The article presents a model based on the use of free tools aiming at the publication of socioeconomic and environmental data and dissemination of information on the internet. The structure of this model makes it possible to present information as tables, graphs, pictures or web maps. The choice of a particular presentation format is determined according to the goals of the developer. As a result of this work the user will create a virtual geographic database for the generation of static information and interactive web maps. The main tools used are the Spring geographic information system, MySQL relational database, PHP script and Apache HTTP server.Key words: Web mapping, free tools, Spring Web, Geographic Information System.Um modelo baseado no uso de ferramentas livres é apresentado, visando à publicação de dados socioeconômicos e ambientais e divulgação de informações na internet. A estrutura deste modelo permite que as informações sejam apresentadas sob a forma de tabelas, gráficos, fotos ou mapas para a web. A escolha de um determinado formato de apresentação da informação é determinada de acordo com os objetivos do desenvolvedor. Como resultado do trabalho, o usuário criará um banco de dados geográficos virtual para gerar informações estáticas e mapas interativos para a web. As principais ferramentas utilizadas foram o sistema de informações geográficas Spring, banco de dados relacional MySQL, PHP script e o servidor Apache HTTP.Palavras-chave: mapeamento via Web, ferramentas livres, Spring Web, Sistema de Informação Geográfica

Bordin, Fabiane

Faccini, Ubiratan Ferrucio

Reinhardt, Alessandro Ott

Tognoli, Francisco Manoel Wohnrath

Veronez, Maurício Roberto

Unisinos (Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos): SEER Unisinos

