Just to prove that GIS users are “hip” and “cool” here is a video that takes a contemporary “rap” artist’s song and adapts it with GIS- specific lyrics. I really “dig” this, especially the “sweet” line about geodatabases.

ESRI have released the first service pack for ArcGIS 10. The list of fixes is enormous and having encountered several of the bugs so I would highly recommend you perform the update. The ArcGIS Desktop 10 service pack is 361mb in size so make sure you have a decent internet connection.The download page is here. When I tried it I was getting a download speed of less than 1mb/ sec so if you administer for multiple users it may be worth uploading the file to your own server. It is reasonably straightforward to install. Simply double click your downloaded file and follow the steps. Don’t believe the estimated time remaining as it said 2 minutes for me throughout the installation that took approximately 5. If you rely on a license server you may need to re-approve the external connections required and then re-open ArcGIS Desktop for it to work.

Overall I found the app to be very impressive. You are greeted with a world map that you can instantly interact with by panning and zooming in the usual way.

The map tiles loaded surprisingly quickly- it took approx 5 seconds to zoom from the above view to building level with only 1 bar of signal.

Users can search for places of interest…

…but this provided the only disappointment with the map appearing to lack the required data.

Zooming out a little resolved this problem, but I am not sure how many people would think to do this. I suspect the problem is relatively easily  addressed and may well be in future updates. Offering standard maps is not particularly innovative and not what the app sets out to achieve. The real innovation is the ability to view layers available from the ArcGIS.com website. You can, for example, use OpenStreetMap as the base map

or overlay additional information, in this case the Gulf Oil Spill Forecast:

Navigation to layers is straightforward:

I especially like the fact that users can add their own servers and also bookmark their favourite layers. On top of these features users can measure distances and calculate areas.

I found these tools to be extremely intuitive and I expect they will become an integral part to many field based introductory GIS courses. In a recent talk I attended, Jack Dangermond said that GIS software in the past was made to be complicated. With this application ESRI have demonstrated that GIS can be made to be easy. I think all who use this app both from within and beyond GIS with be genuinely impressed.

**I have just discovered a more in depth review worth reading from James Fee’s GIS blog.**

Jack Dangermond head of ESRI, the world’s largest GIS software company, presented the AGI Education keynote at UCL on Monday 7th June. The talk entitled “Some Developments in GIS” focussed on current innovations in GIS software and on the direction in which the field is heading. He acknowledged the instrumental role that UCL has played in the development of GIS with, for example, one of the first GIS PhD theses, written by Roger Tomlinson and supervised by Peter Wood, originating from the Department of Geography. Jack also gave credit to Carl Steinitz, a former lecturer of his and now visiting professor in the Bartlett School of Architecture, for instrumental input into his academic development.

The Department of Geography was the first outside of North America to be awarded “ESRI Development Center” status and has been working closely with the company. Each year the Development Center awards its Outstanding Student of the Year prize. This year, I had the honour of being awarded his certificate from Jack Dangermond after the lecture. Jack was interested in my research, having already searched for the spatial distribution of ‘Dangermond’s’ using the UCL Department of Geography’s WorldNames database.

Jack was in the UK to be awarded the prestigious Founder’s Medal from the Royal Geographical Society. During his acceptance speech he spoke of what GIS has already achieved and its growing potential to improve people’s lives throughout the world.

The 2010 UK election results have been visualised in hundreds of different ways. The map below is another contribution. We have used the RGB Colour Model to create the colours. The colour model works by mixing Red, Green and Blue to produce the final colour (more details below).We have given the Conservatives blue, Labour red and all other parties (incl. Liberal Democrats, Scottish National Party, Plaid Cymru, Green Party etc) green. How red, green or blue the constituency is depends on the proportion of the vote won by each of the three groups. So dark blue’s are very Conservative, purples are Conservative/ Labour, turquoise is Conservative/ Lib Dem (and others), yellows are others/ Labour and greys represent an even split between all three groups. It is a reasonably intuitive way of getting a general impression of the views of the people of the UK, and crucially includes all the votes that get ignored when a single colour is assigned to each constituency based on the party to win the seat. It is a shame that we have to group the Lib Dems. and smaller parties together so if you are interested in the exact break down of results you can see it here.

The Details

The proportion of each colour to go into the mix is controlled by a saturation value of between 0-255. To produce this value we re-scaled the percentage of the vote won by each of the groups to a value of between 0-255. So if Labour won 100% of the vote the red value would be 255 and the green and blue values would be assigned 0. If Labour (red) won approx 50% of the vote, the other parties (green) 10 % and conservatives (blue) 40% the rgb value would be (128, 25, 102) to produce a purple colour. A three way split (85, 85, 85) would be grey. To enhance the range of colours we have stretched them out a little to make the differences a little clearer. We know there are limitations of the RGB colour model but the UK elections is one of the few examples where there are generally three possible outcomes for each constituency, so the results lend themselves to this type of visualisation.

GIS Developer:

Reporting to the TSG Technology Manager, the role of the GIS Developer is to support the sales process through the development of bespoke demonstration applications, and to work with Customers and Business Partner organisations to provide  technical advice and guidance. The role requires the individual to be both analytical and Customer facing, therefore experience of working in a Customer facing environment and confidence at presenting to an audience is essential. Ideally the individual will be educated to degree level or above in a Computer Science, Software Engineering or an IT related subject

Ideally the individual will be educated to degree level or above in GIS or an IT related subject.

This role would suit a graduate with at least 1 years post graduate experience.

If you are interested in exploring the above opportunity in more depth, please email (preferably) or write to us, enclosing your CV and details of your availability (both for interview and for job commencement, if successful) and your current and expected salary.

GIS Consultant

Reporting to the TSG Industry Manager, the GIS Consultant is responsible for providing Technical Input (including demonstrations and presentations) to support Customer meetings and other sales / marketing activities. The role requires the individual to be both analytical and Customer facing, therefore experience of working in a Customer facing environment and confidence at presenting to an audience is essential.

Ideally the individual will be educated to degree level or above in GIS or an IT related subject.

This role would suit a graduate with at least 1 years post graduate experience.

If you are interested in exploring the above opportunity in more depth, please email (preferably) or write to us, enclosing your CV and details of your availability (both for interview and for job commencement, if successful) and your current and expected salary.

Applications should be marked ‘Private and confidential’ and submitted to:

HR Department (Email:hrteam@esriuk.com)

ESRI (UK) Ltd, Millennium House, 65 Walton Street, Aylesbury HP21 7QG
Telephone: 01296 745 500

Closing date: 7th May 2010

Following a slightly critical post about the map featured on ESRI’s Geomedicine website I thought I would balance things with a post on a good example (in my opinion) of a mapping service from ESRI. I was really impressed with their Free Embeddable Maps website. Users can select from a number of demographic measures such as population density,  median age, average household size and population change between 2000 and 2009 and map them at a range of scales. Maps can be personalised using a title and direct links to the creator’s website or their email address. My map of New York Median Household Income is here. It would be good to get more data and coverage beyond North America. It would also be nice to enable multiple overlays (perhaps using different forms of representation on the map). The page is only beta so these additions may follow.

I know this kind of thing has been done before, such as with the London Profiler Website, but ESRI’s contribution is remarkably simple to use. Users with no GIS experience will be able to create a map in under a minute.  It can then be embedded in a any web page or linked to via bit.ly. The interface is well-thought out and users can read additional information from the pop-outs that appear when the map when they click on an area of interest. The maps deserve to be utilised by a range of users, but I expect educators and their students stand to benefit most from this excellent free service.