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Trends in 3D GIS development
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Short Description: S Zlatanova, AA Rahman, M Pilouk - Journal of Geospatial Engineering, 2002 - gdmc.nl for detailed consideration, because they constitute a large share of the GIS market
and provide Figure 5: The Aula, TUDelft: 3D model queried in GeoGraphics
Content Inside: Trends in 3D GIS development
Siyka Zlatanova 1, Alias Abdul Rahman 2, Morakot Pilouk 3 GIS Technology Section, Delft University of Technology, Thijsseweg 11, 2629JA, Delft, The Netherlands. s.zlatanova@citg.tudelft.nl 2 Department of Geoinformatics, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 UTM Skudai, Johor, Malaysia. alias@fksg.utm.my 3 Environmental System Research Institute (ESRI), 380 New York Street, Redlands, California, USA. mpilouk@esri.com
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Abstract:
Currently, a variety of software is capable of handling a wide range of spatial problems, beginning with approaches for describing spatial objects to quite complex analysis and 3D visualisation. However, an increasing number of applications need more advanced tools for representing and analysing the 3D world. Among all types of systems dealing with spatial information, GIS has proven to be the most sophisticated system that operates with the largest scope of objects (spatial and semantic), relationships and provide means to analyse them. However, what is the status of 3D GIS? It is the aim of this paper to find the answer by analysing both available software and efforts of researchers. An overview of several software packages and 3D case studies performed in Oracle and MicroStation provide knowledge about the 3D functionality offered by commercial systems. The most significant achievements in the 3D research area concerning key issues of 3D GIS, i.e. 3D structuring and 3D topology portray the current research status. At the end, the paper addresses some of the issues and problems involved in developing such a system and recommends directions for further research. The scope of the paper is limited to 3D GIS systems and research in vector domain. Problems of subsurface applications are excluded as well.
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Introduction
The need for 3D information is rapidly increasing. Currently, many human activities, i.e. urban planning, cadastre, environmental monitoring, telecommunications, public rescue operations, landscape planning, transportation monitoring, real-estate market, hydrographical activities, utility management, military applications, make steps toward third dimension. Practically, the area of interest grows significantly when 3D functionality is offered on the market. Moreover, the role of geo-information in all kinds of business processes is getting quite transparent. Terms such as "location-specific information" and "location-based services" become a part of the daily business language to denote the link between the virtual world of information (transactions, events, internet communication) and the real world of information - customers, inventory, shipping and the like. Most business transactions rely on information systems to operate successfully, as the geoinformation (location-specific information) is critical for many of them (see Sonnen and Morris, 2000). Once the developments in 3D GIS provide a compatible functionality and performance, the spatial information services will evolve into the third dimension. Traditionally, GIS system should be able to maintain information about spatial phenomena and provide means to analyse it and thus gain knowledge of the surrounding world. In general, consensus on the demanded functionality of GIS was achieved years ago. The tasks or the functions of a GIS are specified as follows (see Raper and Maguire, 1992): 1) data capture, 2) data structuring, 3) data manipulation, 4) data analysis, and 5) data presentation. Indeed, 3D GIS aims at providing the same functionality as 2D GIS. Unfortunately, such 3D systems are still not available on the market. A variety of different software (i.e. 2D GIS, DBMS and CAD) is employed to maintain the objects of interest and extract the required information. Due to deficiencies of all the systems to handle 3D objects, the data are often spread between several systems. For example, one system is used for data storage and another for 3D visualisation. This
Journal of Geospatial Engineering, Vol. 4, No. 2 (December, 2002), pp.1-10. Copyright Ó The Hong Kong Institution of Engineering Surveyors
