New Generation Platforms for Exploration of Crowdsourced Geo-Data

This chapter addresses two recent topics in the field of geo-information, the former more technological and the latter more scientific. On one side, there is an emerging trend of visualizing data and their changes in space and time through multidimensional geospatial clients and/or virtual globes. In the most advanced cases, these are not simply plain viewers but also allow analysis of the data by acting as “multidimensional intelligent geo-viewers”. On the other side, citizen science is providing a great momentum to the possibility of lay people taking part in scientific development. It is a new, citizen-centred paradigm which, in most cases, takes advantage of the individual and collective augmented capability of sensing the surrounding world through the sensors that we wear. The “citizen sensors” will consciously contribute to this development, either through volunteered geographic information or by being themselves an unconscious part of the data analytics, which makes use of geo-crowdsourced data to extract information in order to create a higher level understanding of natural and manmade phenomena. This chapter seeks to outline the Web technological solutions for visualizing and analyzing such data, through a summary of the current state of the art and the original applications developed by the authors

Geographic Information Systems and Science

Geographic information science (GISc) has established itself as a collaborative information-processing scheme that is increasing in popularity. Yet, this interdisciplinary and/or transdisciplinary system is still somewhat misunderstood. This book talks about some of the GISc domains encompassing students, researchers, and common users. Chapters focus on important aspects of GISc, keeping in mind the processing capability of GIS along with the mathematics and formulae involved in getting each solution. The book has one introductory and eight main chapters divided into five sections. The first section is more general and focuses on what GISc is and its relation to GIS and Geography, the second is about location analytics and modeling, the third on remote sensing data analysis, the fourth on big data and augmented reality, and, finally, the fifth looks over volunteered geographic information.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Earth Observation Open Science and Innovation

geospatial analytics; social observatory; big earth data; open data; citizen science; open innovation; earth system science; crowdsourced geospatial data; citizen science; science in society; data scienc

Streamlining Digital Modeling and Building Information Modelling (BIM) Uses for the Oil and Gas Projects

The oil and gas industry is a technology-driven industry. Over the last two decades, it has heavily made use of digital modeling and associated technologies (DMAT) to enhance its commercial capability. Meanwhile, the Building Information Modelling (BIM) has grown at an exponential rate in the built environment sector. It is not only a digital representation of physical and functional characteristics of a facility, but it has also made an impact on the management processes of building project lifecycle. It is apparent that there are many similarities between BIM and DMAT usability in the aspect of physical modeling and functionality. The aim of this study is to streamline the usage of both DMAT and BIM whilst discovering valuable practices for performance improvement in the oil and gas projects. To achieve this, 28 BIM guidelines, 83 DMAT academic publications and 101 DMAT vendor case studies were selected for review. The findings uncover (a) 38 BIM uses; (b) 32 DMAT uses and; (c) 36 both DMAT and BIM uses. The synergy between DMAT and BIM uses would render insightful references into managing efficient oil and gas’s projects. It also helps project stakeholders to recognise future investment or potential development areas of BIM and DMAT uses in their projects

Three-dimensional geological mapping: Workshop extended abstracts

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Web-based discovery and dissemination of multidimensional geographic information

A spatial data clearinghouse is an electronic facility for searching, viewing, transferring, ordering, advertising, and disseminating spatial data from numerous sources via the Internet. Governments and other institutions have been implementing spatial data clearinghouses to minimise data duplication and thus reduce the cost of spatial data acquisition. Underlying these clearinghouses are geoportals and databases of geospatial metadata.A geoportal is an access point of a spatial data clearinghouse and metadata is data that describes data. The success of a clearinghouse's spatial data discovery system is dependent on its ability to communicate the contents of geospatial metadata by providing both visual and analytical assistancet o a user. The model currently adopted by the geographic information community was inherited from generic information systems and thus to an extent ignores spatial characteristics of geographic data. Consequently, research in Geographic Information Retrieval (GIR) has focussed on spatial aspects of webbased data discovery and acquisition. This thesis considers how the process of GIR from geoportals can be enhanced through multidimensional visualisation served by web-based geographic data sources. An approach is proposed for the presentation of search results in ontology assisted GIR. Also proposed is an approach for the visualisation of multidimensional geographic data from web-based data sources. These approaches are implemented in two prototypes, the Geospatial Database Online Visualisation Environment (GeoDOVE) and the Spatio-Temporal Ontological Relevance Model (STORM). A discussion of their design, implementation and evaluation is presented. The results suggest that ontology-assisted visualisation can improve a user's ability to identify the most relevant multidimensional geographic datasets from a set of search results. Additional results suggest that it is possible to offer the proposed visualisation approaches on existing geoportal frameworks. The implication of the results is that multidimensional visualisation should be considered by the wider geographic information community as an alternative to historic approaches for presenting search results on geoportals, such as the textual ranked list and two-dimensional maps.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceUniversity of Newcastle upon TyneGBUnited Kingdo

A new trajectory for spatial data infrastructure evolution in the developing world

Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 107-113).Spatial Data is a key resource in the development of cities. There is a lot of socio-economic potential that is locked away in spatial data holdings and this potential is unlocked by making the datasets widely available for use. Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDIs) have served this primary purpose; to make data accessible through the use of web based technologies. However, SDIs have not had their anticipated impact at local levels of governance. They have traditionally served as platforms that facilitate access to raw spatial datasets. They have not fully facilitated for the use of these datasets and therefore have attracted minimal attention from decision makers and users. This research suggests a new trajectory for SDI evolution; a trajectory that will allow them to evolve into more relevant platforms for confronting the urban crisis in developing nations and thereby ensuring that they have the societal impact that they are intended to. The research explores the characteristics of the mainstream efforts to counter urban crises in the developing world to determine how the new SDI should be re-conceptualised to more adequately assist in responding to the urban crisis. This leads to the incorporation of Evidence Based Practice (EBP) into SDI through the use of urban indicators and knowledge creation processes to reflect on the pressing societal issues. From the new SDI concept, an architectural design is implemented as a “proof of concept”. At the heart of this new concept is the SDIs ability to provide access to more than just raw spatial datasets but useful information products that are based on these data. This proves that EBP can be incorporated into SDI to make them more efficient in responding to the urban problems in developing nation and consequently more relevant Information Infrastructures for urban decision makers

Integrative Trust-Based Functional Contracting: A Complementary Contractual Approach to BIM-Enabled Oil And Gas EPC Project Delivery

The research has successfully bridged the gap between contractual and technological practices for the Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) contracts in oil and gas projects. It has identified the related Building Information Modelling (BIM) uses and developed an integrative trust-based functional contracting that complement to EPC contracts. The research contributes to new functional perspectives of contracting and also provides significant insights into the proper use contract functions for improving BIM-enabled projects’ performance