Backgrounder: spatially enabling CMS content
The following is an outline of a background document on creating spatially enabled content with a CMS. Charles and Dan put this together after the 2006 Vancouver OSCMS.
How to use this document? Some people may only want to to add spatial tags to their nodes (and use canned mapping sources like Google Maps). They will find Sections 5 and 6 most interesting. Others may be interested in getting their own base map data and even serving it. We hope they will find the early sections useful.
We should really use a Wiki tool for this organic document/book. We will look into this.
Index
0. Other Sources of Information
1. Data: Base Maps
2. Data: Base Geocoded Data
3. Data: Client Map Data
3. Data: Other geocoded data
4. Location: IP-based Location Information
5. Location: Spatially Enabling Nodes
6. Bringing it all together in Drupal: work to date
- GMap, Carto, Plazes, Location, Gig
7. Interested People
View full node to see content...
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0. Other Sources of Information
- PlanetGeospatial
Planet Geospatial is an aggregation of public weblogs written by
GIS Professionals and Hobbyists. The opinions expressed in those
weblogs and hence this aggregation are those of the original authors.
Planet Geospatial is maintained by James Fee
1. Data: Base Maps
- free
- satellite raster data, GIS vector data
- e.g. search geoconnections [http://www.geoconnections.org/]
- e.g. sat data [http://glcf.umiacs.umd.edu/]
- better yet, free but someone else is custodian and server!
- GoogleMaps
- Yahoo
- e.g. BC Government (Integrated Land Management Bureau)
- geocoded [standards: http://www.opengeospatial.org/]
- raster
- vector
- open source geocoding / data processing tools
- GDAL (raster) [http://www.remotesensing.org/gdal/index.html]
- OGR (vector) [http://www.remotesensing.org/gdal/ogr/]
- FWTools [http://fwtools.maptools.org/]
- PROJ.4 (projections)
- map data viewers / GIS tools
- OpenEV (FWTools)
- uDig (java tool)
- QGIS
2. Base Geocoded Data
- e.g. National Geospatial Agency (US)
- name servers
- geocoder.us; geocoder.ca
- Brainoff.com [http://brainoff.com/worldkit/geocoder/]
- Yahoo does this too
- * assumption that using WGS84 (same as GPS system)
- MaxMind
-
3. Data: Client Map Data
- security
- storage
- MySQL 5 [http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/spatial-extensions.html]
"MySQL implements spatial extensions following the
specification of the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC).
- PostGIS [http://postgis.refractions.net/]
"PostGIS adds support for geographic objects
to the PostgreSQL object-relational database."
- serving [standards: OpenGIS]
- Mapserver
- Geosever
- Do we need to store data in OGC specific formats?
- No and Yes... Right now ok to have goegraphic information in node module
- later may need tables
- for some clients/problems, you may want to store the data in
tables that have the OGC
4. Location: IP-based Location Information
- Module that does
- Localities (IP-based plus DB behind)
5. Location: Spatially Enabling Nodes
- adding spatial locations to nodes or other information
- mapping metatdata to metadata (e.g. P-CODE to lat/long)
Client Applications
- e.g. polling station monitoring
- dial in asterix server, voice
- entl groups
- tracking news posts and pictures on logging or entl
6. Bringing it all together in Drupal: work to date
- task 1: viewing base maps
- task 2: overlaying client data
- GMap module [http://drupal.org/node/33591]
- original concept: display a map in a node
- xmap
- defined by macro
- any module that wants a map, could make call to this module
- possible to generalise even further...
- "maps" variable with all info, defn, overlays, + external call
- include a google include or yahoo...
- explorer uses
- Carto module [http://drupal.org/node/24727]
- Plazes module [http://drupal.org/node/37281]
- Location API, module [http://drupal.org/project/location]
7. Interested People
(we could start a 'spatially enabled' mailing list...)
Dan Karran http://www.dankarran.com/contact/ dan@karran.net
Charles Burnett http://www.mapswest.com cburnett@uvic.ca (setaceous@drupal.org)
James (webgear@drupal.org)
Eric Gunderson eric@developementseed.org