KEY CONCEPTS & TECHNIQUES IN GIS Part 9 pdf

92 KEY CONCEPTS AND TECHNIQUES IN GIS

Object view

Represents the features as discrete objects with well-define boundaries in an empty

space

Ontology

Formal specification of the meaning of a datum

Overlay

Quintessential GIS operation that determines spatial coincidences

PDF

Portable document format – an open file format for the description of device￾independent documents

Pedologist

One who studies soil science

Precision

The amount of detail that can be discerned in geographic information

Projection

See Map projection

Raster

Spatial organization of data similar to an array or a spreadsheet; space is com￾pletely filled by the cells that make up the raster

Regional science

Academic discipline at the intersection of economics and geography that devel￾oped its own set of spatial analysis techniques

Remote sensing

The technique (and science behind) gathering information from objects without

touching them

Scanning

An automated form of digitizing that results in raster data

Semantics

The meaning of a datum

Shape measures

Set of statistical measures to describe spatial configurations; originally devel￾oped in landscape ecology

Spatial reference

Descriptor for a location on Earth

SQL

Structured query language – a standard (with many variations) way of querying a

database

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