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History of GIS
GIS in Rhode Island
Critiquing GIS
Multimedia GIS

Overview
History of multimedia GIS
Barriers to multimedia in GIS

Overview
A multimedia GIS incorporates structured and geo-referenced multimedia resources. As Raper notes, “these geo-representations offer richer concepts than two-dimensional GIS as they extend the dimensionality, the data types, the analytical powers and the information management capabilities of the existing system” (Raper, 2000). Thus, as Faust concludes, “Viewing information in three dimensions is a natural way for a human to view data representing a three-dimensional world.” (1) Multimedia data types can include photographs, animated images, video, and sound. In a planning context, images taken on the ground (as opposed to the aerial plan perspective of maps) aid participants in identifying location and provide illustrations of inaccessible places. (2)

GIS and multimedia can be combined in three ways:

1. GIS in multimedia – integrates the output of GIS systems (usually maps) and some spatial analysis capability with stand-alone multimedia authoring software.
2. Multimedia in GIS – expands the capability of commercial GIS packages such as ArcView to display multimedia data types.
3. World Wide Web and GIS – uses the Web to integrate modified GIS software through extensions and Java programming. Commercial packages include ESRI’s ArcIMS. (3)

History of Multimedia GIS
The potential of multimedia GIS has long been recognized. One of the first attempts at integrating digital maps with multimedia (also called hypermaps) was carried out at MIT in the 1970s. The Aspen Movie Map linked a map of Aspen, Colorado’s streets with dynamic images stored on laser discs. Users could interactively navigate around the streets and even query the buildings contained in the images for information. (4) The Aspen map was not geographically referenced, but the project showed the potential for merging two-dimensional digital cartography with real three-dimensional images.

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, there existed no practical method for including additional text or images into commercial GIS packages. Researchers and planners continued instead to develop systems based on non-geographically referenced maps and the emerging technology of hypermedia. By 1990, there existed three commercially available hypermedia authoring programs running on desktop personal computers. The software allowed users to link maps, images, and text and explore them in a nonlinear sequence. (5) Planners argued that this nonlinear presentation more accurately reflected the information needs of the planning process

The emergence of hypermedia (the linking of text, images, and sound in a nonlinear structure) in the early 1990s sparked an interest in linking GIS and multimedia. A 1991 GIS text envisioned GIS as one part of a larger hypermedia information structure: “Over the next decade, the traditional perception of GIS consisting of a vector map and associated non-graphic data will be replaced with a more comprehensive view of hypermedia.” (6) However, it was not until the mid-1990s, with the development of the World Wide Web and its associated graphical browsers, that the architecture for a hypermedia system became possible on a broad scale. By 1995, a special issue of Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design was devoted to multimedia GIS. While many of the articles featured systems that merely integrated static maps with multimedia (bringing GIS into multimedia), the ParcBIT project showed that the increase in information afforded through multimedia necessitated the development of a system that would truly link the data contained in a GIS with multimedia sources. (7)

A true integration of multimedia into commercial GIS packages that extends the same spatial functionality as text databases may be several years away. For instance, spatial indexing of the frames of a video is not currently feasible. ArcView’s programming language, Avenue, seems to offer the most potential for customizing multimedia applications. (8)

Barriers to multimedia in GIS
The attribute tables that form the database behind the visual map in a GIS cannot practically contain more than several words per field (and they traditionally use abbreviations) and do not support images, video, or sound file formats. The Hotlink feature in ArcView can associate multimedia and narrative text with the features of a GIS coverage through a script that launches an independent window within ArcView (usually for the supported image formats of .jpg and .tif) or a separate software program such as Microsoft Word or Apple Quicktime. Herzog describes how this process might work: “Through a hot link, when a feature such as a building footprint is selected, a pop-up window can display a drawing of its interior spaces, a photo of its façade, a database of tenants, a scanned site plan, a video of its history, subdivision documents, and/or a recorded advertisement.” (9) Several scripts written by ArcView users are freely available from ESRI that expand the capabilities of the Hotlink feature. These scripts however, use multiple applications to display separate multimedia sources. So, for example, detailed text might be stored in a Microsoft Word document, while pictures appear in an image-viewing program, and video is displayed by Windows Mediaplayer. This method is cumbersome for displaying a variety of multimedia types and presents problems for storing and organizing data.

Lines, points, and polygons within a coverage can also be associated with a webpage by using a custom Hotlink script. Several versions of this script are freely available from the ESRI ArcScripts library. HTML offers the flexibility of supporting text and images in the same software environment. It is cross-platform and can be stored locally or remotely. Previous research has demonstrated the advantages of hypermedia and hypertext for organizing and navigating large amounts of information. Hypermedia Hotlinking from ArcView allows an unlimited amount of associated spatial data to be referenced to a digital cartographic representation. Indeed, this has been the promise of GIS from its inception.

The World Wide Web and hypertext markup language (HTML) allow for the creation of searchable multimedia databases that can be associated with a GIS and queried in much the same manner. Distribution of this information over the Internet is more complicated. Two options exist: hypermaps and ArcIMS. Basic non-geographically referenced hypermaps are relatively simple to incorporate into web sites since these maps are essentially images with associated web pages. Distributing the data and graphic representations produced in ArcView requires ESRI’s newly released ArcIMS (Internet Map Server). ArcIMS uses java scripting and applets to deliver most of the graphic and analytic capability of ArcView over the Internet. (10) This software ports GIS to a web user; it does not take full advantage of the Web’s ability to incorporate hypermedia. It also requires an additional investment in server hardware while increasing access times to users.

1. Faust, N. L. (1995). The virtual reality of GIS. Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design 22, 257-268.
2. Shiffer, M. J. (1995a). Environmental review with hypermedia systems. Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design 22, 359-372.
3. Bill, R., Dransch, D. and Voight, C. (1999). Multimedia GIS: concepts, cognitive aspects and applications in an urban environment. In A. S. Camara and J. Raper (eds.), Spatial Multimedia and Virtual Reality. London: Taylor and Francis.
4. Bodum, L. (1999). Future directions for hypermedia in urban planning. In A. S. Camara and J. Raper (eds.), Spatial Multimedia and Virtual Reality. London: Taylor and Francis.
5. Wiggins, L. L. and Shiffer, M. J. (1990). Planning with Hypermedia. APA Journal Spring, 226-235.
6. Antenucci, J. C., Brown, K., Croswell, P. L. and Kevany, M. J. (1991). Geographic Information Systems: A Guide to the Technology. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold: 268.
7. Blat, J., Delgado, A., Ruiz, M. and Segui, J. M. (1995). Designing multimedia GIS for territorial planning: the ParcBIT case. Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design 22, 665-678.
8. Bill, R., Dransch, D. and Voight, C. (1999). Multimedia GIS: concepts, cognitive aspects and applications in an urban environment.
9. Herzog, M. T. (2000). GIS Technology and Implementation. In S. Easa and Y. Chan (eds.), Urban Planning and Development Applications of GIS. Reston, Virginia: American Society of Civil Engineers.
10. ArcIMS. Environmental Systems Research Institute. Accessed 27 April 2001: http://www.esri.com/software/arcims/