GeoAmbassador – Michael P. Finn ( U. S. Geological Survey)

It is my great pleasure to introduce Michael P. Finn as our GeoAmbassador. Michael P. Finn is a Research Cartographer in the U. S. Geological Survey’s Center of Excellence for Geospatial Information Science. He holds a BS in Geography with a Minor in Cartography and Map Technology from Southwest Missouri State University (now Missouri State University) and an MS in Civil Engineering from Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University. Mike has worked as a Computer and IT Specialist, and a Research Cartographer with the US Geological Survey for the past 17 years. He also has 10 years of experience with the US Air Force and 7 years with the Defense Mapping Agency.

mikefinn

Mike Finn

Mike serves or has served on the Boards of Directors of the Cartography and Geographic Information Society (CaGIS), the American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (ASPRS), and the Cyberinfrastructure Specialty Group of the Association of American Geographers (AAG). He has also served as the Director of the GIS Division for ASPRS. Mike is currently serving as President of CaGIS after serving as President-Elect in 2015 and Vice President in 2014. In addition, Mike is a member of the Editorial Board for the journal Cartography and Geographic Information Science.

For international scientific service, Mike is currently serving as Vice-Chair of the International Cartographic Association (ICA) Commission on Open Source Geospatial Technologies for the 2015 – 2019 term. In addition, he is and has been an active member of the ICA Commission on Map Projections. Previously, Mike served as a Co-Chair of the International Society for Photogrammetry & Remote Sensing’s (ISPRS) Technical Commission IV (TC – Geodatabases and Location Based Services), Working Group 4 (Geospatial Data Infrastructure) for the XXIIIrd ISPRS Congress (2012 – 2016) and Co-Chair of the TC IV (Geodatabases and Digital Mapping), WG 1 (Geospatial Data Infrastructure) for the XXIInd ISPRS Congress (2008 – 2012).

His research interests are in data-intensive and high-performance computing for scientific applications using digital geospatial data; in geodesy, spatial coordinate systems, and map projections; in quantitative approaches to imaging in environmental modeling and GIS. Mike is the Principal Investigator for CEGIS’ research project for Data-Intensive and High-Performance Computing. The principal objective is to explore data-intensive and high-performance computing, particularly within the CyberGIS domain, to support lidar and spatial data processing for te 3D Elevation Program (3DEP) of the US. A second objective is to investigate big data approaches and workflows with lidar and 3DEP as well as other big data integration with other USGS science data.

Mike’s recent research has been focused on on varied spectrum of activities from CyberGIS data services for enhancing the usability of high-resolution national topographic datasets to MPI and parallel file systems for processing large files in the LAS format. He has also worked on CUDA-based parallel map projection methods as well as problems with spatial binning relative to map projections. He has also contributed actively to the scientfic community from serving as member of the Editorial Board of the journal Cartography and Geographic Information Science to International Scientific Committee for the International Cartographic Conference, 2017

Mike and Silvana Comboim has been leading the ICA commission on Open Source Geospatial Technologies . They have successful organised the ICC workshop on Spatial data infrastructures, standards, open source and open data for geospatial (SDI-Open 2015)  jointly with the ICA Commission on Geoinformation Infrastructures and Standards, the Commission on Open Source Geospatial Technologies , Open Source Geospatal Foundation (OSGeo) and the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) on 20 and 21 August 2014 at Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) in Rio and the conference itself http://www.icc2015.org   was a great opportunity to strengthen the “Geo for All” initiative and to reinforce the key projects and research links for the future. Mike organised the workshop on “Advancing GIScience with Open Source Technologies,” on behalf of the ICA Commission on Open Source Geospatial Technologies, held in conjunction with AutoCarto 2016, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. A report with pictures on the workshop can be found at http://icaci.org/summary-of-the-workshop-on-advancing-giscience-with-open-source-technologies/ and https://github.com/mfinnCEGIS/workshopAdvancingGIScienceOST/

Mike is the co-organizer of the International Cartographic Conference 2017 Pre-Conference Workshop on Spatial data infrastructures, standards, open source and open data for geospatial (SDI-Open 2017), Washington, DC (http://icc2017.org/preconference-workshops/ ). I believe OpenSDI is a very important initiative

I want to thank Mike for all his contributions to GeoForAll community. I understand Mike will be retiring from government service later this year but i am sure he will be closely involved with GeoForAll activities as before. We are proud to honour Mike as our GeoAmbassodor and we are extremely grateful for his contributions to Geo for All.

