This paper by S. Raghavendran of Pixel Infotek Pvt Ltd on GIS Interoperability and Spatial ETL solutions was presented at the GSDI conference in India and provides an excellent description of the interoperability challenges that Safe's products address.
GGGIIISSS IIINNNTTTEEERRROOOPPPEEERRRAAABBBIIILLLIIITTTYYY::: TTTHHHEEE “““SSSAAAFFFEEE””” WWWAAAYYY 1 S.Raghavendran 1GIS Analyst PIXEL INFOTEK PVT LTD #194, Sankey Rd., Sadashiva Nagar Bangalore-560 080, India Tel: +91-80-3619351/2/3, Cell: +91-9845673851 Fax: + 91-80-3619354 Email: srg_gis@yahoo.com Geography or GIS for that matter has never been so Databases and other related electronic documents of closer to our lives. “GIS Interoperability” rightly said, as different types and from multifarious organizations. the holy grail of GIS has never been so much discussed However this could be as simple as a plain GIS format among the geospatial community. Interoperability has “A” to GIS format “B” translation or could be a been in our daily lives, whether we liked it and realized complicated one requiring data transformation into the it or not. If interoperability was not an issue in the lives structure the user or the application needs. In other stof the Stone Age man but for sure it is in this 21 words true GIS interoperability would mean the right century hi-tech electronic, tech perceptive day today life. tools and technologies to exchange or transform Be it the travel experiences of someone amongst us geospatial data into the structure, wherein the end user especially to foreign lands with languages different from can take full advantage of specific GIS software what we are accustomed to and facing situations of capabilities. inadequate communication have been definitely part of our memories. Imagine the interoperability if there was one global language for communication. Imagine, what WWhhyy GGIISS iinntteerrooppeerraabbiilliittyy?? The concept of Geospatial Data Infrastructure was first it would be if music files of our heartthrob celebrities conceived in Canada in the early 1980s. There after written on Samsung CD’s could be played only in other countries like USA, UK, Holland, Australia and Samsung CD players. But for the interoperability, music Malaysia joined the race. Of late with the setting up of CDs has transcended such barriers. “How nice it would National Geospatial Data Infrastructure (NGDI) in India, be, had I taken one of those power adapters for my the importance of geospatial data and the need to have a electrical appliances” – A common hearsay from the geospatial data infrastructure similar to any other first timers to the United States from Asian countries. infrastructure has increased manifold. Up to the early 1990's, GIS implementations were typically stand-alone Interoperability has been in our daily lives, whether we systems not integrated with other business processes. liked it and realized it or not and GIS is no exception to The data used was stored in file-based formats that. Unfortunately the kind of interoperability that optimized for fast access. The ability to share data exists in the other industries does not exist in the within an organization was limited to Network File geospatial industry for several reasons. Geospatial System (NFS) capability and typically required that all interoperability though seen as a moving target has in application software be from the same software vendor. the recent years definitely gained momentum. Thanks to Sharing of data with other organizations using another the buzzword “Geospatial Democracy”, dissemination vendor’s software typically involved the use of GIS data of geospatial information being seen as a public right, translators either provided with the GIS software or built the initiative efforts of various organizations in for this purpose using popular programming languages developing open standards and the increasing usage of and utilities. Contrastingly, in this cyber savvy era of SDI (Spatial Data Infrastructure) interoperability tools rapid transition, government agencies and other like FME (Feature Manipulation Engine): GIS organizations are required to provide quick response to Interoperability may soon be a reality! natural disaster, environmental crises and other such issues based on critical information available to them. WWhhaatt iiss GGIISS iinntteerrooppeerra... [download for more]
