Presentation given at the Geospatial in the Cultural Heritage Domain - Past, Present & Future event in London on 7th March 2012. The event was organised as part of the JISC GECO project.

1. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
Project team
•Professor Richard Rodger (University of Edinburgh)
•Chris Fleet (National Library of Scotland)
•Stuart Nicol (University of Edinburgh)
•Daniel Henrie (National Library of Scotland)

2. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
• Objectives of the project;
• Outputs;
• More detail about the online mapping
tools;
• Sustainability;
• Lessons learned?

3. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
Objectives of the project
• To create a set of geo-referenced historical maps of
Edinburgh (for student learning purposes);
• To reach a broader public (through NLS website);
• To develop tools for working with and visualising
historical source material;
• To develop dynamic maps, graphs and diagrams
relating to Edinburgh, so as to further the understanding
of 19th and 20th century cities.
= Pilot or Proof of Concept Project

4. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
Outputs
• Resources:
• 25 georeferenced maps of Edinburgh
1765 – 1950 (WMS, TMS and
downloadable JPG/JGW).
• A suite of digitised boundary polygons
(ShapeFiles and KML).
• Documented workflows.
• Online mapping tools.

5. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
Mapping tools for historians
• The website http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
• Aims:
• Avoid complicated GIS;
• Quick wins for the user – not ‘mission-
critical’ accuracy;
• Quick wins for the project – small team
with minimal specialist IT support;
• Relatively heavy reliance on Google APIs.

6. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
Address-based history
• Social & economic historians tend to
gather a lot of geographic data;
• Find it hard to visualise that data
geographically;
• Looking for patterns – it doesn’t have to
be accurate.

39. http://urbhist.nls.uk/extmap/ssindex.php?
ssid=0AubsC9Ep6FwtdEdTVHhrcGRKNnJVTnc5UTFmTTljcWc

40. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
Lightweight ‘mashup’ design
• APIs
• Google Maps, Geocoding, Elevation, Visualization,
Docs & Spreadsheets
• Yahoo geocoding
• NLS Historic Mapping, AddressingHistory
• Tile Map Services & KML/GeoRSS
• NLS (OS OpenData), OpenStreeMap, Virtual Earth,
user generated
• JS libraries
• (ExtJS/ExtMap, JQuery)

41. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
Issues: sustainability & licensing
• Google Maps API V2 depricated
• Licensing: what are the issues related to
batch geocoding from Google?
• BatchGeo.com
• Lack of control over changes to APIs
• Open HTTP or API?
• TMS or WMS? Are our resources
sustainable?

42. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
Issues: resources & skills
• We’ve benefited from partnership with
NLS – others don’t have that level of
access to maps, skills & infrastructure;
• Problem of accessing and preparing
maps for other areas;
• Who should be taking a lead?

43. http://geo.nls.uk/urbhist/
Lessons learned?
• We’ve found it useful to engage with
commercial free-to-use services & APIs
(quick and functional) ...
• but aware of the big drawbacks &
limitations;
• Have successfully engaged researchers
and the wider community.