Best wishes,

Suchith

“GeoForAll” Lab of the Month – Czech Technical University in Prague, Czech Republic

It is my great pleasure, to introduce our colleagues at Faculty of Civil Engineering, Department of Geomatics, Czech Technical University (CTU) in Prague, Czech Republic as our “GeoForAll” lab of the month. CTU is one of the founding labs as part of the worldwide network of OSGeo laboratories following the motto Geo for All.

The GeoForAll Lab [1] (formerly OSGeo Research and Education Laboratory) is located at the Czech Technical University in Prague, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Department of Geomatics, Czech Republic. Their mission, as one of the laboratories in the OSGeo worldwide university network, is to develop collaboration opportunities for academic, industrial, and government organizations in open source GIS software and data . See the announcement and info at GIM) [2].

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Figure 1 – Summary of CTU’s FOSS4G education activities [4]

The laboratory was established by Martin Landa and was the first lab to be established under the ICA-OSGeo MoU in Czech Republic. It has been expanding and providing support for the development and documentation of open-source geospatial software . The laboratory is devoted to education in geoinformatics using FOSS4G, and to research in open source software development for geospatial applications. CTU in Prague has a strong track record in Geoinformatics . Prof. Aleš Čepek has established a study program in geoinformatics since 2005 (originally with Prof Leoš Mervart), he is the author of project GNU Gama and of a minor project GNU Sqltutor (both hosted at GNU servers) and the editor in chief of Geoinformatics FCE CTU journal [2].

The major focus of CTU GeoForAll lab is software development. They are contributing to various international Open Source Geospatial Software projects, namely GRASS GIS, QGIS, and GDAL. Martin Landa is an OSGeo charter member since 2011 and a member of the GRASS Development Team since 2006. He is actively involved in the GRASS project as the lead architect of graphical user interface (GUI) development and PostGIS integration in GRASS vector architecture.

I am impressed to see the excellent student projects done at CTU. For example for the Google Summer of Code 2016 , Adam Laža’s project on “Complete basic cartography suite in GRASS GIS wxGUI Map Display” and Ondřej Pešek’s project on “PyQt GUI generated from XML” are great exampes of contributions from the CTU sutdent community to the wider OSGeo community.

There is also an impressive range of Masters student projects [3] of GeoForAll (OSGeoREL) Lab at CTU in Prague at https://github.com/ctu-geoforall-lab-projects/

I would like to thank Martin and all colleagues and students at CTU for their contributions to the GeoForAll initiative . We are looking forward to working and building more collaborations with all interested on this education mission.

Best wishes,

Suchith

[1] http://geomatics.fsv.cvut.cz/research/geoforall/

[2]https://www.gim-international.com/content/news/open-source-geospatial-and-education-laboratory

[3] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNy1pEGYxypkpQfx4m8qWGA

[4]http://geo.fsv.cvut.cz/~landa/publications/2012/ogrs2012/poster/landa-ogrs2012-poster.pdf

How NASA and the United Nations are using location intelligence to build smart cities in developing countries

Very interesting article on How NASA and the United Nations are using location intelligence to build smart cities in developing countries is at

https://www.devex.com/news/how-nasa-and-the-un-are-using-location-intelligence-to-build-smart-cities-in-developing-countries-89721

GeoForAll is very happy to be part of these excellent global developments happening at all levels and dimensions.There is also strong synergies with UN OpenGIS Initiative. We encourage all to be part of the various calls from Global Food Security to SMARTIES Entrepreneurship competitions [1],[2][3] to expand ideas.

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We welcome everyone interested to join synergies and work together to expand OpenCitySmart opportunities[4][5] and enable Geo technologies in empowering communities and helping improving the Quality of Life and standards of living for everyone. Let us all work together to help create a world that is more accessible, equitable and full of innovation and opportunities for everyone.

