How Volunteered Geographic Information can improve GIS @ work

1. Blurring the lines
Volunteered Geographic Information
in aid of Professional GIS
Andrew Zolnai
blog.zolnai.ca

3. Vendor (alphabetical) Product(s)
License /
maintenance
Freemium /
modulation
Disclaimer: incomplete and subject to change without notice, no
warranty or endorsment actual or implied, do consult sources first
ACDSee Canvas GIS Module cost options www.acdsee.com/en/products/canvas-15/gis-module
AutoDesk AutoCAD Map 3D cost options www.autodesk.com/products/autodesk-autocad-map-3d/overview
Amazon Web Service EC2 free limited tier per transaction aws.amazon.com/ec2/
Bentley Microstation cost options www.bentley.com
Carbon Project Gaia free personal sliding commercial thecarbonproject.azurewebsites.net/Products/Gaia
Esri ArcGIS Home Use nominal cost annual renewal www.esri.com/software/arcgis/arcgis-for-home
Esri ArcGIS Online free limited tier per transaction www.arcgis.com
Esri ArcGIS Desktop cost options www.esri.com/software/arcgis/arcgis-for-desktop/
Esri ArcGIS Server cost options www.esri.com/software/arcgis/arcgisserver
GIScloud GIScloud free personal sliding commercial www.giscloud.com
Google Cloud Platform free limited tier per transaction cloud.google.com
Google Earth Builder free personal sliding commercial www.google.com/enterprise/mapsearth/products/earthenterprise.html
Google Map Maker free personal sliding commercial www.google.com/mapmaker
Google Maps Engine free personal sliding commercial www.google.com/enterprise/mapsearth/products/mapsengine.html
Hexagon Geomedia cost options www.hexagongeospatial.com/products/geomedia/Details.aspx
MangoMap MangoMap free personal sliding commercial www.mangomap.com
Mapcentia GeoCloud2 free personal sliding commercial www.mapcentia.com
MapCite Excel add-in free personal sliding commercial www.mapcite.com
Pitney Bowes MapInfo / Xtreme cost options www.mapinfo.com
QGIS Desktop / Server free free www.qgis.org

4. In the beginning
• ArcGIS desktop
• File geodatabase to reduce size
• AGX / KML files on web site
CLIWOC ships captains data
250K points
spatial data stripped out
reformatted across dateline

5. http://youtu.be/2fnAlFJdruQ

6. Packages & Vector Service
• layer packages on arcgis.com
• free account but upload / download
• vector uploads on giscloud.com
• postGIS backend, freemium model
• direct web-to-web transfer
• OGC WMS to arcgis.com
GSSHG global shorline from NOAA
250K vectors @ various resolutions

8. Package & Online Validation
• UK guv data released
• enter geohistorical attributes
• validate vector and attribute data
• send errors to UK guv who reposted
• re-validate re-posted data  AOK
Parishes constant since Domesday
East Anglia agro-economic data
QGIS then ArcGIS & 1Spatial OVS
from 25 to 2 errors over 2000 polygons

10. Web Service
• Amazon Web Service private account
• 'Small' elastic service, nominal mo. fee
• Mapcentia Geocloud2 stack
• Leaflet frontend, postGIS backend
• unlimited data, no performance hits
GSHHG global vector shoreline any scale
CLIWOC shipping on Stamen backdrop

13. Extranet Publish
• arcgis.com pay-as-you go credits
• direct desktop-to-web and back
• geoprocess on desktop or online
• permissions stack ('organizations')
• republish data as Map Stories
WhereIsAndrew time-aware animation
Neolithic agriculture spread map story
CLIWOC shipping time-aware on AGOL 
performance limitation on # points / vectors

17. Intranet publish
• arcgis.com for organisation
• Wipro internal portal
• arcgis.com w entitlement
MMS-to-PPDM data model example
- respect PPDM membership criteria*
- share corporate intelligence internally
BOEM GOM gov. dataset to share
*: posted to Esri Geonet & PUG Online communities w permission

19. SAGE*
• Syndication
publish data to appropriate platform
• AGgregation
mash up complementary datasets
• Entitlement
set permissions as appropriate
*: Olivier lePeuch, Schlumberger, 2002

20. Business lessons learned
• Lots of free data, some so large it’s not
worth maintaining in-house
• Easily access corporate data with
proper permissions
• Mash up project-specific and general
background data as appropriate
• Serve it up again with proper permission
to target audience
• Importance increases with the variety of
internal and external stakeholders

22. Tech lessons learned - AGOL
• scale-dependant symbology
• Filter data to those germane to AOI
• Map and web templates as per AGOL
• To create
- ArcGIS Desktop still tops for data query / prep
- ArcGIS Server to upload / serve mega datasets
- ArcGIS Online to share projects in organisation
- Web / Feature Mapping Services for alien data
• To disseminate:
- Arcpy to format / locate data for non-tech users
- Map Packages to preserve all (upload / download)
- Model Builder to wrap workflows (serious limits)

24. Tech lessons learned - AWS
• Denormalise data
- minimize the number of tables
- eliminate unnecessary look ups and domains
- it is ok to have duplicated data
- we don't have a memory or space problem anymore
• Post all data & create views by decade
• Render online faster than on the desktop!
- tile caching in Leaflet, Mapcentia GeoCloud stack
- reading AmazonWeb Services data, postGIS backbone
• Share data
- file geodatabase on ArcGIS Online
- shape files on Share Geo