7(1):71-76, jan/jun 2011© Copyright 2011 by Unisinos - doi: 10.4013/gaea.2011.71.05INTRODUCTIONNowadays, there is a huge amount of  information on the internet and there are many ways to publish it. The possibil-ity to link information from different sources, stored in a single database with remote access to the internet, allows users with different interests to use the same information with many purposes, such as educational, industrial, commer-cial, and political, among others.In a short time the internet has become the best and preferred option of  data dissemination. It is present worldwide and its costs keep decreas-ing, motivating the development of  new systems with different characteristics in relation to the predecessors (Casanova et al., 2005).Socioeconomic and environmental information consists of  a data set with social (Index of  Socio-economic De-velopment – IDESE, Index of  Human Development – IDH, Mortality Rate, Illiteracy Rate, etc.), economic (Gross Domestic Product – GDP, Energy Consumption, Total Amount of  Public Revenue, Unemployment Figures, etc) and environmental indexes (Endangered Animal Species, Level of  Pollution on a River, Industrial Solid Waste, etc.), which can be directly or indirectly inter-related.A way of  disseminating information on the internet that has started to in-crease its power are digital maps, because they allow users to interact in an easy way with spatial information, in other words, with information that is related to a point with x, y coordinates on the Earth surface. According to Mitchell (2005), an easy way to make non-tech-nical users to use digital maps is through internet sites that can be visualized in a static (fixed images) or interactive format (made up of  selectable layers). According to Câmara et al. (1996), the spatial information can be classified as ABSTRACTThe article presents a model based on the use of free tools aiming at the publication of socioeconomic and environmental data and  dissemination of information on the internet. The structure of this model makes it possible to present information as tables, graphs, pictures or web maps. The choice of a particular presentation format is determined  according to the goals of the developer. As a result of this work  the user will  create a virtual geographic database for the generation of static information and interactive web maps. The main tools used are the Spring geographic information system, MySQL relational database, PHP script and Apache HTTP server.Key words: Web mapping, free tools, Spring Web, Geographic Information System.RESUMODIVULGAÇÃO DE DADOS AMBIENTAIS E SOCIOECONÔMICOS NA INTERNET USANDO UM MODELO BASEADO NO USO DE FERRAMENTAS LIVRES. Um modelo baseado no uso de ferramentas livres é apresentado, visando à publicação de dados socioeconômicos e ambientais e divulgação de informações na internet. A estrutura deste modelo permite que as informações sejam apresentadas sob a forma de tabelas, gráfi cos, fotos ou mapas para a web. A escolha de um determinado formato de apresentação da informação é determinada de acordo com os objetivos do desenvolvedor. Como resultado do trabalho, o usuário criará um banco de dados geográfi cos virtual para gerar informações estáticas e mapas interativos para a web. As principais ferramentas utilizadas foram o sistema de informações geográfi cas Spring, banco de dados relacional MySQL, PHP script e o servidor Apache HTTP.Palavras-chave: mapeamento via Web, ferramentas livres, Spring Web, Sistema de Informação Geográfi ca.Dissemination of environmental and socio-economical information on the web using a model based on free toolsAlessandro Ott Reinhardt, Maurício Roberto Veronez, Francisco Manoel Wohnrath Tognoli, Ubiratan Ferrucio Faccini, Fabiane BordinUniversidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos. Av. Unisinos, 950, 93022-000, São Leopoldo, RS, Brazil. alessandro.reinhardt@navteq.com, veronez@unisinos.br, ftognoli@unisinos.br, ufaccini@unisinos.br, fabianebor@unisinos.br72Dissemination of environmental and socio-economical information on the web using a model based on free toolsthematic (separated in classes – e.g. soil maps, vegetation maps), cadastral (table records linked with map features – e.g. points of  sample data, polygons with data on cities), networks (lines with as-sociated attributes – e.g. electrical grid, roads network), digital elevation models (grid of  points with x, y, z information – e.g. 3D surface, map of  soil contamina-tion based on sample points) and images (grid of  pixels – e.g. satellite image, aerial photograph).Free tools are software without cost that can be acquired with no restric-tions, respecting their copyrights. Free software can be open source or not, but their distribution should have no cost, even though open source software might have their distribution free or over license costs (GNU, 2009). This paper presents a model based on the use of  free tools to publish socioeco-nomic and environmental information on the World Wide Web, allowing the developer to choose which dissemina-tion format is more adequate to their objectives. AVAILABLE TOOLSTo store socioeconomic and envi-ronmental data, the MySQL relational database was used. MySQL is the free database most used in the world, due to its fast and consistent performance, high security and easy usability (Greenspan and Bulger, 2001; MySQL, 2007). This database is the fundamental part of  the model proposed in this paper, because it allows the integration between the SPRING Geographic Information Sys-tem (GIS), the Apache Web Server and the PHP script language. The SPRING (Geo-referenced Infor-mation Processing System) is a free GIS developed by INPE (National Institute of  Spatial Researches) and other partners (Câmara, 1996). The database architec-ture of  SPRING is dual, or in other words, alphanumeric data are stored in MySQL and spatial data are stored in a hard disk folder.Casanova et al. (2005) highlight that the main features of  a GIS are:•  Inserting and integrating spatial and conventional information from different sources (census, urban and rural cadastre, satellite images, vectorial data, GPS surveys) in a single database.