BenchMark 2002 issue V3 forPDF.p65

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“Opinions cannot survive if one hasAt the same time, the domains of GIS and IS reflect spatial information content forRe: Benchmarks have blurred—or, better, blended. Plan- New York City, Nashville (Tenn.), and OlatheGraphics’ multiple-decade focus on enter- (Kansas) and are designing systems forBy John C. Antenucci prise implementations has served us well Cook County/ESRI and Columbus (Ohio).President and CEO with a customer Working with the Oregon Department ofAdministrative Services, we successfullye-launching Benchmarkscompleted a proof of concept that providedis a benchmark unto itself.real-time access to spatial information fromRIt represents a touchstone formultiple jurisdictions using industry-PlanGraphics which, while continuingstandard browsers while the user had noto deliver superior customer service,knowledge of the source or construct of thehas at the same time successfully dealtsource data.with the “failed” corporate marriage toDCX. Our focus remains on the public sector; ourservices and solutions are focused onAs it has been a while since we lastemergency preparedness and public safety,published Benchmarks, let me acquaintnon-emergency information disseminationnew readers with its intent. First, for those base of(e.g., 311 systems) and asset management—of us in the field of cartography and CIOs, CTOs, andboth infrastructure and real property.surveying, benchmarks have always IS managers. In the past sixThrough Benchmarks, we hope to keep ...

Informations

• Publié par: Lomif
• Nombre de lectures: 14
• Langue: English

Extrait

Re: Benchmarks

By John C. Antenucci

President and CEO

R

e-launching

Benchmarks

is a benchmark unto itself.

It represents a touchstone for

PlanGraphics which, while continuing

to deliver superior customer service,

has at the same time successfully dealt

with the “failed” corporate marriage to

DCX.

As it has been a while since we last

published

Benchmarks,

let me acquaint

new readers with its intent. First, for those

of us in the field of cartography and

surveying, benchmarks have always

represented a known starting point; for

those of us in the information technology

industry, a benchmark has always been a

comparative analysis technique for perfor-

mance and functionality. And for the master

distiller of Kentucky’s fine bourbons, each

has a benchmark or standard which they aim

to achieve, starting with a fresh mash and

volatile fermentation. PlanGraphics’ bench-

mark is the success that our clients achieve

in implementing systems and providing

business solutions that leverage spatial

information.

Our reputation as a consultant continues to

thrive, and our advisory services are

founded on more than 1,200 engagements.

Not as widely recognized are the size and

breadth of our system implementation and

system integration services, which now

represent 70 percent of our business

activity. The diversity of those integration

and implementation services is striking.

They include, but aren’t limited to, imple-

menting a catalog and retrieval system for

the National Imagery Management Agency

(NIMA)’s access to classified analog

products; integrating DB2, Oracle, and

ESRI’s SDE for Nashville-Davidson County,

Tenn., parcel records; and integrating GIS

and an engineering records document

management system for the Rhode Island

Department of Transportation.

During

Benchmarks’

hiatus, there have been

remarkable interest, acceptance, and growth

of all things spatial. GPS is now a ubiquitous

household tool, maps and routing from the

Internet common practice, and government

constituents’ demand for access to jurisdic-

tion databases more frequent.

At the same time, the domains of GIS and IS

have blurred—or, better, blended. Plan-

Graphics’ multiple-decade focus on enter-

prise implementations has served us well

with a customer

base of

CIOs, CTOs, and

IS managers. In the past six

months, we facilitated the development of a

strategic IT plan for Oregon State govern-

ment, having gained credibility though our

work on the State’s GIS strategic plan a year

earlier. We have designed and delivered

enterprise-based data warehouses that

reflect spatial information content for

NewYork City, Nashville (Tenn.), and Olathe

(Kansas) and are designing systems for

Cook County/ESRI and Columbus (Ohio).

Working with the Oregon Department of

Administrative Services, we successfully

completed a proof of concept that provided

real-time access to spatial information from

multiple jurisdictions using industry-

standard browsers while the user had no

knowledge of the source or construct of the

source data.

