Geospatial Infrastructure

for Collaboration

http://worldmap.harvard.edu

WorldMap WorkshopMarch, 2013

Ben Lewis blewis@cga.harvard.edu

What is WorldMap?

• A new way to share geospatial information• Blends library and workbench• Online creation and publishing• Fine-grained access control• Service oriented architecture• Collaboration at levels of code, hosting, and

functionality

WorldMap Allows One to…

• Discover data and visualize it in new ways• Organize one’s own (large) mapping datasets

online• Mashup / Overlay one’s data with those of

others• Animate change over time for large datasets• Collaborate by letting several people edit the

same map• Publish your data to the world or to just a few

collaborators

Between powerful desktop-bound apps, and lightweight web apps

Analysis

Eas

e of

Use

Collaboration WorldMap

Google Earth

ArcGIS

Download WorldMap workshop materials

• Login to your computer. If you don’t have a FAS account, use: Login: cga-gis Password: ArcMap10

• Go to http://gis.harvard.edu– Click Learn GIS > Non Credit Training – Scroll down to WorldMap Training– Click Download Workshop Materials– Unzip and save this folder on your desktop

– Open a web browser, and go to http://worldmap.harvard.edu

How is WorldMap Different?

Most good data outside Harvard• Vast amount of spatial information in the

world, some digital, some not, some georeferenced, some not, most of it not online.

• Much data generated in the course of research cannot be made public during the investigation but could be afterwards.

• Most data ends in a drawer because no way to share; next researcher reinvents the wheel.

Upload, Create, Share

Universities, schools

Scholars outside the academy

Memory institutions

Government agencies

Businesses

Permeable Membrane for Web-Enabling Data

* The Research Lifecycle:• Scoping• Data gathering /

exploration• Synthesis / analysis• Writing / communication• Publishing / delivery

Internet

Sharing via system interoperability

Commercial Systems

local data local data

Government Systems

Other Institutions

WMS, WFS, RSS etc.

WorldMap Database

dow

nloa

dupload

upload

uplo

ad download

local data

download

WorldMap in the Classroom

“World Religions and Multicultural America” taught by Diana Eck

“Reinventing Boston: The Changing American City” taught by Rob Sampson and David Luberoff

“Societies of the World 28” taught by Kelly O’Neill“Environmental Management of Tourism

Development” taught by Megan Epler Wood“The African City”, “The African Past: Art and History

to 1800” taught by Suzanne Blier “Chinese History 200R”, “Societies of the World 12”,

“Culture and Belief 26” taught by Peter BolApprox 8 more coming

Recent features…

Layer creation toolsLinking features to multi-media contentAbility to load Picasa and YouTube feeds as layersWorldMap Gazetteer

Features in Development…

• Time Animation of large datasets• Mobile client• Annotation• Ranking commenting tools• Spatial analysis tools• Heatmap visualization tools

System Statistics

Since Release in July:• 6712 registered users• 6181 data layers – 111,486 fields• 1595 maps published• 1000 visits / day average

Open Source Code

Source code available

https://github.com/cga-harvard/cga-worldmap

Platform Collaborators

TelaScience

Recent Support From…

Lee and Juliet Folger Fund

TelaScience

thank you

Jeff Blossom

Center for Geographic Analysis

jblossom@cga.harvard.edu

Integration with ArcGIS

Input• Esri Shapefile• GeoTIFF• SLDOutput• Esri Shapefile• JSON• GeoTIFF• KML, GML

Web Services• Esri Open REST• WMS• WMS-C• WFS• WCS• CSW

open standards-based input

• ESRI REST Services• OGC web services • ESRI Shapefile, zip compressed or not• GeoTIFF• Styled Layer Descriptors (SLD)

Open standards-based output

Download Formats:• Zipped Shapefile• GML 2.0• GML 3.1• CSV• Excel• GeoJSON• JPEG• PDF• PNG• KML• Linked KML

Metadata Format:• ISO TC211