2. Within the last six decades, GIS has evolved from a concept to a science.
The phenomenal evolution of GIS from a rudimentary tool to a modern,
powerful platform for understanding and planning our world is marked by
several key milestones.
The following are the significant developments in GIS history:
1963: Roger Tomlinson and colleagues developed the Canada
Geographic Information System for Canadian Land Inventory.
This project pioneers much technology and introduces the
term GIS.
1964: The Harvard Laboratory for Computer Graphics and Spatial Analysis
was established in Harvard University under the direction of Howard Fisher.
Two years later, Symap, the first raster GIS was created.
1967: The United States Bureau of Census developed the DIMEGDF (Dual
Independent Map Encoding-Geographic Database Files), a data structure
and street address database for the 1970 census.
3. 1969: ESRI Inc. and Intergraph Corp were formed. MapInfo Corp was
formed in 1986
1969: Ian McHarg’s book “Design With Nature” was published. This
book was the first to describe many of the concepts in modern GIS analysis,
including the map overlay process.
1981: ESRI Inc. launched ArcInfo, the first major commercial GIS software
system.
1985: GPS (Global Positioning System) becomes operational.
1994: Bill Clinton signs Executive Order 12906 which leads to the creation of
US National Spatial Infrastructure (NSDI), clearinghouses and Federal
Geographic Data Committee (FGDC)4 Training Module on Basic QGIS Training for Participatory Mapping of
Existing Land Uses Project
1996: Internet-based GIS products were introduced by major GIS
companies almost simultaneously.
4. 1999: The first World GIS Day was celebrated by more than 1.2 million
participants
2000: The GIS industry passed the US$ 7 billion mark and now had more than
million core users and perhaps 5 million casual users.
Today: GIS gives people the ability to create their own digital map layers to
help solve real-world problems. GIS has also evolved into a means for data
sharing and collaboration, inspiring a vision that is now rapidly becoming a
reality—a continuous, overlapping, and interoperable GIS database of the
world, about virtually all subjects.
The Future of GIS: With its movement to web and cloud computing, and
integration with real-time information via the Internet of Things, GIS has
become a platform relevant to almost every human endeavor—a nervous
system of the planet. As our world faces problems from expanding
population, loss of nature, and pollution, GIS will play an increasingly
important role in how we understand and address these issues and provide
a means for communicating solutions using the common language of
mapping