Our focus remains on the public sector; our

services and solutions are focused on

emergency preparedness and public safety,

non-emergency information dissemination

(e.g., 311 systems) and asset management—

both infrastructure and real property.

Through

Benchmarks,

we hope to keep our

community of clients abreast of each other’s

recent progress, as well as informed about

the exciting and ever-changing world of GIS.

As always our personal benchmark will

remain—our clients’ success!

A

s federal agencies increasingly

focus on locational information,

PlanGraphics has recruited

Tracye Turner to lead its federal business

development efforts. Turner has more

than 10 years of experience selling federal

network solutions and professional

services. “Her sales force at Northrop

Grumman was successful in selling

complex enterprise solutions into federal

agencies which tie into our business

development direction,” said John C.

Antenucci, president of PlanGraphics.

Some 30 federal agencies now use GIS,

Turner said. She believes that the federal

sector has renewed its focus on GIS

because “decision-makers will need to

access spatial information to compare it

with other spatial information and non-

spatial information.”

Furthering the Federal Focus

“For example, the federal government

may need to know transportation routes;

the location/speed/density of trucks/

vehicles; the location of gas and oil

pipelines, water/sewer pipes, and power

lines; the location of first responders;

3-D analysis of structures, etc.,” she

added. “Some of the reasons that they

need the information may be for econom-

ic development, planning, impact

analysis, commerce, forestry, natural and/

or man-made disasters, and more.”

Furthermore, Turner said, “The federal

government will need to take stovepipe

systems and integrate them for a number

of reasons which include cost and time

savings, intra- and inter-agency collabo-

ration, trend analysis, effective data

mining, and just the simple need of

seeing ‘the big picture’ in order to make

informed decisions.”

“

O

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i

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n

o

t

s

u

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v

i

v

e

i

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o

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a

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no chance to fight for them.”—Thomas Mann

By Jennifer Oberlin

Marketing Services Manager

M

uch speculation has been

occurring lately about the future

impact of GIS on IT. With the

convergence of the two, GIS is charting new

territory all over the IT world. No one knows

this more than long-time PlanGraphics client

Al Leidner,Assistant Commissioner,

Citywide Geographic Information Systems,

NewYork City Department of Information

Technology and Telecommunications

(DoITT). I recently had an opportunity to

talk with him about his career in the GIS

industry and where he thinks GIS is headed.

PlanGraphics:

When was your first

involvement with GIS? When and what was

your role? How did you get involved?

AL:

My career began in 1970 with the New

York City Planning Department. During my

initial job interview, I was asked to lo-

cate on a map where I lived. I an-

swered the question correctly and

got the job! During the 10 years I

was with the Planning Depart-

ment, I worked extensively with

maps of all kinds, but they were

paper maps, and I learned how

time-consuming it could be to

create them and modify them.

In 1978, having become aware of the

potential importance of technology to City

operations, I published a paper entitled

“Organizing City Government for New

Technology and Innovation.” However, at

this time I was unaware of GIS technology.

At the same time, as it turns out, a group

within the Department of City Planning

was developing a digital street name and

address database (Geosupport) linked to a

street center line map of the City (LION). In

1980, I moved to the Mayor’s Office of

Operations and began to coordinate the

introduction of technology, especially

microcomputers, into various City agen-

cies. I remember sending the first DOS-

based IBM PC to be received by the City, to

a detective in the New York City Police

Department. Other donated PCs from

different computer vendors were given to a

variety of City agencies.

I moved to the Department of Environmen-

tal Protection (DEP) in 1984, and while

working on a project there that involved

determining the locations of hazardous

materials in the City, I learned about the

power of digital mapping. I became more

familiar with City Planning’s work with

their new GIS systems and also became

aware that DEP was also starting work on

a digital map of the City’s watermains. I

started to add this all together and

realized that almost all the information

utilized by DEP had a locational compo-

nent and the same could be said for other

City agencies as well.

DEP design engineers worked in a CAD

environment and were developing a water

main base map that was a mosaic of as-

built drawings without true spatial

accuracy. They were also planning to

develop a citywide sewer map also using

as-built drawings. Because both maps

would be built to different accuracy

standards, we realized that they would not

be able to be used together. We recognized

that the only solution to this

problem was to develop an

accurate physical base map

and register both water

and sewer layers to it so

that these infrastructure

elements could be

related to each other.

