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Blog: Chris Harlow on ITSearch The Harlow Report Archives
It's also so much more than mere GIS mapping on a phone or tablet. Ultimately, an effective Mobile GIS is designed to connect the office and the field which entails empowering boots on the ground with three things:
If a “Mobile GIS” fails on any of these three fronts, it fails in bridging the gap that exists between field and office teams. Too often, software is labeled “Mobile GIS” but is too complex for field users, doesn't play nice with other applications, or has a poorly designed interface, creating siloes rather than dissolving them.
Read full story at IoT For All…
first published week of: 07/24/2023
This is the result of a 20-year collaboration of several hundred scientists from around 30 different institutions worldwide.
A still image taken from the animation released by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (Epfl). It shows a map of the universe in expansion.
This is the result of a 20-year collaboration of several hundred scientists from around 30 different institutions worldwide.
To answer some of the most pressing questions about the universe, scientists have revealed the largest 3D map of the universe ever created. The map, published on June 19, is the result of an analysis of more than two million galaxies and quasars (luminous galactic nuclei which have supermassive blackholes) covering over 11 billion years of cosmic time. It fills in the most significant gaps in our knowledge of the universe.
Announced by Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), the results come from the extended Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (eBOSS), an international collaboration of more than 100 astrophysicists and one of the SDSS’s main surveys. Within the eBOSS team, groups of scientists from different universities around the world focused on different aspects of the analysis. The map today represents their combined effort of mapping the universe for over two decades.
“We know both the ancient history of the Universe and its recent expansion history fairly well, but there is a troublesome gap in the middle 11 billion years,” said cosmologist Kyle Dawson, who leads the team, in a statement. “For five years, we have worked to fill in that gap, and we are using that information to provide some of the most substantial advances in cosmology in the last decade.”
Read full story at VICE…
first published week of: 11/27/2023
With location services becoming ubiquitous in apps today, businesses that take a geographic approach to developing their technology can gain an edge.
While travel and commuting pick up speed once again across the world, investment in out-of-home advertising (OOH) is growing in tandem. With OOH ad spend projected to grow to 37.7 billion (USD) globally in 2022 , many major brands have returned to launching high impact creative campaigns (like Amazon's Prime Video Anamorphic billboard promoting The Wheel of Time's release) in flagship locations, as well as in high traffic areas.
As brands continue to invest more dollars into creative OOH marketing and advertising campaigns, outdoor media owners and planners are turning to Location Intelligence and GIS to improve their strategies so they can put themselves ahead of the competition. Why? Because access to spatial analytics and audience data enables them to better align their to their target audiences, as well as visualize and analyze their data from a refreshed, holistic perspective so they can see opportunities and relationships they may have missed previously.
Read full story at CARTO…
first published week of: 10/30/2023
New apps can provide real-time traffic data or help you find a parking space and navigate shopping centres and airports
Maps have come a long way since cartographers used mermaids and dragons to cover up the gaps in their knowledge.1 Welcome to real-time traffic data
Currently, traffic data largely consists of ad hoc reports from the ground and analysis of camera feeds. Companies such as Waze, acquired by Google for $1.1bn in 2013, are changing that. Users of the service contribute to a real-time data stream that maps a city's traffic with unprecedented detail.
2 Let's take this inside
Modern navigation systems can get you to the door, but rarely any further. Now that's slowly becoming a thing of the past. Google now offers indoor maps for Android users at around 10,000 locations and rival Microsoft is doing the same with Bing Maps, including indoor maps at locations such as Heathrow.
3 Open alternatives
Although Google Maps dominates the mapping industry, there are viable open-source alternatives that have no copyright restrictions and let the crowd update the map. OpenStreetMap is the leading name in this area and powers travel app Citymapper.
4 A military upgrade
Britain's armed forces are beginning to go beyond GPS with "quantum positioning". By using powerful lasers to detect the effects of gravitational and magnetic fields on super-chilled atoms, the navy hopes to track its submarines to centimetre precision.
Read full story at The Guardian…
first published week of: 09/11/2023
Some of these portals promise more than they deliver, some have been frustrating, but some have been extremely valuable in GIS work.
We have been writing this geospatial data column since 2012, when our book The GIS Guide to Public Domain Data, was published. Over the 5 years that have elapsed, in addition to keeping issues such as data quality, copyright, privacy, and fee vs. free at the forefront of the conversation, we have tested and reviewed many geospatial data portals.
Some of these portals promise more than they deliver, some have been frustrating, but some have been extremely valuable in GIS work. We have decided to list 10 of those that we have found most useful, rich with content, easy to use, and with metadata that is available and understandable. In considering such a list, we realize that “most useful” really depends on the application that one is using GIS for, but the following sites should be useful for users in many disciplines. Some allow for data to be streamed from web servers into your GIS software, and all allow data to be downloaded.
Read full story at Spatial Reserves…
first published week of: 09/04/2023
Organized crime networks — or mafia — stretched across the U.S. in the 1960s. Researchers used geographic information systems to investigate how these networks were shaped and how they shaped organized crime during the mafia's organizational height.
At its height in the mid-20th century, American organized crime groups, often called the mafia, grossed approximately $40 billion each year, typically raising that money through illegal or untaxed activities, such as extortion and gambling.
A team of researchers used geographic information systems — a collection of tools for geographic mapping and analysis of the Earth and society — and data from a government database on mafia ties during the 1960s, to examine how these networks were built, maintained and grown. The researchers said that this spatial social networks study offers a unique look at the mafia’s loosely affiliated criminal groups. Often called families, these groups were connected — internally and externally — to maintain a balance between security and effectiveness, referred to as the efficiency-security tradeoff.
Read full story at Penn State…
first published week of: 11/13/2023