GIS Open Discussion

Where would a good place be to start learning about GIS and how it works for a novice?

The world of GIS is very far reaching and broad, so I guess the question for you is - what is it about GIS that interests you? Is there a part of your job function related to creating and sharing geographic content?

As Tom points out Esri's ArcGIS platform has much to offer, but it also contains a lot of complex capabilities which may be hard for a novice to grasp. The good thing is that Esri has an extensive knowledge base and there is quite a bit of training available online if you go that route. There are also easy to use applications such as Story Maps in ArcGIS which are an intuitive way to create GIS related content as a beginner.

Free resources such as Google Earth and Google Maps allow you to easily create maps both online and on your desktop which may be worth looking into. APAN also has various mapping capabilities if you are a member of a community with appropriate rights. Our Community Maps feature can pull in geographic references from a group's geotagged content to display on a map. We also have the ArcGIS for SharePoint Web Part available for sites which allow custom lists containing Latitude and Longitude references to be added to a map.

I have put together a quick list of external resources for you to check out in the MAPUG Wiki which other users may also find helpful:

community.apan.org/.../

Todd,

As a non GIS specialist I would agree with you- . ARCGIS is too complex for many US and partner cross functional staff members. I think the current mapping provided through APAN is very useable for the non GIS specialist. I'd advocate for continuing to use a google based map and imagery solution that can import data in KML format. I like the idea of being able to toggle between the map and imagery- this feature of APAN maps is very useable. I'd like more ability to use (import and export) various coordinate formats though because its difficult at present to import all lat long variations and I have not found that MGRS is supported. I'd like to have an ability in all maps to draw ellipses or add points.

I'd like an ability to use APAN to maintain a CIP COP in a coalition environment. I'd also like to see APAN have a geonames database that can be queried.

Hi John. Gotta disagree when you are talking about real world, enterprise, warfighting functions. If you want to collaborate, share, and improve SA for decision making in JIIM environments the ArcGIS platform with industry standards, formats, support to open standards etc. IS the way to go. Our partners in US Gov't, NATO, FVEY etc. usually have ELAs to utilize ArcGIS. This allows the common understanding of REST services, use of extensible APIs and widgets and more. NATO has just renewed their ELA and announced they will be utilizing it for more than GIS- it will be the foundation of their C4ISR technology.
I would agree with Todd though- Is there a part of your job function related to creating and sharing geographic content? What do you need from a GIS? What information products do you need to create, share, archive etc.

I'm looking for pretty simple stuff at this point. Namely an overlay showing where all of our units are and another overlay showing what missions are going on and where. I have absolutely not experience with GIS from a design standpoint so I'm starting from the beginning.