Fundamental GIS Concepts

POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS

Ronald Briggs
University of Texas at Dallas

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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Representing Geographic Features
How do we describe geographical features?
• by recognizing two types of data:
– Spatial data which describes location (where)
– Attribute data which specifies characteristics at that location
(what and how much)
How do we represent these digitally in a GIS?
• by grouping into layers based on similar characteristics (e.g hydrography,
elevation, water lines, sewer lines, grocery sales) and using either:
– vector data model (coverage in ARC/INFO, shapefile in ArcView)
– raster data model (GRID or Image in ARC/INFO & ArcView)
• by selecting appropriate data properties with respect to:
– projection, scale, accuracy, and resolution
How do we incorporate into a computer application system?
• by using one or other of two types of computing environments
– procedural programming and the relational data base model (RDBMS)
(such as Arc/Info thru v. 7)
– object-oriented programming and the object data model [Smallworld,
Intergraph GeoMedia, ArcView v. 3 (partially) ArcGIS v. 8,]
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Spatial and Attribute Data
• Spatial data (where)
– specifies location
– stored in a shape file in Arcview
• Attribute (descriptive) data (what and how much)
– specifies characteristics at that location, natural or human-
created
– stored in a data base table
GIS systems traditionally maintain spatial and attribute data
separately, then “join” them for display or analysis
– for example, in ArcView, the Attributes of … table is used to
link a shape file (spatial structure) with a data base table
containing attribute information in order to display the attribute
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Spatial Data Types
• continuous: elevation, rainfall, ocean salinity
• areas:
– unbounded: landuse, market areas, soils, rock type
– bounded: city/county/state boundaries, ownership
parcels, zoning
– moving: air masses, animal herds, schools of fish
• networks: roads, transmission lines, streams
• points:
– fixed: wells, street lamps, addresses
– moving: cars, fish, deer
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Attribute data types
• Categorical (name):
(often coded to numbers eg SSN
but can’t do arithmetic)
– nominal
• no inherent ordering
• land use types, county names
– ordinal
• inherent order
• road class; stream class
• Numerical
(may be expressed as integer [whole
number] or floating point [decimal
fraction])
– interval
• known distance between values
• can’t say ‘twice as much’
• temperature (Celsius or Fahrenheit)
– ratio
• natural zero
• ratios make sense (e.g. twice as
much)
• income, age, rainfall

Attribute data tables can contain locational information, such as addresses

or a list of X,Y coordinates. ArcView refers to these as event tables. However,
these must be converted to true spatial data (shape file), for example by
geocoding, before they can be displayed as a map.
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 GIS Data Models:
Raster v. Vector
“raster is faster but vector is corrector” Joseph Berry
• Raster data model • Vector data model
– location is referenced by a grid cell – location referenced by x,y
see see
in a rectangular array (matrix) coordinates, which can be linked
next
slide – attribute is represented as a single next to form lines and polygons
slide
value for that cell – attributes referenced through
– much data comes in this form unique ID number to tables
• images from remote sensing – much data comes in this form
(LANDSAT, SPOT) • DIME and TIGER files from US
• scanned maps Census
• elevation data from USGS • DLG from USGS for streams,
– best for continuous features: roads, etc
• census data (tabular)
• elevation
• temperature – best for features with discrete
• soil type boundaries
• land use • property lines
• political boundaries
• transportation
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Concept of
Vector and Raster Real World

Raster Representation Vector Representation

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
0 R T
1 R T
2 H R
point
3 R line
4 R R
5 R
6 R T T H
7 R T T polygon
8 R
9 R
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Representing Data using Raster Model
• area is covered by grid with (usually) equal-sized cells
• location of each cell calculated from origin of grid: “two
down, three over” (usually from upper left, but lower corn fruit

left in ARCVIEW)

clover
• cells often called pixels (picture elements); raster data wheat
often called image data
fruit
• attributes are recorded by assigning each cell a single
value based on the majority feature (attribute) in the
cell, such as land use type. 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
0 1 1 1 1 1 4 4 5 5 5
• easy to do overlays/analyses, just by ‘combining’ 1 1 1 1 1 1 4 4 5 5 5
corresponding cell values: “yield= rainfall + fertilizer” 2
3
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
4
4
4
4
5
5
5
5
5
5
(why raster is faster, at least for some things) 4 1 1 1 1 1 4 4 5 5 5
5 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3
• simple data structure: 6 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3
7 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3 3
– directly store each layer as a single table 8 2 2 4 4 2 2 2 3 3 3
(basically, each is analagous to a “spreadsheet”) 9 2 2 4 4 2 2 2 3 3 3