[1] http://aims.fao.org/es/activity/blog/godan-local-farming-challenge-2017

[2] https://opensourcegeospatial.icaci.org/2017/03/smarties-entrepreneurship-competition-nasa-europa-challenge-2017/

[3] https://opensourcegeospatial.icaci.org/2017/01/invitation-to-nasa-citysmart-challenge-solutions-for-sustainable-cities-2/

[4] https://opensourcegeospatial.icaci.org/2016/02/opencitysmart-the-open-platform-for-smart-cities/

[5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWuMfMMPfPw

The Rise of OpenStreetMap as a World Mapping Agency

The Geospatial IG [1] of the Research Data Alliance will be meeting in Barcelona on 5th April 2017 to keep building ideas for the global research agenda for Geospatial Data Science.

https://www.rd-alliance.org/ig-geospatial-rda-9th-plenary-meeting

I would also like to make use of the Geospatial IG meeting opportunity at RDA9 in Barcelona to further discuss ideas on the rise of OpenStreetMap (OSM) as a World Mapping Agency (WMA) build by the efforts of thousands of volunteers.   It is also interesting to see the community links of the OpenStreetMap and  the Open Source Geospatial Foundation (OSGeo) expanding rapidly both locally and globally. OSM has now reaching the level of a Global Mapping Agency build by the efforts of thousands of volunteers and OSGeo is the world’s largest geospatial ecosystem.  What a great combination of synergies. Both initiatives are just over a decade  old and have fundamentally changed the whole geolandscape.

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Myself and colleagues are working on a paper on OSM and OSGeo and i want to use this meeting to discuss more ideas with the community. I look forward to welcome you all to RDA meeting in Barcelona.

Best wishes,

Suchith

EUROGEO 2017

The EUROGEO 2017 Conference is organised in Amsterdam, The Netherlands on 2-3 March 2017.

Geographical education is facing many challenges at schools and in higher education. The purpose of EUROGEO 2017 is to examine some of these issues and their possible responses.

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EUROGEO 2017 will aim to address cross-cutting issues such as:

  • How does geographical education respond to needs of society and the world around us?
  • Does geographical education give young people the necessary tools they need to think spatially?
  • How do new technologies and open access to data help engage youngsters?
  • How should education respond to the ever-increasing importance of geographic information?

 

GeoAmbassador  – Dr. Rafael Moreno-Sanchez

Today, The Open Source Geospatial Foundation celebrates our 11th Anniversary. On behalf  of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation i would like to  send our greetings to everyone on the happy occassion of 11th Anniversary of when our  Foundation was founded (4th Feb 2006) at http://www.osgeo.org/node/1672

It is my great pleasure to introduce Dr. Rafael Moreno-Sanchez as our GeoAmbassador. Rafael is currently working at the Department of Geography and Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado Denver, USA. He has a bachelor’s degree in forestry from the Chapingo Autonomous University in Mexico. He received his Ph.D. in Natural Resources Management from Colorado State University in the USA. Before joining academia full time in 1996, he was a researcher for the National Institute for Forest, Livestock, and Agriculture Research (INIFAP) in Mexico; Director of the National Center for Disciplinary Research in Conservation and Improvement of Forest Ecosystems INIFAP (Mexico); and Post-Doctoral Fellow with the Organization of American States—SEMARNAP in collaboration with the University of Western Ontario (Canada). He has been teaching full time since 1996 in the areas of natural resources management, sustainable development, and geographic information science and technology. He is currently in the Department of Geography and Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado Denver.

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Dr. Rafael Moreno-Sanchez

Rafael Moreno led the effort to establish the FOSS4G lab which opened in 2014 in the Department of Geography and Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado (CU Denver) (https://geospatial.ucdenver.edu/foss4g/home-2).

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Since then four new courses fully dedicated to FOSS4G have been created. These offerings add to already existing geographic information system science and technology (GISc&T) courses that use FOSS4G exclusively or for parts of their content. Currently CU Denver offers a total of 38 courses that are core or applied GISc&T. In the fall of 2016 a Certificate in FOSS4G was formally approved by the university Educational Policies and Curriculum Committee. The university is planning to offer this certificate fully online starting in the fall of 2018. Currently the CU Denver FOSS4G lab coordinates the webinar series [1] for Geo4All labs network [2]. A new GIS science and technology research lab at CU Denver opened this spring semester and it will incorporate teaching, research, and service activities in FOSS4G.