We also understood

that an accurate physical base map could

be useful throughout City government and

began to think about a citywide mapping

effort.

City GIS supporters approached Gino P.

Menchini, then director of the Mayor’s

Office of Computer, Plans and Controls,

with the idea of developing a City base

map. Mr. Menchini supported the idea and

helped to organize and lead a citywide GIS

Steering Committee that consisted of

representatives from about twelve City

agencies. After obtaining funding, hiring

PlanGraphics as GIS consultants, and

developing map specifications, aerial

photography of the City was completed in

1996.

The next three years were spent developing

the digital base map which was completed

in 1999. This same year, Allan Dobrin

became the Commissioner of DoITT.

Commissioner Dobrin recognized the value

of GIS and saw it as a Citywide function.

He created a GIS division within DoITT

and hired me to manage it. One of my first

actions was to develop a strategic plan for

the further development of a Citywide GIS

Utility with the base map—dubbed

NYCMAP—at its center. With the continued

help of PlanGraphics, Hunter College and

other contractors, as well as the collabora-

PlanGraphics Client Profile:

Al Leidner, New York City

Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications

tion of dozens of agency GIS professionals,

the Citywide GIS Utility became a reality

in 2000 and included an Oracle-centered

GIS database.

PlanGraphics:

What influenced your GIS

attitude/career?

AL:

Perhaps my most important recogni-

tion about GIS was that it was a technolo-

gy with the potential to save lives. This

became clear as we thought about DEP’s

need to digitally map the locations of

hazardous materials so that information

could be quickly and accurately transmit-

ted to first responders. This perception was

reinforced by seeing the effectiveness of

computer mapping of crime through

NYPD’s Comstat program which helped

bring down the murder rate in NYC from

more than 2,000 to under 650 over the last

ten years.

Now, with the convergence of GIS and the

Internet, we are relying on Web-enabled

interactive mapping capabilities to

support public safety applications with

life-saving potential. For example, during

the first cases of West Nile Fever in New

York City, the Department of Health used

an Intranet-based GIS application to map

the location of dead birds, human West Nile

cases, mosquito traps, sewer catchbasins,

and wetlands, to support the targeted use

of insecticide in hot zones that has held the

disease in check.

Following the attack on the World Trade

Center, GIS was also used to meet over

2,600 requests for data by emergency

responders. We found that GIS was a very

effective tool that could quickly integrate

multiple kinds of data from infrastructure

layers to building plans to remote sensing

information and put it in a form that

responders required to be effective.

PlanGraphics:

What is the place of GIS in

relationship to traditional IT?

AL:

I think of GIS as an extension of the

IT revolution. Although use of computer

technology and digital data extends into

almost all aspects of City operations, data,

perhaps the most important component of

IT, often resides in isolated silos. GIS

allows data from across the enterprise to

be brought together in highly useful and

effective combinations, greatly increasing

the value of IT. A way to put it is that GIS is

IT on spatial steroids.

PlanGraphics:

What source did you derive

your vision/inspiration from?

AL:

The book,

The Magic Mountain

, by

Thomas Mann.

“A way to put it is that GIS is IT on

spatial steroids.”—Al Leidner

“Always do right. This will gratify some people, and astonish the rest.”—Mark Twain

G

IS technology is gaining recogni-

tion for the solutions that it

provides in situations that

previously would not have been

considered GIS-oriented. Plan-

Graphics has an exclusive

partnership and North American

sales agreement with Xmarc, a

company that provides a unique

tool kit which, coupled with PlanGraphics’

skill, offers solutions to both traditional GIS

customers, as well as some not-so-tradition-

al GIS customers.

Xmarc provides infrastructure software

solutions for wireless and Web-enabled

companies that need to manage, interact

with, and distribute critical corporate and

location-based data.

Xmarc’s Wireless and Internet Infrastructure

Software Environment (WIISE) enables

companies to optimize network performance,

visualize and manage corporate assets, and

develop and deploy customized location

applications to a variety of devices,

including mobile phones, PDAs, and PCs.

