Optimal Constrained Wireless Emergency Network Antennae Placement

With increasing number of mobile devices, newly introduced smart devices, and the Internet of things (IoT) sensors, the current microwave frequency spectrum is getting rapidly congested. The obvious solution to this frequency spectrum congestion is to use millimeter wave spectrum ranging from 6 GHz to 300 GHz. With the use of millimeter waves, we can enjoy very high communication speeds and very low latency. But, this technology also introduces some challenges that we hardly faced before. The most important one among these challenges is the Line of Sight (LOS) requirement. In the emergent concept of smart cities, the wireless emergency network is set to use millimeter waves. We have worked on the problem of efficiently finding a line of sight for such wireless emergency network antennae in minimal time. We devised two algorithms, Sequential Line of Sight (SLOS) and Tiled Line of Sight (TLOS), both perform better than traditional algorithms in terms of execution time. The tiled line of sight algorithm reduces the time required for a single line of sight query from 200 ms for traditional algorithms to mere 1.7 ms on average

Internet of things

Manual of Digital Earth / Editors: Huadong Guo, Michael F. Goodchild, Alessandro Annoni .- Springer, 2020 .- ISBN: 978-981-32-9915-3Digital Earth was born with the aim of replicating the real world within the digital world. Many efforts have been made to observe and sense the Earth, both from space (remote sensing) and by using in situ sensors. Focusing on the latter, advances in Digital Earth have established vital bridges to exploit these sensors and their networks by taking location as a key element. The current era of connectivity envisions that everything is connected to everything. The concept of the Internet of Things(IoT)emergedasaholisticproposaltoenableanecosystemofvaried,heterogeneous networked objects and devices to speak to and interact with each other. To make the IoT ecosystem a reality, it is necessary to understand the electronic components, communication protocols, real-time analysis techniques, and the location of the objects and devices. The IoT ecosystem and the Digital Earth (DE) jointly form interrelated infrastructures for addressing today’s pressing issues and complex challenges. In this chapter, we explore the synergies and frictions in establishing an efficient and permanent collaboration between the two infrastructures, in order to adequately address multidisciplinary and increasingly complex real-world problems. Although there are still some pending issues, the identified synergies generate optimism for a true collaboration between the Internet of Things and the Digital Earth

Geospatial information infrastructures

Manual of Digital Earth / Editors: Huadong Guo, Michael F. Goodchild, Alessandro Annoni .- Springer, 2020 .- ISBN: 978-981-32-9915-3Geospatial information infrastructures (GIIs) provide the technological, semantic,organizationalandlegalstructurethatallowforthediscovery,sharing,and use of geospatial information (GI). In this chapter, we introduce the overall concept and surrounding notions such as geographic information systems (GIS) and spatial datainfrastructures(SDI).WeoutlinethehistoryofGIIsintermsoftheorganizational andtechnologicaldevelopmentsaswellasthecurrentstate-of-art,andreflectonsome of the central challenges and possible future trajectories. We focus on the tension betweenincreasedneedsforstandardizationandtheever-acceleratingtechnological changes. We conclude that GIIs evolved as a strong underpinning contribution to implementation of the Digital Earth vision. In the future, these infrastructures are challengedtobecomeflexibleandrobustenoughtoabsorbandembracetechnological transformationsandtheaccompanyingsocietalandorganizationalimplications.With this contribution, we present the reader a comprehensive overview of the field and a solid basis for reflections about future developments

The Map As An Object of Service Design

The rapid development of ICT has led to the transformation of maps from printed paper to virtual digital publishing and three-dimensional mapping. This allows speculation to be replaced with certainty and accuracy in maps. This also allows maps to function as participatory platforms with the capacity to collect, create, store and process data through people’s interaction with other individuals, the environment and cities. This has significantly changed the way that key stakeholders interact with each other through mapping and raised fundamental ontological and epistemological questions about the nature of maps and mapping. This paper reviews literature in critical cartography and map examples to see how recent technological developments relate to mapmaking. The current practice and thinking in cartography has been challenged, as cartography is traditionally considered the core mapmaking profession. When maps start to function as participatory platforms and become democratized, cartography seems to become obsolete. In light of this, we suggest that maps become the objects of service design. In this role, service designers consider maps as services and take a user-centred approach to facilitate the engagement of key stakeholders in complex systems. The key contribution of this paper lies in the fact that it initiates a discussion of the potential of service design in developing digital platforms, smart cities and public services through mapping. It suggests that future studies could contextualize the involvement of service design in this new territory and investigates its implications and limitations

Introducing innovative technologies in higher education: An experience in using geographic information systems for the teaching‐learning process

In today's world, new technologies are being used for the teaching‐learning process in the classroom. Their use to support learning can provide significant advantages for the teaching‐learning process and have potential benefits for students, as many of these technologies are a part of the work life of many current professions. The aim of this study is to analyse the use of innovative technologies for engineering and science education after examining the data obtained from students in their learning process and experiences. The study has been focused on computational geographic information systems, which allow access to and management of large volumes of information and data, and on the assessment of this tool as a basis for a suitable methodology to enhance the teaching‐learning process, taking into account the great social impact of big data. The results allow identifying the main advantages, opportunities, and drawbacks of using these technological tools for educational purposes. Finally, a set of initiatives has been proposed to complement the teaching activity and to improve user experience in the educational field.This study was supported by the Spanish Research Agency and the European Regional Development Fund under project CloudDriver4Industry TIN2017‐89266‐R