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Figure – Activities at FOSS4G lab , CU Denver

 Geo for All is committed to work towards the vision of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development for building a better world for everyone. Open Education is the simple and powerful idea that the world’s knowledge is a public good and that technology in general and the internet in particular provide an extraordinary opportunity for everyone to share, use, and reuse knowledge. Openness is key for true empowerment and sustainability. [3]

Geo for All is a worldwide movement that provides immediate benefit to the world. We will also link the ideas from Maps and Sustainable Development Goals to our Vision 2030 for Open Geospatial Science as there are also lot of synergies and will add momentum for our vision for Open Geospatial Science [4] . We aim to create openness in Geo Education for developing creative and open minds in students which is critical for building open innovation and contributes to building up Open Knowledge for the benefit of the whole society and for our future generations.

We are looking forward to building  strong research and teaching collaborations  worldwide in Open Geospatial Science. We are proud to honour Rafael as our GeoAmbassodor and we are extremely grateful for his contributions to Geo for All.

Happy birthday to OSGeo Foundation and may God’s grace and blessings be with all of us and OSGeo for our efforts to empower everyone with open geo principles  to help create a world that is more accessible, equitable and full of innovation and opportunities for everyone.

Best wishes,

Suchith Anand
http://www.geoforall.org/

[1] http://www.geoforall.org/webinars/

[2] http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Edu_current_initiatives

[3] https://opensourcegeospatial.icaci.org/2016/07/sharing-is-caring-why-openness-is-key-for-true-empowerment-and-sustainability/

[4] https://opensourcegeospatial.icaci.org/2016/06/open-consultation-on-the-vision-2030-for-open-geospatial-science/

 

 

 

 

 

GeoForAll Webinar Series – FOSS4G at The National Renewable Energy Laboratory

On behalf of GeoForAll, we would like to welcome you to our next webinar which might be  of interest to wider community.Details on the webinar on Friday December 2, 2016 at 7:00 PM GMT and how to connect remotely below. 
 
 
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) is the United States’ primary laboratory for renewable energy and energy efficiency research and development. Details at http://www.nrel.gov
Talk details and how to connect are at http://www.geoforall.org/webinars/
 
Please join at https://ucdenver.zoom.us/j/173408130If you can’t attend, presentation recording will be posted in the Geo4All YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCL1E2akvCNWP_nC0p5CpB8g
FOSS4G Tools for Geospatial Analysis at the National Renewable Energy Lab: A Pragmatic Approach
Presented by Nick Grue
The proliferation of geospatial analysis tools and methods means that no matter what your analysis goals, there are likely several options for running analysis, generating data, and visualizing your results. With a wide selection of tools to choose from, you are also presented with the question of which tool is most useful, has highest performance and efficiency, and easiest to use for your case.Here at the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL), we had the unique opportunity to start fresh with building a new analysis model, and had to decide which technologies would be most useful. We eventually ended up primarily using Python for analysis, and PostGIS and Geoserver for visualization. Deciding on those tools took a fair amount of testing and comparison. This webinar will discuss the different tests we ran, our findings, and why some tools appeared to be better suited for our case than others.Analysis tools discussed in this webinar will include PostGIS vector analysis, PostGIS raster analysis, Python analysis of vector datasets, Python vectorized analysis of raster datasets, Python multiprocessing, and Geoserver visualization.

=====================================
Dan Getman of the NREL did an excellent presentation last year on “Creation, Analysis, Sharing, and Visualization of Complex Spatiotemporal Data Using Free and Open Source Software at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory”.The recording is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0NTPFzGXn8&feature=youtu.be
We thank Rafael Moreno  and colleagues  at the University of Colarado Denver, USA for their help  in organising the GeoForAll free webinars for the benefit of the wider community.

