Page 114 - DCAP208_Management Support Systems

Unit 7: Business Analytics and Data Visualization

graphics, hyperlinks, images, sound, digital and analogue video and animation. Although many Notes
GIS have been successfully implemented, it has become quite clear that two-dimensional maps
cannot precisely present multidimensional and dynamic spatial phenomena. Moreover, there is
a growing need towards accessing spatial data. It seems that merging GIS and Multimedia is a
way to deal with these issues.
The latest advances in computer industry especially in hardware have led to the development of
the Multimedia and Geographical Information System (GIS) technologies. Multimedia provides
communications using text, graphics, animation, and video. Multimedia GIS systems is a way to
overcome the limitations displayed by the technologies when they are used separately.
Multimedia can extend GIS capabilities of presenting geographic and other information.
The combination of several media often results in a powerful and richer presentation of
information and ideas to stimulate interest and enhance information retention. They can
also make GIS more friendly and easier to use. On the other hand, multimedia can benefit
from GIS by gaining an environment which facilitates the use and analysis of spatial data. The
result is a system, which has the advantages of both worlds without retaining most of their
disadvantages.

Self Assessment

Fill in the blanks:
9. GIS uses layers, called “.......................” to overlay different types of information.
10. A map serving as the primary index to multimedia data in a multimedia geo-representation
is termed a ........................
11. ....................... is a technology that encompasses various types of data and presents them in
an integrated form.
7.4 GIS Subsystems

A GIS has four main functional subsystems. These are:

7.4.1 Data Input Subsystem

A Data Input subsystem allows the user to capture, collect, and transform spatial and thematic
data into digital form. The data inputs are usually derived from a combination of hard copy
maps, aerial photographs, remotely sensed images, reports, survey documents, etc.

GIS Data Types

These data will contain maps of different detail levels (maps of the county, its main cities and
villages, maps of the archaeological and historical sites etc.), photos of places and monuments,
video images, text (in many languages), music and sound. For more complex applications,
multimedia data can be remotely sensed imagery, scanned maps, digitized video clips, DTMs,
one or more dimensional measurements, simulation model outputs and others. Most of them
are complicated objects, which have large data volumes, intensive processing requirements and
rich semantics.
The basic data types in a GIS reflect traditional data found on a map. Accordingly, GIS technology
utilizes two basic types of data. These are:
Spatial data: Spatial data describes the absolute and relative location of geographic features.

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