•  Offering mechanisms allowing to combine a lot of  information, through algorithms of  manipula-tion and analysis, as well as to query, recover and visualize the geographic database content.According to Silberschatz et al. (1999), a GIS is a Geographic Database be-cause it is a spatial database able to store geographic information. Thus, despite being an information system, a GIS is also made up of  a set of  data related to a set of  programs to access these data, such as MySQL.The PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor) is a script language built-in HTML (HyperText Markup Language). Its syntax has its own characteristics and others borrowed from C, Java and Perl languages. The PHP offers support to the main web servers, particularly the Apache and Microsoft IIS. It also has API extensions for MySQL, ODBC, IMAP, LDAP and others (PHP, 2007). The Apache HTTP server has an open source and is a project of  the Apache Software Foundation. Apache has the support of  the most modern operational systems, including UNIX and Windows and its goals are to sup-ply security, efficiency and services ac-cording to HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) current standards (Apache, 2007).PROPOSAL OF A MODELThe model for the publication of  socioeconomic and environmental in-formation on the web is made up of:  a server that stores the MySQL database, the Spring Web files, HTML pages, im-ages and PHP files, PHP script, FTP server and the Apache HTTP server. The model is also made up of  a com-puter with the software GIS SPRING, HTML editor and PHP files, and a FTP client. The developer can work directly on the server or on the computer, but this choice will depend on which tasks will be executed (Figure 1). Notice that server and computer could be dissolved in a single hardware, but this decision depends on the infrastructure of  each organization. Regarding the operational systems, all software can be executed through Windows and/or UNIX.The selected data from a structured project on SPRING can be easily ex-ported to the Spring Web format. This process generates a set of  compiled files in Java language that are database and system independent; in other words, the files are read by the Java Client directly from the web page and the user does not need the software MySQL and SPRING to visualize them. However each folder with a set of  Spring Web files should contain the file “springclient.jar” because it establishes the interface between the user and the server data (Spring, 2007).Differently from HTML, images, tables and graphics in PHP files, the files in web mapping format from Spring Web require that the computer, besides having a browser (Internet Explorer, Netscape, Mozilla) to access the internet pages, should also have a Java client installed.  The web mapping format allows users to interact with maps and related data through a Java interface that is executed inside the user’s machine. Figure 2 shows an example on Spring Web from themap of  the Rio dos Sinos Hydrographic Basin (RSHB), with its boundary, main drainage, secondary drainages and main wetlands.The PHP script establishes an inter-face between the MySQL database and information presented on the web page, allowing the dynamic creation of  tables and graphics that can have their infor-mation regularly updated, without the need of  rewriting the PHP script. In order to create graphics in PHP, the JpGraph library has to be installed on the server, because it is possible to create dynamic graphics through it, since it is a PHP script. JpGraph makes it pos-sible to create many types of  graphics, giving predefined examples that make 73Gaea - Journal of Geoscience, vol. 7, n. 1, jan/jun 2011, p. 71-76.Alessandro Ott Reinhardt, Maurício Roberto Veronez, Francisco Manoel Wohnrath Tognoli, Ubiratan Ferrucio Faccini, Fabiane Bordinit easier to understand their structure (JPGRAPH, 2007). Greenspan and Bulger (2001) em-phasize that before employing any PHP script, the developer should know how to model a database, create tables and query their information through the SQL (Structured Query Language). MySQL does not have any relevant restrictions related to its tables and field names, having its restrictions oriented by SPRING. Some restrictions regard-ing table importation in a SPRING database are:•  The table name cannot have more than eight characters;•  The table and field names should be preceded by letters to be able to include numbers;•  Special characters cannot be used in table and field names (e.g. #, $, %, &, *, (, ), {, }, [, ], /, \, |, ;, :, -, @, !, ?, <, >, =, +).    In Figure 3 is shown a table dynami-cally created in PHP, with environmental data related to the percentage of  dis-solved oxygen, in some points of  the Sinos’ River and in the period from 1990 to 2006. The graph in Figure 4 was also created dynamically in PHP and contains the total average from each of  the water quality indicators proposed by FEPAM/RS (http://www.fepam.rs.gov.br). The constant computing advances allow servers to execute many applica-tions at the same time at an increasing speed (Silberschatz et al., 1999). This enables web applications to aggregate more functionality without losing per-formance. Miranda (2004) highlights some of  the Spring Web qualities: it does not use proprietary data format, it offers strong operational analysis (statistics, research, grouping, and cartograms), easy usability, and its performance to realize spatial analysis is better than other applications of  public domain with the same purpose. Figure 5 shows an example in Spring Web, using the municipalities that form the Rio dos Sinos Basin, for which a grouping query with information related to the mu-Figure 1. Model for socio-economic and environmental publication of information on the web.Figure 2. Example of map in Spring Web environment to the Rio dos Sinos Hydrographic Basin, RS, Brazil.74Dissemination of environmental and socio-economical information on the web using a model based on free toolsnicipalities’ population in 2009 was per-formed. The minimum and maximum number of  inhabitants was divided in seven intervals, varying from yellow to red. It was possible to observe that the highest population concentration (red color) is