OPEN FIELDS

Today, nearly 800 million people suffer from hunger and malnutrition around the world. For the first time in human history, we have the knowledge and the tools to put an end to it. Open data makes that knowledge available to everyone [1].

At the 2012 G-8 Summit, G-8 leaders committed to the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition, the next phase of a shared commitment to achieving global food security. As part of this commitment, they agreed to “share relevant agricultural data available from G-8 countries with African partners and convene an international conference on Open Data for Agriculture, to develop options for the establishment of a global platform to make reliable agricultural and related information available to African farmers, researchers and policymakers, taking into account existing agricultural data systems.”

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The GODAN initiative was announced at the Open Government Partnership Conference in October 2013 following 2012 G8 discussions.  Participants made commitments to Open Data for Agriculture at the International Conference on Open Data for Agriculture in Washington D.C. Subsequently the Governments of the United States and United Kingdom partnered to form this global initiative.


I am really happy to get the opportunity to work for the  Global Open Data for Agriculture and Nutrition (GODAN) . I am seconded from the University of Nottingham to GODAN now.  I would like to invite you all to know more about the amazing work that GODAN  is doing  and join us. Some introduction slides that i presented on GODAN  at AgriGIS ThinkTank at Kenya last month are at  https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/genius/documents/godan-uon-intro.pdf


OPEN FIELDS is the second episode of GODAN’s new documentary web series that meets individuals around the world who are on the frontline of how technology and data are reshaping agriculture to combat food insecurity and improve global nutrition. In this episode, viewers meet Eunice, a successful smallholder farmer who lives outside of Mombasa, Kenya. In Kenya, around 80 per cent of people have access to some form of farmable land. Although the soil is rich and fertile for farming, many plots of land stand empty or with failed crops.In the Mombasa region, Haller Foundation (a GODAN partner) have been working with local farmers for 50 years to design organic methods to improve crop production and also provide a solid economic stream for rural families.

Eunice has found success in maximizing her crop yield by using the open-source mobile phone app from the Haller Foundation. With an estimated 83% of Kenya now online, largely through mobile phones, Haller Farmers App has been developed to digitise and release local knowledge on a global scale, to anyone, anywhere. The application is free to use for anyone with a smartphone and internet access. They have also worked with Free Basics and Airtel Kenya to improve rural access for low income families, providing free data to download and use the app.

 


Let us now all work together on our joint mission  to get every government, non­-governmental, international and private sector organization to make agriculture and nutrition data available, accessible and usable so that we acheive the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal on End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture. So please join the Open Data Revolution to end global hunger and together we can make this possible.

Best wishes,

Suchith

Dr. Suchith Anand

http://www.geoforall.org/

GeoForAll – Building and expanding Open Geospatial Science


[1] https://opensourcegeospatial.icaci.org/2016/10/reflections-from-godan-summit-2016-join-the-open-data-revolution-to-end-global-hunger/

Happy PostGIS Day

Happy PostGIS Day 🙂

On behalf of GeoForAll community, I am pleased to share the latest edition of our newsletter. Thanks to Dr Nikos Lambrinos (Chief Editor) and our amazing team of editors for making this possible.

Download the latest newsletter at http://www.geoforall.org/newsletters/

We would like to introduce our colleagues at Department of Geoinformatics, Palacký University in Olomouc, Czech Republic as our “GeoForAll” lab of the month. Details at https://opensourcegeospatial.icaci.org/2016/11/geoforall-lab-of-the-month-department-of-geoinformatics-palacky-university-in-olomouc-czech-republic/

We are also happy to present Victoria Rautenbach from the Centre of Geoinformation Science (CGIS) at the University of Pretoria (UP) in South Africa. as our GeoAmbassador. It is even more great pleasure to have another GeoAmbassodor Dr. Serena Coetzee (the GeoForAll chair of Africa ) who nominated Victoria for us. I want to thank Serena for introducing to us a great colleague as our GeoAmbassodor of the month and sending us all the details at https://opensourcegeospatial.icaci.org/2016/11/geoambassador-of-the-month-victoria-rautenbach/

GeoForAll’s mission is make geospatial education opportunities open to all and to make sure we all work together to create global citizens contributing to the betterment of humanity. Please be our GeoAmbassadors and share these ideas with all. Open principles in education (open educational resources, free and open software, open data, open standards etc) are key for true empowerment of staff and students globally and making education and opportunities accessible to all . We look forward to working and building collaborations with all interested in this education mission. Access to quality education and opportunities is key for getting rid of extreme poverty and enabling broadly shared prosperity for all.

