An Architecture for Integrated Intelligence in Urban Management using Cloud Computing

With the emergence of new methodologies and technologies it has now become possible to manage large amounts of environmental sensing data and apply new integrated computing models to acquire information intelligence. This paper advocates the application of cloud capacity to support the information, communication and decision making needs of a wide variety of stakeholders in the complex business of the management of urban and regional development. The complexity lies in the interactions and impacts embodied in the concept of the urban-ecosystem at various governance levels. This highlights the need for more effective integrated environmental management systems. This paper offers a user-orientated approach based on requirements for an effective management of the urban-ecosystem and the potential contributions that can be supported by the cloud computing community. Furthermore, the commonality of the influence of the drivers of change at the urban level offers the opportunity for the cloud computing community to develop generic solutions that can serve the needs of hundreds of cities from Europe and indeed globally.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure

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

Open-Source web-based geographical information system for health exposure assessment

This paper presents the design and development of an open source web-based Geographical Information System allowing users to visualise, customise and interact with spatial data within their web browser. The developed application shows that by using solely Open Source software it was possible to develop a customisable web based GIS application that provides functions necessary to convey health and environmental data to experts and non-experts alike without the requirement of proprietary software

Assessment of the Conditions for a European Union Location Framework Report EUR

The European Union Location Framework (EULF) is a set of good practices and actions to promote more effective and efficient use of location information in e-government services. The EULF is part of the Interoperability Solutions for Public Administrations (ISA) Programme, which supports interoperability solutions, sharing and re-use among European Public Administrations. This report assesses the conditions for an EULF, based on a survey of Member States and an examination of EU policies and work programmes. Five focus areas are being considered initially: policy and strategy alignment, e government integration, standardisation and interoperbility, costs and benefits and committed partnerships. The assessment confirmed their importance in realising and maximising the benefits of location-related information and services. There are various good practices demonstrating that these issues can be addressed and that benefits for governments, citizens and businesses can be delivered. However these good pratices are not universally deployed and there are some significant gaps. The assessment also identified other important issues, including the need for effective leadership and governance, a user-driven approach, an open and balanced data policy, training and awareness raising and appropriately targeted funding. There is, therefore, a need for an EULF, to build on the good practices and interest from Member States and to develop a framework of guidance and actions that will foster interoperable cross-sector and cross-border sharing and use of location information.JRC.H.6-Digital Earth and Reference Dat

Open source GIS for HIV/AIDS management

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Reliable access to basic services can improve a community's resilience to HIV/AIDS. Accordingly, work is being done to upgrade the physical infrastructure in affected areas, often employing a strategy of decentralised service provision. Spatial characteristics are one of the major determinants in implementing services, even in the smaller municipal areas, and good quality spatial information is needed to inform decision making processes. However, limited funds, technical infrastructure and human resource capacity result in little or no access to spatial information for crucial infrastructure development decisions at local level.</p> <p>This research investigated whether it would be possible to develop a GIS for basic infrastructure planning and management at local level. Given the resource constraints of the local government context, particularly in small municipalities, it was decided that open source software should be used for the prototype system.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The design and development of a prototype system illustrated that it is possible to develop an open source GIS system that can be used within the context of local information management. Usability tests show a high degree of usability for the system, which is important considering the heavy workload and high staff turnover that characterises local government in South Africa. Local infrastructure management stakeholders interviewed in a case study of a South African municipality see the potential for the use of GIS as a communication tool and are generally positive about the use of GIS for these purposes. They note security issues that may arise through the sharing of information, lack of skills and resource constraints as the major barriers to adoption.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The case study shows that spatial information is an identified need at local level. Open source GIS software can be used to develop a system to provide local-level stakeholders with spatial information. However, the suitability of the technology is only a part of the system – there are wider information and management issues which need to be addressed before the implementation of a local-level GIS for infrastructure management can be successful.</p

