Virtual 3D Cities Anytime, Anywhere

by Bern Szukalski on May 16, 2012

Virtual 3D cities and geodesign in 3D are hot topics these days, and with new and upcoming technology the ability to not just view cityscapes, but do meaningful work, design, and planning around them, is increasingly becoming possible – and more portable.

While many of these developments are part of core ArcGIS (as found in ArcGlobe, ArcScene, and Esri CityEngine) they are also now becoming more broadly available via lightweight desktop and browser-based applications to knowledge workers, planners, and city managers – where many geodesign decisions get made.

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What’s the Big Deal about Big Data?

by Victoria Kouyoumjian on May 7, 2012

The technology tides have shifted again and, as the notion of cloud computing is becoming mainstream across most industries, a new buzzword is emerging: Big Data.  Never heard of it? Simply put, the term refers to the ever-growing mountain of data, generated from myriad sources, that organizations must effectively address.

Big Data Caricature

Courtesy: Keith Mann, Esri

For instance, according to a recent MeriTalk survey, 96% of Federal IT professionals expect their agency’s stored data to grow in the next two years by an average of 64 percent.

Big Data is often described using the Three “V”s:  Velocity, Volume, and Variety.  By example, let’s take a few of the real world case studies gathered by IBM and provided by Mike Rhodin, Senior Vice President at IBM Software Solutions:

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Can Geodesign Help Us Adapt to Climate Change?

by admin on April 23, 2012

The earth’s climate is changing, leading to serious problems for humanity in areas such as food security, health, and public safety. We need to adapt swiftly. But where do we start? Should we reinforce or rebuild existing structures? Or should we abandon existing settlements and relocate the population in some cases? And how can mass rebuilding/relocation efforts be best accomplished from human, environmental, and economic perspectives?

Geodesign is a framework for understanding the complex relationships between human-designed settlements and the changing environment, for quickly planning ways to adapt existing communities and build new ones in a more sustainable manner. This methodology helps us assess risk, identify change, create synergies, develop strategies, adapt to change, and monitor the results. Geodesign takes an interdisciplinary, synergistic approach to solving the critical problems of future design—to optimize location, orientation, and the features of projects at local and global scales.

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New Film Benefits Chimpanzees in the Wild

by admin on April 12, 2012

In celebration of Earth Day, Disneynature is releasing its latest true-life adventure called CHIMPANZEE.  The film follows Oscar, a young chimpanzee with an entertaining approach to life who overcomes several obstacles.  More than just an entertaining movie, it’s also an opportunity for you to learn more about chimpanzees, and ultimately play a role in their conservation.

The Jane Goodall Institute (JGI) has long history of using geospatial technology to help conserve chimpanzee habitat and support surrounding communities.  Dr. Lilian Pintea, JGI’s Director of Conservation Science, explained their approach at the recent Eye on Earth Summit:

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GIS without the Box

by Bern Szukalski on April 6, 2012

The recent Esri Developer Summit (DevSummit) in Palm Springs brought together thousands of developers and GIS professionals from all over the globe. Attendees learned more about building and successfully launching applications built upon the portfolio of tools, components, and software that Esri offers, and had a chance to network and exchange ideas with development team members and peers.

Many Web and mobile developers outside the mostly GIS-oriented community that attended the DevSummit may not be as familiar with these solutions, but they certainly should be, and this was my theme at a recent keynote at the Where 2012 Conference.

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Businesses Embrace the Power of Place

by admin on March 12, 2012
Simon Thompson

Simon Thompson

Technology and the great recession have changed retailing forever. Gone is “Clonetown USA” with its repetitive retail landscape replaced and redesigned to engage the customer on their own terms. Today, it’s all about doing business locally, bringing your store to the customer rather than thinking the customer is inclined to seek you and your products out at your store. AppFire caused a major media buzz when they announced in January 2011 that the average Smartphone user spends just over three quarters of their 84 minutes a day using maps, social networking, and other activities immersed in the Web. The least important thing we now do with our phones is talk!

Smartphones have empowered the tech-savvy consumer and as a result stores are porous. According to the Mobile Movement Study, 95 percent of smartphone users have looked for local information and 70 percent use smartphones while shopping in-store to price compare or find the best place to purchase a product. For the retailer the most important statistic is that about the same number visit the business they search and 53 percent actually purchase.
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Where Are We Going? GIS and the Millennial Generation

by admin on March 2, 2012

Since the dawn of humankind, people have sketched maps on cave walls and rocks. These maps documented and communicated important geographic knowledge, and helped our ancestors make better decisions about the critical choices that determined their survival or demise.

Fast-forward to the 1960s. Computers had arrived on the scene and were beginning to be used to help us solve increasingly complex problems. “It was not until the IT revolution brought new hardware and software, removing earlier constraints, that hopes could begin to be realized and modern GIS could take shape,” Prof. Brian J. L. Berry of the University of Texas, Dallas says in an article titled “Quo Vadimus?” in the upcoming Spring 2012 issue of ArcNews.  “And take shape it has, creating the extraordinary new interdisciplinary area of geospatial information science.”

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GIS and The City 2.0

by admin on February 27, 2012

More than 50% of the 7 billion people inhabiting our planet now live in cities, a number projected to grow to more than 75% during this century. The growth of cities as the center of the human world was highlighted when “The City 2.0” was awarded the 2012 TED Prize.  “For the first time in the history of the prize, it is being awarded not to an individual, but to an idea,” the TED committee stated. “It is an idea upon which our planet’s future depends.”

Clearly cities will play an increasingly important role in our future survival. Cities offer easier access to services, and urban dwellers are more efficient consumers of limited resources. Cities are human destiny. But as our cities become more populated and more numerous, how do we best manage this complexity?

We need to start thinking about cities in a different way.

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Private Clouds: Moving from Hype to Reality (Really!)

by Victoria Kouyoumjian on February 14, 2012

Back in 2008, the term “cloud computing” was barely a glint in the eye of most technology companies.  Perhaps they used SalesForce.com and Gmail, but tossing around the “cloud” terminology wasn’t really de rigueur.

Now it’s hard to imagine tech discussions without some reference to it at least once in conversation.  Seems like it’s everywhere – or at least the terminology is.

In 2009, Esri hitched its geo-wagon to Amazon Web Services (AWS) as our primary cloud provider.  But the general consumer audience was much more familiar with shopping experiences through Amazon.com rather than cloud hosted services off of AWS.  Fast forward less than three years, and things certainly have changed.  AWS has established itself as separate and different from Amazon.com, with a brand synonymous with “cloud” as a globally-known public cloud infrastructure service provider.   And in 2010, Esri announced the availability of ArcGIS Online, initially supported by AWS infrastructure under-the-hood, to bring the ubiquity of a public cloud platform to the geospatial community.

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The Next 20 Years of GIS Education

by admin on February 8, 2012

This is part 2 of my interview with David DiBiase, Director of Education at Esri, about the opportunities and challenges ahead with GIS in education.  [You can read part 1 here]

Have we yet reached a sort of “critical mass” where more educators know about geospatial technologies than don’t know about the technology?

Maps and mapping are certainly part of more people’s day to day lives than ever before. For example, we know that mapping applications are among the most popular apps for smartphones. However, map awareness doesn’t equate with GIS awareness. Relatively few educators, researchers, administrators, and students know how GIS can support learning, help produce research insights, realize efficiencies and better decisions, and provide an edge in the job market. Furthermore, despite the mass market appeal of web mapping, resistance to incorporating GIS assignments in curricula in disciplines like business, economics, education, engineering, political science, and others, persists.

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