This report is a summary of the Specialist meeting for NCGIA Research Initiative 8 entitled "Formalizing Cartographic Knowledge". The Specialist Meeting was held in Buffalo New York, 24-27 October 1993 to discuss knowledge representation and formalization issues relating to automation of cartographic processes. The four research topics given high priority are to formalize the language of cartographic elements and to standardize definitions of GIS processing operations, to implement formalized mechanisms to evaluate mapping system design, to impose more rigorous structure on the process of eliciting cartographic knowledge, and to embed cartographic knowledge into spatial data models and spatial data processing models