located next to the capital of  the State of  Rio Grande do Sul.In Figure 6, an example in which a cartogram operation over the munici-palities from BHRS is applied, allowing checking the concentration of  values in a numeric field, in this case the Gross National Product (GNP) of  each mu-nicipality is shown. Therefore, a bigger yellow point in the map indicates a higher GNP index for the respective municipality.Finally, Figure 7 shows a query done with the research operation (window “Pesquisa na Tabela Atual”), where a restriction to select only municipali-ties with revenue per capita above R$ 3,000.00 (window “Tabela de Atributos”) was defined. The statistic operations in Spring Web was not shown because of  the large amounts of  information that is shown in pizza graphs. Despite being more limited if  com-pared to a GIS, web mapping applica-tions allow more users to have contact with spatial information.DATA SOURCES There are many reliable sources of  environmental, social and economical data on the web. Socioeconomic infor-mation can be obtained through pages from the National Confederation of  Municipalities (http://www.cnm.org.br), the Civil Defense Department of  the state of  Rio Grande do Sul (http://www.defesacivil.rs.gov.br), Foundation of  Economics and Statistics – FEE (http://www.fee.tche.br), Brazilian Institute of  Geography and Statistics – IBGE (http://www.ibge.gov.br) and Ministry of  Cities (http://www.cidades.gov.br). Environmental informationcan be obtained through pages fromRio Grande do Sul Sanitation Com-pany – CORSAN (http://www.corsan.com.br), Ministry of  the Environment Figure 3. Example of table dynamically created in PHP.Figure 4. Example of a graphic dynamically created in PHP using the JpGraph library.Figure 5. Example of grouping query in Spring Web.75Gaea - Journal of Geoscience, vol. 7, n. 1, jan/jun 2011, p. 71-76.Alessandro Ott Reinhardt, Maurício Roberto Veronez, Francisco Manoel Wohnrath Tognoli, Ubiratan Ferrucio Faccini, Fabiane Bordinto publish their information through the internet are strong reasons that justify the employment of  the aforementioned techniques.This paper’s intention was to dem-onstrate how to create a single model for disseminating static and interactive information on the internet using maps, charts and tables. The model can also be quickly modified or updated, according to the users’ necessities.It is important to point out that there are advantages and disadvantages between using a GIS already known in the market (e.g. ArcGIS, SPRING) and an open source one (e.g. OpenGIS, MapServer). In this paper the software SPRING 4.2 was employed and even being a complex GIS, it offers many advantages compared to other GIS, such as connection with the client/server relational database, importation and exportation of  many data formats, met-ric operations, queries, spatial analysis, relationship between objects and data-base tables, images processing, decision making support and spatial statistics and many other functions.A relevant aspect of  the proposed model is the facility in finding tutorials and tips on the web concerning the dis-tinct software mentioned in this paper. Good knowledge about cartography, GIS and logic programming is needed, since the user will have to use and edit map fea-tures, data tables and structured queries.REFERENCESAPACHE. 2007. Http Server Project. Available at: http://httpd.apache.org. Accessed on: 12/01/2010. CÂMARA, G. 1996. Anatomia de Sistemas de Informação Geográfica. Campinas, Instituto de Computação, UNICAMP, 197p.CÂMARA, G.; SOUZA, R.C.M.; FREITAS, U.M.; GARRIDO, J. 1996. SPRING: Integrating remote sensing and GIS by object-oriented data modelling, Computers & Graphics, 20(3):395-403. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0097-8493(96)00008-8CASANOVA, M.; CÂMARA, G.; DAVIS, C.; VINHAS, L.; QUEIROZ, G. 2005. Banco de Dados Geográficos. Curitiba, Mundo-Geo, 506 p.FUNDAÇÃO DE ECONOMIA E ESTATÍSTI-CA (FEE). 2010. Available at: http://www.fee.tche.br. Accessed on: 15/10/2010.Figure 6. Example of cartogram operation in Spring Web.Figure 7. Example of quest operation in Spring Web.– MMA (http://www.mma.gov.br), and State Foundation of  Environmental Protection Henrique Luis Roessler – FEPAM (http://www.fepam.rs.gov.br). Other information, as digital maps and satellite images, can be obtained from IBGE, National Institute of  Spatial Researches – Division of  Imag-ery Processing – INPE/DPI (http://www.dpi.inpe.br) and Department of  Geography from University of  Maryland (http://glcfapp.umiacs.umd.edu).CONCLUSIONTo offer interaction with geographic information to a larger number of  users and allowing to organizations, educa-tional institutions, and governmental bodies to use interactive maps in order 76Dissemination of environmental and socio-economical information on the web using a model based on free toolsGNU (GNU Operating System). 2010. Philosofy. Available at: http://www.gnu.org. Accessed on: 15/10/2010.GREENSPAN, J.; BULGER, B. 2001. MySQL/PHP Database Applica-tions. New York, M&T, 596 p.JPGRAPH. 2007. What is JpGraph?. Available at: http://www.aditus.nu/jpgraph.  Accessed on: 15/10/2010.MIRANDA, J.I. 2004. Spring Web: um Aplicati-vo para publicar mapas na Web. São Paulo, Embrapa, 22 p.MITCHELL, T. 2005. Web Mapping Ilustrated. Sebastopol, O’Reilly Media, 368 p.MySQL. 2007. About MySQL AB. Available at: http://www.mysql.com/company. Accessed on: 12/01/2010.SILBERSCHATZ, A.; KORTH, H.F.; SUDAR-SHAN, S. 1999. Sistemas de Banco de Dados. São Paulo, Makron Books, 778 p.SPRING. 2007. Sistema de Processamento de Informações Georeferenciadas. Available at: http://www.dpi.inpe.br/spring. Accessed on: 12/07/2010.PHP. 2001-11. PHP: Um simples tutorial. Available at: http://br.php.net/tut.php. Accessed on: 12/01/2010.Submetido em: 31/08/2010Aceito em: 21/03/2011

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Divulgação de dados ambientais e socioeconômicos na internet usando um modelo baseado no uso de ferramentas livres

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Divulgação de dados ambientais e socioeconômicos na internet usando um modelo baseado no uso de ferramentas livres

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