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Blog: Chris Harlow on ITSearch The Harlow Report Archives
Ever thought to yourself, “How many smaller countries could you fit into Australia?” Or possibly, “Which countries in the western hemisphere have legit secessionist movements?” Or, perhaps most pressing of all, “Where does it pay best to be a lifeguard?” We live in the age of the map now, so these are no longer questions you have to continue simply wondering about.
Maps are spectacular at conveying a lot of information in a simple image. Did you know, for example, that four breweries control a huge share of the world’s beer market? Or that Belgium’s largest immigrant population is Italian? Each month we do a round-up of some of the best maps on the internet. Here are the best from October. continued…
first published week of: 11/02/2015
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This week, a woman was rescued after her car crashed and was perched perilously 50 yards down a cliff when she activated Find my iPhone on her mobile phone in New Zealand. Rescuers were searching for her 25km away from her actual location, not knowing she had taken a wrong turn on her way home. When they got the signal with her coordinates, they found her very quickly.
I have written countless blogs about using location to find people and property using GPS and its not very often that these stories happen so close to home. I’m hoping that stories like these will encourage people to work out how to find an app they can use to share this information.
FInd My iPhoneI have many location based apps. If you have an Apple device, Find My iPhone is free and has some extra bonuses, because if your device is misplaced, lost or stolen, you can use the app to location your device, you can set off an alarm and you can also disable it so that it is rendered useless to any lowlife who is planning on selling it. continued…
first published week of: 07/20/2015
We are swimming in data. It’s becoming increasingly important that we learn how to integrate data sets to give us an accurate picture of what’s going on around us, from fleet and asset management to damage assessment after a natural disaster.
In the past, you practically needed to possess an advanced degree in Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to make sense of the abundant information available for solving problems. But thanks to emerging technologies, things are getting easier.
Companies like Esri are creating software platforms that, according to Esri Education Manager Joseph Kerski, “get these tools in the hands of the decision-makers to make the world a better place – to solve problems in public safety, water, and health.”
In December 2014, Esri released a new 3D scene viewer that allows users to integrate a wide range of geographic information into the company’s ArcGIS platform. According to Kerski, 3D tools were available in the past, but the user had to download them. Now, consumers can create three-dimensional maps and models via their Web browser. continued…
first published week of: 04/20/2015
Here’s an experiment: The next time you head out to lunch, compare the restaurant’s icon on your mapping application to the location on the door. The odds are that the icon will be at least 20 meters away from the door itself.
For a consumer, that’s not going to stop them from finding lunch. But that margin of error presents a major hurdle for marketers as they look to use location data to not only target ads, but measure their effectiveness as well. The algorithms which marketers use to analyze location cannot tell whether we intended to go to a McDonald’s on the corner or the gym next door.
The good news is that the technology, which smartphones use to determine where we are in the real world, is improving. Here are four trends that will help push location-based services forward in 2015.
1. Smartphones will start to understand places — not just location
In 2014, Apple introduced Visit Monitoring, a feature that allows developers to identify common places in a user’s life and collect more granular information. The feature creates an alternative for developers who want to access a user’s location on a more passive basis. The concept of the passive check-in offers a solution to the problem that geo-fencing was only able to provide approximations for: Namely, where do my consumers go?Developers are still in the early days of figuring out how well passive visit detection works and how ad networks can take advantage of this ‘visit’ point. Mobile advertising networks have struggled to build meaningful attribution models using the local data available on the market today. But the introduction of the so-called “visit data” could change that in coming years.
2. Improved consumer data will put pressure on business POI providers
Several companies have launched SDKs enabling two-to-five-meter location resolution either via Bluetooth or refined GPS. Marketers will use those improved data to better measure whether consumers who saw ads eventually ended up in stores.The shift from a navigation to attribution use case will put pressure on the data companies who sell point-of-interest data. These companies will need to match the accuracy of the location signal to meet the market demand for attributing in-store visits to those they’ve advertised to; proximity will no longer be good enough. continued…
first published week of: 01/19/2015
he University of Illinois Extension and 4-H will host a new Mapping and GIS Club for tweens and teens ages 10 to 16 this month and next.
Group members will explore various mapping methods and the technology used to create maps. Meetings will be held from 3 to 4:30 p.m. on Saturdays, April 11, 18, 25, and May 2, 9 and 16, at Western Illinois University-Quad Cities Riverfront Campus, in Riverfront Hall, room 118, at 3300 River Drive, Moline.
Members will “get in the field” using GPS units to collect data that will be used to create a brand new map. They also will learn GIS (Geographic Information Systems) basics, a computer program which allows us to layer maps and manipulate data to display new information, according to a news release. continued…
first published week of: 04/06/2015
There is no doubt that technology has made a significant impact in the medical world. Advancements range from those that improve the comfort of many patients to those that extend their lives. Perhaps one of the most interesting technologies that has emerged onto the scene is one meant to more efficiently address geographical links to illnesses: geographic information systems, or GIS.
Geographic information systems are a sophisticated form of mapping software that enables users to visually display input data associated with a designated project. Displaying data visually allows users to see geographical groupings of patient demographic data in a new way. Furthermore, the program allows users to run statistical tests and answer ‘what if’ questions that can arise as a result of direct or indirect changes that take place.
Here are five potential benefits of integrating geographic information systems in healthcare IT: continued…
first published week of: 11/09/2015