Presentation of John Lindsay in the GISRUK 2014

1. The
Whitebox
Geospa/al
Analysis
Tools
Project
and
Open-­‐Access
GIS
John
Lindsay,
Ph.D.
University
of
Guelph
GISRUK,
Glasgow
April
16-­‐18,
2014
1

2. What
is
Whitebox
GAT?
2

3. hIp://www.uoguelph.ca/~hydrogeo/Whitebox/
• Origins
in
the
Terrain
Analysis
System
(TAS)
• Whitebox
GAT
project
started
in
2009
• Free
and
open-­‐source
GIS
and
remote
sensing
soUware
package
• Google
code
repository
• Mul/-­‐plaXorm
soUware
• Translated
into
11
languages
3

4. Whitebox
• Currently
contains
372
tools
for
processing
DEMs,
raster
images,
vector
data,
and
LiDAR.
• New
tools
can
be
added
as
plugins
developed
using
any
JVM
programming
language
(Java,
Groovy,
Python).
• Useful
as
a
powerful
geoprocessing
engine
4

5. Basic
GIS
and
Vector
Data
Analysis
5

6. Terrain
Analysis
Toolbox
• Tools
for
extrac/ng
informa/on
from
DEMs.
• Surface
deriva/ves
(slope,
aspect,
curvature)
• Hillshading
and
visibility
analysis
• Rela/ve
landscape
posi/on
• Landform
classifica/on
• Topographic
index,
sediment
transport
index,
etc.
6

7. LiDAR
represents
the
state
of
the
science
for
topographic
and
canopy
mapping.
7
LiDAR
Toolbox

8. LiDAR
Toolbox
• Whitebox
contains
tools
to
– interpolate
LAS
files,
– mosaic
/les,
– fill
in
missing
data
gaps,
– remove
off-­‐terrain
objects
– model
vegeta/on
canopy
8

9. 9

10. Removing
Off-­‐terrain
Objects
10
Original
last-­‐return
LiDAR
DEM
Bare-­‐Earth
DEM
created
using
‘remove
off-­‐terrain
objects’
tool

11. Processing
Massive
DEM
Datasets
11
This
file
was
mosaiced
from
4200
LiDAR
/les
It
consists
of
4.25
billion
grid
cells
and
a
file
of
15.8GB

12. Hydrology
Toolbox
Flow
accumula/on
image
derived
from
a
DEM
• Flow-­‐path
enforcement
• Flow
algorithms
• D8,
FD8,
D∞,
MD∞
• flow
direc/on
• flow
accumula/on
• Flow-­‐path
length
• Watershed
delinea/on
• Sub-­‐basin
delinea/on
• Hillslope
mapping
12

13. 13
Surface
Flow-­‐path
Enforcement
Depression
Filling
Depression
Breaching
Road
blocks
flow
in
DEM
X
X
Filling
Breaching

14. Stream
Network
Analysis
Toolbox
• DEM-­‐based
automated
stream
mapping
– Algorithms
based
on
either
valley
recogni/on
methods
(i.e.
DEM
shape)
or
channel
ini/a/on
methods
(i.e.
contribu/ng
area
thresholding)
• Link
length
and
slope
• Stream
ordering
• Long
profiles
• Link
classifica/on
14

15. Remote
Sensing
Applica/ons
• Numerous
spa/al
filters
• Contrast
stretching
• Change
detec/on
algorithms
• PCA
and
inverse
PCA
• Image
classifica/on,
feature-­‐space
plomng
• Photogrammetry
15

16. Whitebox
as
an
‘Open-­‐Access
GIS’
• The
poten/al
benefits
of
O-­‐S
GIS
include
wider
community
involvement,
deeper
user
knowledge,
and
rapid
innova/on
in
the
field.
• The
inten/on
of
O-­‐S
GIS
is
good
but
we
could
realize
even
more
benefits
if
we
altered
the
implementa/on.
• The
poten/al
benefit
of
OSS
is
oUen
defeated
by
the
barriers
that
are
in
place
as
a
result
of
the
implementa/on
of
the
O-­‐S
model.
• Open-­‐Access
GIS:
soUware
should
be
designed
in
a
way
that
reduces
the
barriers
that
oUen
discourage
or
disallow
end-­‐users
from
examining
the
algorithm
design
and
implementa/on
associated
with
specific
geospa/al
tools.
16

17. Whitebox
as
an
‘Open-­‐Access
GIS’
17

18. Whitebox
as
an
‘Open-­‐Access
GIS’
18

19. Whitebox
as
an
‘Open-­‐Access
GIS’
19

20. Whitebox
Usage
20
• Downloaded
1573
/mes
in
last
17
weeks.
• Downloads
originated
in
91
countries

21. Concluding
remarks
• Whitebox
provides
extensive
tools
for
extrac/ng
informa/on
from
spa/al
data
sets.
• The
open-­‐source(access)
nature
and
ease
of
use
of
Whitebox
provides
an
ideal
environment
for
educa/on
and
research.
21

22. Acknowledgements
• It’s
been
a
wonderful
honour
to
speak
with
you
today.
• Funding
for
this
work
has
been
provided
by:
22