GIS in Geography Teaching

If it is true that every period of our history is marked by important revolutions which shaped its spirit and nature, today we can claim to live in what has been aptly defined, by a Pennsylvania State University project, as a “Geospatial Revolution”. Understanding the world in which we live, how it has changed and how the ways in which humans interact with it have changed, how people try to know, interpret and represent it, all provide crucial aspects for the planning of curricula, training courses and in the production of appropriate contents for them. GIS represents an effective tool for teaching the understanding of space and place. GIS finds application in various fields from natural science and geology to sociology and anthropology, from political sciences, economics and urban studies to archaeology and history. The use of this tool enables the introduction of research methods in geography teaching, leading, for example, to the acquisition of the ability to create a conceptual model of reality that can be studied as well as to select the most useful data for this purpose, to interpret it independently, and to represent it effectively

WEB MAPPING ARCHITECTURES BASED ON OPEN SPECIFICATIONS AND FREE AND OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE IN THE WATER DOMAIN

The availability of water-related data and information across different geographical and jurisdictional scales is of critical importance for the conservation and management of water resources in the 21st century. Today information assets are often found fragmented across multiple agencies that use incompatible data formats and procedures for data collection, storage, maintenance, analysis, and distribution. The growing adoption of Web mapping systems in the water domain is reducing the gap between data availability and its practical use and accessibility. Nevertheless, more attention must be given to the design and development of these systems to achieve high levels of interoperability and usability while fulfilling different end user informational needs. This paper first presents a brief overview of technologies used in the water domain, and then presents three examples of Web mapping architectures based on free and open source software (FOSS) and the use of open specifications (OS) that address different users' needs for data sharing, visualization, manipulation, scenario simulations, and map production. The purpose of the paper is to illustrate how the latest developments in OS for geospatial and water-related data collection, storage, and sharing, combined with the use of mature FOSS projects facilitate the creation of sophisticated interoperable Web-based information systems in the water domain

Geospatial data harmonization from regional level to european level: a usa case in forest fire data

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Geospatial Technologies.Geospatial data harmonization is becoming more and more important to increase interoperability of heterogeneous data derived from various sources in spatial data infrastructures. To address this harmonization issue we present the current status of data availability among different communities, languages, and administrative scales from regional to national and European levels. With a use case in forest data models in Europe, interoperability of burned area data derived from Europe and Valencia Community in Spain were tested and analyzed on the syntactic, schematic and semantic level. We suggest approaches for achieving a higher chance of data interoperability to guide forest domain experts in forest fire analysis. For testing syntactic interoperability, a common platform in the context of formats and web services was examined. We found that establishing OGC standard web services in a combination with GIS software applications that support various formats and web services can increase the chance of achieving syntactic interoperability between multiple geospatial data derived from different sources. For testing schematic and semantic interoperability, the ontology-based schema mapping approach was taken to transform a regional data model to a European data model on the conceptual level. The Feature Manipulation Engine enabled various types of data transformation from source to target attributes to achieve schematic interoperability. Ontological modelling in Protégé helped identify a common concept between the source and target data models, especially in cases where matching attributes were not found at the schematic level. Establishment of the domain ontology was explored to reach common ground between application ontologies and achieve a higher level of semantic interoperability

A Web-Based geographical information system prototype on Portuguese traditional food products

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Geospatial TechnologiesPortuguese traditional food products use certification labels from EU quality schemes to distinguish from other food products. With the number of traditional food products increasing every year, how to manage the information more efficiently and how to spread the information to the public more clearly and interactively become the challenges. Considering the geographic distribution is one of the key features of the traditional food products, the web-based GIS is a potential system to manage and share the information. In this thesis, the prototype of web-based GIS is designed as three tiered software architecture comprising of web application, web service and spatial database. The prototype provides the possibility to integrate with the information from other sources. For the information managers, the prototype takes advantage of the web, open specifications and open source software. Therefore, it minimizes the barrier of the migration from original information system, and the information management is easy to be done in the web browser. For the public, the web map is easy to use and user-friendly. In the end, the potential improvement in the management web interface is discussed, and the further development such as introducing more roles into the system and having the usability test are pointed out