddlliinngg Vienna, [email protected]

http://www.agile-secretariat.org

13 - 17 JULY CCOOAASSTT -- GGIISS 006677tthh IInntteerrnnaattiioonnaall SSyymmppoossiiuumm oonn GGIISS aanndd CCoommppuutteerr CCaarrttooggrraapphhyy ffoorrCCooaassttaall ZZoonnee MMaannaaggeemmeenntt.. WWoolllloonnggoonngg aanndd SSyyddnneeyy Australiahttp://www.uow.edu.au/science/eesc

/conferences/coastgis06

31 JULY - 4 AUGUST IIEEEEEE//IIGGAARRSSSS 22000066 Denver, USA http://www.igarss06.org

August 2006

29 AUG. - 1 SEPT. MMaapp AAssiiaa 22000066Queen Sirikit National Convention CenterBangkok, Thailand [email protected]

http://www.mapasia.org

September 2006

14 - 22 SEPTEMBER 99tthh IInntteerrnnaattiioonnaall SSyymmppoossiiuumm oonn HHiigghh MMoouunnttaaiinn RReemmoottee SSeennssiinnggCCaarrttooggrraapphhyy Graz, [email protected]

http://www.kfunigraz.ac.at/geowww

/hmrsc/hmrsc_9

October 2006

8 - 13 OCTOBER FFIIGG WWoorrkkiinngg WWeeeekk 22000066 aanndd XXXXIIIIII GGeenneerraall AAsssseemmbbllyy Munich, Germany http://www.fig2006.de

9-13 OCTOBER AACCRRSS22000066Ulaanbaatar, [email protected]

http://www.acrs2006.ub.mn

20 - 21 OCTOBER GGeeooiinnffoorrmmaattiiccss 22000066Wuhan, Chinahttp://www.Imars.whu.edu.cn/

geoinformatics2006

November 2006

3 - 11 NOVEMBER GGSSDDII--99 Santiago, [email protected]

http://www.igm.cl/gsdi9

20 - 24 NOVEMBER 1133tthh AAuussttrraallaassiiaann RReemmootteeSSeennssiinngg && PPhhoottooggrraammmmeettrryyCCoonnffeerreennccee 22000066 Canberra, [email protected]

http://www.arspc.org

Events


DUBAIAirport Free Zone Area, P. O. Box No: 54664, Dubai, UAE Tel + 971-4-2045350,51 Fax + 971-4-2045352Hand Phone + 971-50-6400768 (Swati Grover)Email [email protected]

INDIAG-4, Sector-39, Noida-201 301, INDIATel + 91-120-2502180 to 87, Fax + 91-120-2500811Hand Phone + 91-9871725868 (Neeraj Budhari)Email [email protected]

C O U R S E S

Diploma in Geo- Informatics

Corporate Programme

Two months full time programme covering basics of GIS, GPS and Remote Sensing. The programme provides extensive Hands-on training on AutoCAD Map, MapInfo, ArcGIS, ERDAS Imagine and GPS based Mobile Mapping.

Short-term programmes on different spatial technologies for professionals and decision makers.

Industry Specific

Software Specific

Training programme on domain specific applications of Geo-informatics like, Agriculture, Health, Power, Transportation, Urban Planning etc

Short-term and long-term programmes on state of the art software technologies that keeps the users in pace with the rapid development in the geo-informatics industry.

Map Malaysia 20063 - 4 May, Kuala Lumpurwww.mapmalaysia.org

Map Asia 200629 August - 1 September, Bangkok

www.mapasia.org

Map Middle East 200626-29 March, Dubai

www.mapmiddleeast.org

MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP 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MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULEMAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE I MAP INDIA I MAP MIDDLE EAST I MAP ASIA I GRATICULE

Indi

a

Thai

land

UA

EMal

aysi

a

CATI N

2006L O

2nd INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON POSITIONING, N AV I G AT I O N A N D L O C AT I O N A L I N T E L L I G E N C E

7-9 June, Bangalorewww.location.net.in

Documents

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