Collection Management Issues with Geospatial Information

Among the most challenging aspects of GIS are identifying needs, acquiring resources, and managing the collection, a process that involves decision making in a dynamic and changing environment. Libraries that have traditionally collected maps have a good grounding in many of the issues, yet even they must learn new approaches, new technology, and think beyond the needs of traditional map users. Librarians will find challenges throughout the life of geospatial information, from its acquisition to its disposition, especially as a library collection migrates from a primarily print format to a focus on digital formats.

Accessibility

With the creation of the Internet and the continued evolution of technologies in GIS, networking, and knowledge management, access to geospatial information is a critical component of research and practice. Interoperability is the “new paradigm for joining heterogeneous computer systems into synergistic units that facilitate a more efficient use of geographic information resources” (Harvey, Kuhn, Pundt, Bishr, & Riedemann, 1999, p. 213). As geographers reassess the description of geographic methodologies and techniques across different platforms in the online environment, so have researchers in other disciplines assessed the use of applied geographic techniques for a wide variety of analysis. Such efforts have led some researchers to use new descriptive classifications to identify functionalities in the new scholarship, such as in creating new ontologies for GIS (Fonseca, Davis, & Cmara, 2003; Goodchild, 2004; Goodchild & Haining, 2004; Mark, Skupin, & Smith, 2001). This chapter examines the impact of these new ontologies, reviews the impact standards have on access and issues for end-users in accessing geospatial information.

Geography and Librarianship

There are many definitions of the study of geography. Most scholars define the discipline of geography as broadly concerned with the study of the earth’s environment and interpretation of the different natural and man-made phenomena that occur across it. Geographers are interested in the interrelationships between phenomena across the earth’s landscape in individual locations and across different regions. Though considered a social science by scholars, the field of geography incorporates methods and techniques that relate the study of geography to a variety of disciplines, such as anthropology, geology, ecology, political science, transportation, health, engineering, and library and information science. The multidisciplinary nature of geography provides opportunities for scholars in the discipline to apply these geographic concepts to many areas of study. The application of geographic techniques to new areas of study has provided the impetus for proposing new hypotheses and testing theories in different disciplines. The research has advanced geographic thought beyond established paradigms, as scholars use computer applications and remotely sensed data to redefine concepts of geographic space and to study the phenomena that occur in them.

Geographic Information and Library Education

“I invite all of you to become geographers, if not by vocation then by avocation. GIS is about thinking geographically. Beyond being an essential component of GIS, geography also opens new avenues of examining and analyzing the world around us. More importantly, it provides us with totally new appreciation of everyday life and the environment in which we live it” (DeMers, 1997, p. 199). This quote sets the tenor for this chapter, in which we examine the educational requirements for librarians in the provision of GIS services. Implementing GIS services in academic libraries and facilitating associated digital geospatial data collections can be a daunting task for the librarian assigned these duties. The technical knowledge and computer skill-sets alone involved in understanding how GIS software operates are accompanied with a high learning curve. The research literature emphasizes collaboration with academic departments with the expertise in using GIS software. This chapter will cover the types of services that GIS users need for a prototypical GIS literacy project and basic geographic literacy for librarians. It will examine competencies in academic librarianship and geographic information literacy and offer a sample curriculum that meets the needs of geolibraries, librarians, and their patrons. A brief discussion of preservice and in-service issues, such as mentoring and communities of practice, follows. The conclusion discusses implications for library science in the preparation of new librarians and the professional development of practicing librarians.

What the Future Holds

Geographic information is ubiquitous, from MapQuest in Google to the use of global positioning systems on PDAs and automobiles. More people use geographic information on a daily basis, from directions and a review of a local restaurant to building new infrastructures for communities. Therefore, libraries and librarians should be planning on how best to obtain, market, and provide this type of information for their users’ personal and professional needs. What are some of the emerging themes in geographic information systems, particularly for libraries? In the convergence of services and resources, emergent themes are cartography; platform/network development; “geoweb” services and resources; geodata management trends; and societal impacts. Sui (2004) postulates that GIScience research will be involved in “computational, spatial, social, environmental, and aesthetic dimensions” (p. 65), therefore “geocomputation, spatially integrated social sciences, social informatics, information ecology, and humanistic GIScience” are areas of research to watch (p. 65). This chapter will address these themes from both a GIS and libraries perspective.