PlanGraphics, Xmarc

Offer New Solutions

Xmarc’sFormidaFire—

an advanced suite of

tools for developing

applications—and its

Web deployment option

link complex spatial data

and distribute the resulting

rich applications to clients

throughout the enterprise far

more quickly

and easily than

was possible

before.

NIMA Project

PlanGraphics’ Marcus Brothwell

just completed a project for the Na-

tional Imagery and Mapping Agency

(NIMA) Research Division. PlanGraphics

collaborated with IntelData, Inc., to develop

and implement the Graphical GeoSearch

(GGS) application using Xmarc technology.

NIMA’s Research Division operates

NIMA’s libraries and provides imagery,

imagery intelligence, and geospatial

information to support national security

objectives. The GGS application enables

members of the intelligence community to

more rapidly and accurately search for

information about geospatial products.

project with the Shanghai Sewer Company

to build a GIS flood control system that

provides real-time monitoring and control

for its storm water facilities.

New projects in China, as well as

elsewhere around the globe,

indicate that Li is correct about

the importance of GIS in

E-government solutions,

at home as well as

abroad. Several forward

thinking cities and

provinces in the Chinese

government are now

working with PlanGraph-

ics to facilitate information

collection and development

so that they can provide better informa-

tion to government agencies and other

public service organizations to use in

making sound decisions about urban

planning, construction, management, and

service provision. Most recently, Plan-

Graphics won a contract from the Shanghai

Environment Protection Bureau and the

Sichuan Urban Environmental Project.

Searches can be based on a geographic area

of interest, descriptive data about the map

products, or values of various non-spatial

attributes, e.g., geopolitical codes or stock

numbers.

“The architecture and functionality of the

application are designed for simple access

by any authorized user, not just GIS

specialists,” said John Antenucci, Plan-

Graphics’ president. It allows users to

customize, sort, save, and print the results.

A second release of the application for all of

NIMA with added functionality is expected

soon.

PlanGraphics’ International Division is “dedicated to

providing superior GIS consulting and system integration

services to its international clients.”—Minna Li

“Thereisnosubstituteforhardwork.”—ThomasEdison

P

lanGraphics’ newly established

International Division is “a result of

an increased focus on the internation-

al market, which will include a more active

pursuit of international projects funded by

the World Bank, the Asia Development

Bank, the U.S. Trade DevelopmentAgency,

and other international develop-

ment banks,” according to

Minna Li, a 12-year PlanGraph-

ics veteran who has been

named the division’s vice

president.

Li, a native of Tianjin, China,

with advanced degrees from

Beijing and Murray State universities, has

spearheaded several of PlanGraphics’

previous projects abroad. “With the

expedited economic development in China

during the past 10 years, finding ways to

better manage the development and growth

of the urban area has become an urgent

issue for local governments,” she says. “As

a result, GIS has gained more and more

popularity in China and many parts of the

world in the last five years.”

Many countries and their local governments

are struggling with problems of economic

growth and sustainable urban development

like those that China is facing, Li says.

Managing urban development and protect-

ing and restoring land and water resources

PlanGraphics’ International Expansion

are top priorities of many governments. The

Chinese government, to better assist its

operations and enhance its public services,

proposed a plan to develop a GIS-oriented

information management framework to

improve information sharing among

all the agencies

involved.

PlanGraphics boosted its

international reputation in 1995

when Shanghai Waterworks

Company awarded PlanGraphics

the opportunity to build a GIS-oriented

integrated water network operation system

to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness

of its management and operations. In this

project, Li managed a complete full life-cycle

system development, including a require-

ments analysis and logical design, data

conversion specifications, data QA/QC and

data conversion management, hardware and

software selection and procurements,

physical design, institutional structure and

training, database and application develop-

ment, and training. This project led to a

A New Strategy for Logistical Bottlenecks

By Mike Walls

Executive Consultant

R

ecently PlanGraphics staff, their

technical partners Xmarc, Inc., ESRI,

and the State of Oregon, successful-

ly completed a proof of concept application,

named DIMOND (Digitally Integrated

Mining of Oregon Networked Data). The

multiple technologies involved worked

together to provide a novel way of getting

around the logistical bottlenecks of

consolidating data from multiple sources in

the enterprise.