– no computer data base management system required

(although some GIS systems incorporate them)

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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Representing Data using the Vector Model:
general concept
The fundamental concept of vector GIS is that all geographic
features in the real work (or on a map) can be represented either
as:
• points or dots (nodes): trees, poles, fire plugs, airports, cities
• lines (arcs): streams, streets, sewers,
• areas (polygons): land parcels, cities, counties, forest, rock type
Which is used in a particular instance depends on scale, among
other things: airport or manhole may be a point or polygon
Because representation depends on shape, ArcView refers to files
containing spatial data as shapefiles

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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Representing Data using the Vector Model:
formal application

• point (node): 0-dimension

– single x,y coordinate pair 2
y=2
. Point: 7,2
– zero area x=7
1
– tree, oil well, label location 1
7 8
• line (arc): 1-dimension
2
– two (or more) connected x,y
coordinates Line: 7,2 8,1
1
– road, stream
7
• polygon : 2-dimensions 8

– four or more ordered and 2

connected x,y coordinates Polygon: 7,2 8,1 7,1 7,2
– first and last x,y pairs are the same 1
– encloses an area 7 8
– census tracts, county, lake

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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Representing Data using the Vector Model:
data implementation

•Features in the theme (coverage) have

unique identifiers--point ID, polygon ID,
arc ID, etc
Y •common identifiers provide link to:
1 5 –coordinates table (for ‘where)
–attributes table (for what)
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2 3 Coordinates Table Attributes Table
Point ID x y Point ID model year
1 1 3 1 a 90
2 2 1 2 b 90
3 4 1 3 b 80
X 4 1 2 4 a 70
5 3 2 5 c 70

•concepts are those of a relational data base,

which is really a prerequisite for the vector model
(or need object-oriented computing environment)
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 File Formats for Vector Spatial Data
Coverage: vector data format introduced with ArcInfo in 1981
• multiple physical files (12 or so) in a folder
• proprietary: no published specs & ArcInfo required for changes
Shape ‘file’: vector data format introduced with ArcView in 1993
• comprises several (at least 3) physical disk files (with extension of
.shp, .shx, .dbf), all of which must be present f
• openly published specs so other vendors can create shape files
Geodatabase: new format introduced with ArcGIS 8.0 in 2000
• Multiple layers saved in a singe .mdb (MS Access-like) file
• Proprietary, “next generation” spatial data file format

Shapefiles are the simplest and most commonly used

format and will generally be used in the class exercises.
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Projection, Scale, Accuracy and Resolution
key data properties
• Projection: the method by which the curved 3-D surface of the
earth is represented by X,Y coordinates on a 2-D flat map/screen
– distortion is inevitable
• Scale: the ratio of distance on a map to the equivalent distance
on the ground
– in theory GIS is a scale independent but in practice there is an implicit range
of scales for data output in any project
• Accuracy: how well does the database info match the real world
– Positional: how close are features to their real world location?
– Consistency: do feature characteristics in database match those in real world
• is a road in the database a road in the real world?
– Completeness: are all real world instances of features present in the database?
• Are all roads included.
• Resolution: the size of the smallest feature able to be recognized
– for raster data, it is the pixel size
The tighter the specification, the higher the cost.
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Computing Environments:
Structured Programming & Classical Data Base
• data is strictly separated from the instructions which process that data
• a step by step list of instructions (computer code) is necessary for every action
• data is maintained in a data base
• data bases comprises multiple tables each made up of rows (or entities, such as
counties) and columns (or attributes, such as population counts)
• all phenomena had to be reduced to row/column, entity/attribute representation
• in a relational data base management system (RDBMS), tables are joined
(related) ‘on the fly’ based on common identifiers (id’s, such as county name)
present in both tables
• this was considered to be ‘compute intensive,’ at least until very recently
• because spatial data has even more stringent performance requirements than
‘normal’ data (e.g. to produce graphics with reasonable response time), GIS
systems traditionally used proprietary , special purpose RDBMS (such as INFO)
• now, with the dramatic increase in computer performance, the GIS industry is
incorporating “industry standard” RDBMS’s (ORACLE, INGRES, INFORMIX,
SYBASE)
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 RDBMS: Example
Parcel Table
Parcel # Address Block $ Value
8 501 N Hi 1 105,450
9 590 N Hi 2 89,780
36 1001 W. Main 4 101,500
75 1175 W. 1st 12 98,000