Information Economy and Geospatial Information

The recent socioeconomic trends, convergence of telecommunication technologies and the emergence of information as an integral component of the contemporary economy, have had significant effects on individuals and on wider social groups in the population. The current information node infrastructure of the telecommunications industry, which has facilitated that convergence of the telecommunications technology, is comprised of a variety of links. These links include data clearinghouses, data providers, and data warehouses, which themselves combine to form complex information networks as well as individual links, or single participants. All of these links affect how information flows across the network. Libraries, as participants in the information network infrastructure, are well suited to affect the nature of data processes in the current information economy.

Spatial Databases and Data Infrastructure

The emergence, in recent years, of digital libraries and of Internet-based communication applications have led some researchers to propose that the emerging data infrastructure of the Internet and the capabilities of digital libraries can be used to organize and ease data-mining digital geospatial data across the Internet. Digital geospatial data interoperability, the target of major efforts by standardization bodies and the research community since the 1990s, “has been seen as a solution for sharing and integrating geospatial data, more specifically to solve the syntactic, schematic, and semantic as well as the spatial and temporal heterogeneities between various real world phenomena” (Brodeur, Bédard, Edwards, & Moulin, 2003, p. 243). Some researchers point to the problem that many GIS systems are singular in nature, are generally isolated, and lack interoperability, due in part to the computer architecture upon which they are based (Lutz, Riedemann, & Probst, 2003). This chapter will discuss the emergence of a national spatial digital infrastructure vis à vis the development of a national telecommunications infrastructure. Federal policies, standards, and procedures will be reviewed that assist in the management and production of geospatial data. Several examples of current geospatial libraries will be examined. The chapter will conclude with a short implications section on what are necessary next steps and future trends.

From Print Formats to Digital

The preceding chapter discussed how geographic and cartographic materials are traditionally described in libraries. With the growth of geospatial data, new methods of description needed to be developed to allow users, often with very different information needs, to find and retrieve relevant resources across different platforms and software systems. Geographic information systems are designed to allow the management of large quantities of spatially referenced information about natural and man-made environments, covering areas such as public health, urban and regional planning, disaster response and recovery, environmental assessments, wetlands delineation, renewable resource management, automated mapping/facilities management, and national defense. Powerful computers, advanced network capacities, and enhanced, distributed GIS software allowed the growth of the National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI). Established by Executive Order 12906 in April 1994, the NSDI assembles “technology, policies, standards, and human resources to acquire, process, store, distribute, and improve utilization of geospatial data for a variety of users nationwide” (Federal Geographic Data Committee, 2006a). The goal of the NSDI is to “reduce duplication of effort among agencies, improve quality and reduce costs related to geographic information, to make geographic data more accessible to the public, to increase the benefits of using available data, and to establish key partnerships with states, counties, cities, tribal nations, academia and the private sector to increase data availability” (Federal Geographic Data Committee, 2006b). However, the success of a national spatial data infrastructure depends on the development of a series of standards for that infrastructure. Infrastructure components encompass a variety of elements. Hardware and physical facilities store, process, and transmit information; software applications and software allow access, structure, and manipulation of information; and network standards and transmission codes facilitate interorganizational and cross-system communication (Hanson, 2006). When reviewing standards for geospatial data, one must look at standards for cartography, hardware and software, telecommunications, and information technology standards at national and international levels. Several thousand standards apply to computers, and this can be multiplied geometrically, if not exponentially, with the advent of network standards and integrated data formats. This chapter will address standards in geospatial data, interoperability and transferability, mark-up languages, and the development of the federal metadata standard for geospatial information.

Reference Services

Geographers often define the spatial parameters of different environments by integrating diverse data sets with locational coordinates to create an attribute-rich digital geospatial dataset. From these datasets, researchers can observe and record phenomena and create new geographic metaphors in describing the geographic spaces of places, physical or virtual. One challenge for librarians is to be cognizant of not only the spatial extent of geospatial data, but to have the ability to interpret the socioeconomic milieu, which characterizes the attribute data and the environment in which it describes and to make it accessible for the user community. A second challenge is how to reinterpret traditional patron interactions in an increasingly online service environment and the best use of applications that must be used to “push” information to the patron. A third is how to market the library’s GIS services and resources to our patrons, both old and new.

Describing Geospatial Information

To be optimally useful, geospatial resources must be described. This description is referred to as metadata. Metadata tells “who, what, where, when, why, and how” about every facet of a piece of data or service. When properly done, metadata answers a wide range of questions about geospatial resources, such as what geospatial data is available, how to evaluate its quality and suitability for use, and how to access it, transfer it, and process it. To ensure consistency for access and retrieval, metadata can be standardized to provide a common set of terms, definitions, and organization.