European Standards for Vocational Training in Urban Regeneration

SATURN is the Leonardo da Vinci funded project developed by a partnership of Edinburgh World Heritage, Warsaw School of Economics, CEIT Alanova and IURS (Institut pro udržitený rozvoj sídel o.s.). The project aims to establish a framework for vocational studies in urban regeneration. One of the key questions this project raises is: what range of skills and knowledge professionals should have to enable them to define issues accurately and find the most suitable solutions for urban regeneration? The SATURN project provides a set of manuals and recommendations for students, learners, and professionals in the field of urban regeneration. The real value of SATURN comes from its practical dimension and input from practitioners actively involved in city planning and the processes of urban regeneration

Building Inclusive Smart Sustainable Cities through Virtual Environment

During the last century Urban Population of India has increased from 27 million to 270 million (2001) and now it has reached to 410 million people. By 2050 it is estimated that 814 million person will be living in Indian cities, which will share about 50 percent of the total population of India. Moreover, the share of slum population living in cites is about 21 percent which in absolute term is 90 million persons. If urban population is compared with urban internet user’s population, it is estimated to be about 160 million in June, 2014. Thus, only 39 percent of urban population has access to internet facilities; thought the users are growing at a rate of 47 percent in urban areas and more surprisingly 58 percent in rural areas. The present paper addresses the issue of access of internet or Web 2.0 technologies by economically weaker section of urban community for effective representation of public participation in the process of plan preparation and execution. As now in India, with the taking over of BJP Government under the leadership of Honorable Prime Minister Shir Narendra Modi, planning for 100 smart cities by 2022 is the prime agenda for Urban Development. In this context the present paper examines the complexities of development and planning decision that are embedded in the process for establishing a smart city. No doubt Web 2.0 technologies in the cybernetic age is the fastest way to access, collect, analyze and transfer spatial information and providing innovative, sustainable, participatory solutions for effective government and community empowerment. However, due to the technological complexity, high cost, literacy levels, societal awareness and access to the technology create a social divide, more especially for low income group. Hence, the present paper answers the question that how society democratically and effectively access to Web 2.0 technologies for spatial information and translate the virtually tested, analyzed design in the real world. In overall, the paper tries to frame a concept in order to implement Web 2.0 technologies as a tool for building inclusive, smart and sustainable cites in India

Virtual Campus for the University of Jaume I, Castelló, Spain: 3D Modelling of the Campus Buildings using CityEngine

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Geospatial Technologies.The Virtual Smart Campus for the University of Jaume I – Visca Uji – is a project that aims to transform the University of Jaume I (UJi) into a “Smart Campus”. Several applications are part of the Smart Campus such as Uji Place Finder, Energy Consumption, Routes, Resources Management, and Indoor Mapping. Part of this project is the creation of the 3D model of the university buildings using Esri software — City Engine. This study analysed two 3D modeling approaches: procedural modeling language (CGA Shape) and manual modeling. The first, Computer Generated Architecture (CGA) shape is an extension of set grammars that have been applied in CG successfully over the years. And the second, CityEngine offers a set of shape creation and editing tools that allows a more intuitive and pragmatic 3D modeling technique. Both approaches have advantages and disadvantages, overall creating a 3D model by using procedural modelling language showed to be the more efficient and pragmatic method

A Survey of Volunteered Open Geo-Knowledge Bases in the Semantic Web

Over the past decade, rapid advances in web technologies, coupled with innovative models of spatial data collection and consumption, have generated a robust growth in geo-referenced information, resulting in spatial information overload. Increasing 'geographic intelligence' in traditional text-based information retrieval has become a prominent approach to respond to this issue and to fulfill users' spatial information needs. Numerous efforts in the Semantic Geospatial Web, Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI), and the Linking Open Data initiative have converged in a constellation of open knowledge bases, freely available online. In this article, we survey these open knowledge bases, focusing on their geospatial dimension. Particular attention is devoted to the crucial issue of the quality of geo-knowledge bases, as well as of crowdsourced data. A new knowledge base, the OpenStreetMap Semantic Network, is outlined as our contribution to this area. Research directions in information integration and Geographic Information Retrieval (GIR) are then reviewed, with a critical discussion of their current limitations and future prospects

GEO-C:Enabling open cities and the open city toolkit

The GEO-C doctoral programme, entitled “Geoinformatics: Enabling Open Cities”, is funded by the EU Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions (International Training Networks (ITN), European Joint Doctorates) until December 2018, and is managed by three European universities in Germany, Portugal and Spain. 15 doctoral grantholders (Early Stage Researchers) were selected to work on specific three-year projects, all contributing to improving the notion of open cities, and specifically to an Open City Toolkit of methodologies, code, and best practice examples. Contributions include volunteered geographic information (VGI), public information displays, mobility apps to encourage green living, providing open data to immigrant populations, reducing the second-order digital divide, sensing of quality of life, proximity based privacy protection, and spatio-temporal online social media analysis. All doctoral students conducted long-term visits and were embedded in city governments and businesses, to gain experience from multiple perspectives in addition to the researcher and users’ perspective. The projects are situated within three areas: transparency, participation, and collaboration. They took mostly a bottom-up (citizen-centric) approach to (smart) open cities, rather than relying on large IT companies to create smart open cities in a top-down manner. This paper discusses the various contributions to enabling open cities, explains in some detail the Open City Toolkit, and its possible uses and impact on stakeholders. A follow-up doctoral program has been solicited and, if successful, will continue this line of research and will strengthen aspects of privacy, data provenance, and trust, in an effort to improve relations between data (e.g. news) publishers and consumers