Geography Table
Block District Tract City
1 A 101 Dallas
2 B 101 Dallas
4 B 105 Dallas
12 E 202 Garland
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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Computing Environments: Object Oriented Environment
• objects contain data (or properties) and the code to act on that data
– thus, data is integrated with the code intended to act on that data
– Ex.: water valve connecting two pipe segments (rather than node connecting 2 arcs)
• objects are responsible to carry out their own operations
– thus, step by step instructions for actions are not needed
• complex data (such as spatial or multi-media) can be represented as a glob
– doesn’t need to be “artificially” reduced to row/column format
• objects are intended as reusable components,
– can be combined in different ways to produce other applications or desired results
• most new GIS software implementations (including ArcView, ArcInfo v.8,
Intergraph GeoMedia) are object based
• newest versions of standard RDBMS can incorporate “glob” data directly or
through “middleware” such as ArcSDE (spatial database engine)
• object components for doing fundamental GIS operations (e.g. display theme,
pan, zoom, projections) can also be purchased (e.g ESRI’s Map Objects)

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09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 Software for GIS: The Main Players
• ESRI, Inc., Redlands, CA
– clear market leader with about a third of the market
– originated commercial GIS with their ArcInfo product in 1981 The main two
– privately owned by Jack Dangermond, a legend in the field “pure GIS”
– Strong in gov., education, utilities and business logistics companies.
• MapInfo, Troy N.Y.
– Aggressive newcomer in early 1990s, but now well-established.
– Strong presence in business, especially site selection & marketing, and telecom
• Intergraph (Huntsville, AL)
– origins in proprietary CAD hardware/software
– Older UNIX-based MGE (Modular GIS Environment) evolved from CAD
– “new generation” GeoMedia product based on NT is now their main focus
– strong in design, public works, and FM (facilities management)
• Bentley Systems (Exton, PA)
– MicroStation GeoGraphics, originally developed with Intergraph, is now their exclusive
and main product..
– Strong in engineering; advertises itself as “geoengineering”
• Autodesk (San Rafael, CA)
– Began as PC-based CAD, but now the dominant CAD supplier
– First GIS product AutoCAD Map introduced in 1996
– Primarily small business/small city customer base
 Software for GIS: other players
Vector GIS
• Smallworld Systems
(Englewood, CO)
– first to use OO (early ‘90s),
but failed to compete as
established vendors did
same
– Purchased by GE in 2000
– emphasis on FM & utilities
• Manifold
(CDA International Corp):
– low cost, but low market
share
• Maptitude
(Caliper Corp, Newton, MA):
– another low cost one
09/10/96 Ron Briggs, UTDallas
Raster GIS
• ERDAS/Imagine
– long established leader
• ER MAPPER
– very agressive newcomer originating in
Australia
• Envi,
– relative newcomer, radar specialization,
now (2000) Kodak owned
• PCI
– long-term Canadian player
• CARIS
– newer Canadian entry
• GRASS (Rutgers Univ.)
– Classic old-timer originally developed by
US Army Construction Engineering
Research Lab(CERL) in Champaign, IL;
– army ended dev. & support in 1996 but
assumed by Baylor University.
• IDRSI (Clark Univ)
– pioneering, university-developed package
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POEC 6381 Introduction to GIS
 ESRI Product Line-up: ArcGIS
• ArcExplorer
– Free viewer for geographic data
• ArcGIS Desktop: three primary modules (MS NT/2000 only)
• ArcMap: for data display, map production, spatial analysis, data editing
• ArcCatalog: for data management and preview
• ArcToolbox: for specialized data conversions and analyses
Available capabilities within these modules are “tiered”
• ArcView: viewing, map production, spatial analysis, basic editing
• ArcEditor: ArcView, plus specialized editing
• ArcInfo: above, plus special analyses and conversions
Extensions for special apps.: Spatial Analyst, 3D Analyst, Geostatistics, Business
• ArcGIS Workstation (for UNIX and MS NT/2000)
– the old command line ArcInfo 7.1
• ArcObjects (previously MapObjects)
– set of OLE/COM automation objects for mapping and GIS to incorporate into OO
application development environments such as VB, Delphi and Powerbuilder
• ArcIMS (replaces AV Internet Map Server and Map Objects Internet Map Server)
– Software to develop Internet server-based mapping and analysis
• SDE (Spatial Database Engine)
– middleware to support spatial data storage in standard DBMS (Oracle, SQL-Server)