Currently most of the proprietary GIS software systems lack sophisticated geographical analysis technology. Attempts over the last decade to persuade the system developers to add spatial analysis functionality has so far failed to have much visible impact. The traditional arguments seemingly still apply; viz. no strong market demand, fear of statistical complexity, lack of suitable GIS-able met...

Geographic information systems (GIS) technology and methods have transformed decision-making in society by bringing geographic analysis to the desktop computer. Although some educators consider GIS to a promising means for implementing reform, it has been adopted by less than 2% of American high schools. The reasons behind the interest in GIS, its slow implementation, and its effectiveness in t...

The need for global access and decentralized management of geographic information is pushing the GIS community to establish an open GIS architecture and provide distributed geographic information services. From an operational perspective, the role of client/server components underlie specification of task-oriented programming, and the modularization of GIS software. Exchange of geographic infor...

We describe a uniied framework for representing and manipulating binary topological relationships between complex regions, which are arbitrary compositions of homogeneous 2-dimensional surfaces, possibly with holes. Previously, compositions of regions and regions with holes were treated separately and in a restrictive scenario, where it is required that the composing regions should be disconnec...

We present an ontology and agent communication language (ACL) for an agent-based Geographic Information System (GIS). The ontology is comprised of three critical components necessary to exchange information between GIS-domain agents, systems, or organizations, including: vector, raster, and image data; algorithms descriptions including name, inputs, outputs, and required parameters; and query/r...

Ericsson uses GIS as the core component integrating Business Consulting, Cellular, Transmission, and Datacom Planning departments. The GIS infrastructure is composed of servers and desktop software, integrating the other systems used by Ericsson, such as TEMS and VPI. The result is an ArcSDE/ArcIMS server that stores and shares all the geodatabase with Ericsson users, clients and partners in Br...

This paper discusses the provision of GIS to non-GIS users. Intelligence plays a vital role in combating not only international terrorism but also domestic crimes. In order to explore the full potential of the intelligence materials available, GIS technology shall be made more accessible to non-GIS users, such as frontline police officers and other law enforcement agents. A standalone police/se...