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The Open Source Geospatial Foundation  is the world’s largest Geospatial ecosystem , so we welcome you to the huge network of our partners and collaborators globally from governments, industry , universities, NGOs worldwide that you can connect to  expand your ideas rapidly. Open innovation is key in driving Digital Economy opportunities and we are determined to make sure that everyone benefits.

May the FOSS be with everyone…

Best wishes,

Suchith

Dr. Suchith Anand
http://www.geoforall.org/
https://opensourcegeospatial.icaci.org

GeoForAll – Building and expanding Open Geospatial Science

“GeoForAll” Lab of the Month – Department of Geoinformatics, Palacký University in Olomouc, Czech Republic

Dear GeoForAll Colleagues,

It is my great pleasure to introduce our colleagues at Department of Geoinformatics, Palacký University in Olomouc, Czech Republic as our “GeoForAll” lab of the month. I thank Dr Rostislav Netek for providing all the background information and photos of the activities of the lab which is summarized in this article.

“The Department of Geoinformatics, Palacký University in Olomouc, Czech Republic is a leading department in Czech Republic in fields of Cartography nad Geoinformatics. It guarantees the bachelor study, the master study and PhD study. They are the 100th member of GeoForAll. In research, their staff focus their activity on geoinformatics topics, development and application of GIS as well as free and open source solutions.

fig1

The Department of Geoinformatics was founded in 2001. Nowadays, the Department of Geoinformatics is a separate academic department that offers high quality education and research. It is renowned both nationally and internationally.  The main fields are geoinformatics and geoinformation technologies in education and research, and their promotion, both in the Czech Republic and abroad. Its activities encompass teaching in the field of geoinformatics with special emphasis on geographical aspects, research projects that follow international trends and promotion of modern geoinformation technologies in all spheres of the Czech society. The Department owns two specialised laboratories for geoinformation systems and remote sensing and one research laboratory for the eye-tracking technique in cartography. It uses state-of-the-art equipment and software. Its teaching activities are accompanied by cooperation with prominent national commercial companies in the field as well as renowned foreign universities. The teachers do their best to react to the individual needs of students of bachelor, master and doctoral programmes enabling them to take part in research projects, work and gain experience in commercial companies and excel in national specialised student contests.

fig2

The Department of Geoinformatics is a  centre of education and research as well as popular activities in the field of geoinformatics and cartography on national and international scale.

fig3

 

  • Cartographical Days in Olomouc – A  yearly event consisting of lectures by top experts in thematic cartography and selected fields of application organised by the Dept. of Geoinformatics in cooperation with cartographic, geographic, GIS&T and other associations
  • Olomouc Geoinformatics Colloquiums (OGiC) – Invited lectures by prominent foreign experts aimed at academics and the professional public that take part in the activities of the Department of Geoinformatics.
  • Cartographical conferences by the Cartographic Societies of the Czech and Slovak Republic
  • GISday – A global educational event held on the third Wednesday of November each year that enables geographic information systems users and vendors to open doors of the Department to schools, businesses and the general public to showcase real-world applications of GIS
  • An autumn Olomouc (Podzimni Olomouc) – week of lectures and workshops made by external experts from both academic and commercial community, especially focused on technologies, new solutions, etc.
  • In February 2014 The CARTOCON Conference took place at thier Department – the biggest carto conference in middle Europe ever, many prominent visitors from all over the world, four ICA commissions meetings, etc.
  • cz –  Czech local (mini)conference for Free and Open source Software for Geoinformatics (foss4g) took place at their Department last week!

 

In research, the staff focus their activity on general geoinformatics topics, development and application of  geographical information systems, remote sensing, data processing, thematic and digital cartography, landscape spatial modelling, spatial planning in GIS, etc. Currently, the Department‘s  activities concentrate on research fields:  Spatial modelling of geographical phenomena in GIS, Digital cartography, Remote monitoring of landscape, (Open source) GI technologies.