Traditionally, one of the biggest obstacles

to building a centralized repository of data

for an enterprise is the logistical effort

involved in updating the contents and

keeping them internally consistent. Finding

a solution to this problem is often feasible

for a one-time policy study, but has proven

difficult to set up as an ongoing operation.

Recent advancements in network-oriented

data management technologies, however,

have given us some options formerly not

available.

With this project, the team, led by Plan-

Graphics, was able to implement a proof of

concept for a “virtual data warehouse” in

whichWeb-based middleware eliminated

many of the obstacles to centralizing a data

repository.

The DIMOND Project

The key to the DIMOND project was the

elimination of the requirement to physically

centralize the data. Instead, we created a

virtual repository using middleware tools

from Xmarc and Oracle 8i Spatial to

manage metadata, and we utilized the

Web to display answers to users’

queries that are executed to

their desktop machines, thus eliminating the

need for a repository.

Users start a session by pointing their

Web browsers to the URL of the opening

screen. This downloads the core of the

proof-of-concept application, a custom-

written Java applet.

As users navigate through the application, it

appears to them that they are querying a set

of GIS tables and layers in a traditional cli-

ent-server application. Instead, they are

interacting with a middleware servlet that

looks up in Oracle tables the accessible

metadata for each data set being used.

The middleware then initiates a con-

nection to a series of translator serv-

lets, located at each of the data pro-

vider sites, which pass through the

query and package the response.

The middleware servlet consoli-

dates all of the responses into a

Web page that the user sees.

Each of these interactions was

coded by and managed us-

ing standard Java tech-

niques.

The data used by

the application

need not be

housed in a

central

location or

even in the

same file

format. Instead,

each query is

processed in real time

by the master copy of

the data at the custodian

agency. For the proof of

concept, we set up connec-

Common Problems with

Networking Data

tions to the various agencies’ data formats,

which are highlighted in the table below.

Implications

The implications are unlimited. The middle-

ware product from Xmarc eliminated the

need for centralized data. By consolidating

all of the responses from various data

provider sets into a user-friendly Web page,

we experienced no logistical bottlenecks,

and DIMOND became a success. The

collaboration between PlanGraphics, Xmarc,

and the State of Oregon proved that it is

technically feasible to build a virtual data

warehouse for Web-based interactions.

Agency

Oregon Department of

Administrative Services

Multnomah County

Oregon Office of Geographic

Data Coordination

Tri-Met (Regional Planning

Commission for Portland

MetroArea)

Data Formats

Oracle Tables

ESRI Shapefiles

Oracle Tables

ESRI Shapefiles

ESRICoverages

ESRICoverages

ESRI Shapefiles

Data Served

Counties

Federal Roads

Rivers

County Routes

Regional Street Network

City Limits

Urban Boundaries

Transit Routes

Transit Stops

Proof-of-Concept Project: Participants and Data Types

About PlanGraphics

Since 1979, PlanGraphics has

played key roles in designing and

implementing GIS, document

management systems, Web-based

solutions, and other IT applica-

tions.

Visit us on the Internet at

www.plangraphics.com, or call the

office nearest you:

•

Frankfort, Kentucky

[phone]

•

Silver Spring, Maryland

[phone]

•

Newport Beach, California

[phone]

For more information about

Bench-

marks

, contact its editor, Jennifer

Oberlin, at [phone] or

[e-mail].

“Certitude is not the test of certainty.”—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

•

Different agencies use different

software and hardware to manage

the data.

•

The data are not uniformly accessi-

ble over the network.

•

A crucial data set is locked away

behind security firewalls or too slow

to access because of poor network

connectivity to the agency.

•

Data must be gathered via “sneaker

net” and hand-massaged to get a

consistent data set for analysis.

•

Data processing (the familiar

“Extract-Transform-Load” or ETL

process) can require significant

effort and time.

Copyright2002,PlanGraphics,Inc.“PlanGraphics,Inc.”andthetreelogoareregisteredtrademarksofPlanGraphics,Inc.