engleski

Widening the user base of geospatial data using the Faculty’s WEBGIS system

Through the development of the WEBGIS system, it is our intention to explore the possibilities for more people to use this technology (Internet GIS, GIS – geographical information system) in not only in geology, mining and petroleum engineering, which are the basic profession of the Faculty, but also in disciplines such as geotechnics, hydrology and civil engineering. There are several goals to this exploration. The first goal is the creation of a team capable of solving a problem in the development of the computing infrastructure of our Faculty through its own knowledge and means. The GIS software is frequently used in the teaching process at undergraduate and graduate levels as well as in scientific and professional work, particularly in the process of preparation of doctoral, graduate and final theses. We use the commercial version of the software which is not available to a large number of employees and students due to its high price. Both, the employees and the students currently use this software only within the confines of the Faculty’s computer network. As far as students are concerned, they are only able to access the software during their lessons because there is no open-type computer classroom. The problem arises when larger number of final and graduation theses have to be completed at the same time. Also, numerous geospatial data owned by the Faculty are not available during field practice due to the physical limits of utilizing the network GIS software outside the Faculty's network. In case the WEBGIS system is built, both of these problems would be completely solved as the information could be accessed and GIS maps created using two systems – one, which would only be visible within the Faculty’s network and the other, which would be visible outside the Faculty’s network. Due to the particular nature of the data and the conditions of use, the systems would be significantly different and would be properly protected via an authentication. The second goal is to enable more people to use platforms that are publicly available according to predefined terms set up by the service provider. Within the Faculty’s network, the WEBGIS system could enable the utilization of the State Geodetic Administration’s platforms, thus simplifying all types of purposeful map creation and lowering the cost of using platforms intended for this purpose. The third goal of exploration is a general one – the desire to popularise the GIS format as a geospatial data type, which can be used far better than other similar cartographic data. The fourth goal depends on the fulfilment of the previous three goals. It is our wish to speed up and improve the data exchange among users that would be achievable using the URL’s of maps stored on the server, dynamic HTML maps and GEOPDF files. Activities at the Faculty and a pilot field work to achieve the described goals are already planned. As far as the Faculty lecture rooms are concerned, the hardware which already exists there must be modified for its future purpose via the installation of free and open GIS applications alongside with the configuration of the entire WEBGIS system. The planned field work would entail a visit to objects specified in the hydrogeological database and other publicly available data referring to the objects in the European database of the Mapping and geological storage of carbon dioxide system. The system will be calibrated, the objects’ coordinates will be checked, key values for the object entered, etc. Due to the systems’ abilities check, such exploration would include work with the GPS system, laptop computers, tablets and smart phones as well as the practical analysis on each and all of these devices. As a consequence of the limited funds available for this fieldwork, the initial plan is to test the abilities of the system on hydrogeological objects (wells, boreholes and piezometers) in Zagreb and its neighbouring counties, less in CCS and speleological objects further away. Aside from the aforementioned objects, this system could further be used for geotechnical objects, surface pits, petroleum and gas objects, civil engineering objects, seismotectonic data and for choosing the location for the creation of a radioactive waste disposal site.

WEBGIS; Faculty; open-source; geospatial data

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