The Department of Geoinformatics cooperates with a number of public institutions and private companies. The cooperation can have the form of a  project, commissioned job or student work.  The longterm partners are primarily the Czech Hydrometeorological Institute, the Czech Statistical Office, the Regional Authority of the Olomouc Region, the Olomouc Municipal Authority,the  SmartGIS company, the Forest Management Institute and the Transport Research Centre, local representation of OSGeo Foundation, etc.

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fig8

 

fig7

Every year, many of their students study abroad at universities all across Europe. There are many contractual partner universities as part of the ERASMUS and CEEPUS programme, e.g. the universities of Bochum, Vienna, Valencia, Salzburg, Belgrade, Krakow, Lublin, Trondheim, Sofia, Budapest and other European cities. Similarly, thier Department receives students and teachers from Poland, Hungary, Spain and Serbia. Recently, they have been able to host among others Richard LeGates, Carsten Jürgens, Lászlo Zentai, Tamas Janczo, Maik Netzband, Ranka Stanković, Dagmara Kociuba, Branislav Bajat, Krzystov Kalamucki, Monika Michálková or Bela Markus, who give lectures as part of the Olomouc Geoinformatics Colloquium (OGiC).

fig6

Especially Assoc. Prof. Vilem Pechanec and Dr. Rostislav Netek are deeply focused in their research into FOSS solutions and technologies. Both of thier lectures and research take benefit from many open source solutions – thier server runs on Apache, webpages are powered by WordPress, for GIT/GIS on server-side they use UMN Mapserver, Geoserver, PostgreSQL, PostGIS, SpatiaLite. They also offer every academic year specialized courses such as Scripting in GIS (Python) , GIS online and Web Cartography (Leaflet, OpenLayers, Geoserver), Statistices (R-project), Dynamic web (HTTP Apache, PHP), Freeware a Open Source (GDAL/OGR, FWTools, …), most courses are supported by QGIS software and OSM datasources. Thier staff are involved in membership or open source groups (OSGEO at international level, GeoForAll, OSGEO/FOSS4G at local level ,FOSS expert group within Czech Association for Geoinformation, Open data activities).

Department of Geoinformatics is a  collective member of the Czech Association for Geoinformation (http://www.cagi.cz), co-organises its events and participates in its development. The Department of Geoinformatics is one of the most important bodies in the Czech Republic. Major cartographic activities in the Czech Republic (http://www.czechmaps.cz), the competition provides an organizational map of Children‘s Drawing Contest and Barbara Petchenik. It holds its annual Day of Cartography and in 2009 hosted the 18th cartographic conference.  The Department of Geoinformatics works closely with the Czech Geographic Society (http://www.geography.cz) and is the seat of the Section of Cartography and GIS.  The Department of Geoinformatics works closely with the Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (http://www.sfdp.upol.cz). The Department of Geoinformatics is actively involved in a number of international cartographic associations (http://cartography.tuwien.ac.at/ica/) and is represented in the Commission for National and Regional Atlases. The Department of Geoinformatics supports activities of the  International Geographical Union (http://www.igu-net.org) and is represented in the Commission for Geographical Information Systems. The Department of Geoinformatics is in close contact with the Slovak Association for Geoinformatics (http://www.sagi.sk).”

 

More details are at their web page at http://www.geoinformatics.upol.cz (English version currently under construction :-);

Brochure in English at http://www.geoinformatics.upol.cz/wp-content/uploads/Geoinformatika_brozura_eng.pdf

http://www.geoinformatics.upol.cz/katedra/clenstvi-a-partnerstvi/osgeo

University in Olomouc welcomes collaborations from all interested. Please email Rostislav at rostislav.netek@upol.cz

We thank Rostislav and all colleagues and students at the Department of Geoinformatics, Palacký University in Olomouc, Czech Republic for their contributions to the GeoForAll initiative and look forward to working and building more collaborations with all interested on this education mission.

Happy GIS Day greetings to all.

Best wishes,

Suchith Anand