Enterprise GIS I Definition:

An Enterprise GIS is a geographic information system that is integrated through an entire organization so that a large number of users can manage, share, and use spatial data and related information to address a variety of needs, including data creation, modification, visualization, analysis, and dissemination. Enterprise GIS evolved over the period of time and especially during 2005-2010. Most of the leading !" vendors have had components that constitute an Enterprise GIS for long time but, the efforts to have them all pac#aged together and provide an end-to-end solution pic#ed up fast pace in the recent times. $o put it in simpler terms, an Enterprise GIS should be capable of the follo%ing. etc.,* comply %ith + , "tandards to enable easier integration %ith other systems II. Capabilities supporting huge number of simultaneous transactions integrating %ith other &nterprise "ystems 'such as "A(, )illing "ystems

displaying data in the same %ay 'styles- symbols* for .es#top, /eb and

Mobile users 'preferred* reusable functionality across .es#top, /eb and Mobile

platforms III. Objectives

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"uccessfully achieving the potential of !" in a comple0 enterprise 'such as

a ,ity or ,ounty government* involves agreeing upon some essential ob1ectives. &asily accessed !" on every des#top 'plus vehicles, etc.* !" improving the organization2s business processes !" impacting the accomplishment of the organization2s strategic ob1ectives 3"patially-enabling4 the organization2s other enterprise applications 5on-redundant entry of updates !" specialists maintain base data, standards, and enhancements "upport for electronic transactions %ith the public $angible return on !" investment. IV. GIS USER NEED ASSESSMENT

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User Needs assessment is a systematic process for

determining and addressing needs, or "gaps" between current conditions and desired conditions or "wants". The discrepancy between the current condition and wanted condition must be measured to appropriately identify the need. The need can be a desire to improve current performance or to correct a deficiency User needs assessment is an important part of the GIS

planning process, often used for improvement in individuals, education training, organi!ations, or communities. It can refine and improve a product such as training or service a client receives. It can be an effective tool to clarify problems and identify appropriate interventions or solutions. "y clearly identifying the problem finite resources can be directed towards developing and implementing a feasible and applicable solution. Gathering appropriate and sufficient data informs the process of developing an effective product that will address the groups# needs and wants

V. The old spatial data models

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. In many ways, the Spatial $ata management needs for an

%nterprise are little different than other data management needs. Unfortunately, until very recently, GIS data models have not &ept pace with some of their more sophisticated '$"(S cousins and have traditionally been file based. )rom an %sri perspective, the traditional geographic data models have included* a. Coverages ++ The basic spatial model for ,rcInfo. The

coverage is a very solid data model that has served us very well for many years. The data model includes internal topology, and is very rigorous about enforcing proper feature construction. b. Shapefiles ++ The basic spatial data model for ,rc-iew.

The Shape )ile model is much less rigorous about enforcing feature integrity and relies on run+time calculation for topology.

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c. Librarian ++ .ibrarian layers are collections of coverage#s

which are ad/acent to each other. %ach coverage is referred to as a 0tile0. The tiles are defined in an inde1 coverage which is polygon coverage of /ust the space each tile ta&es up 2such as a USGS map boundary3. Tiles do not have to be e4ual in si!e or shape, but usually are. ,ll tiles have to conform to the tile boundaries specified by the inde1 coverage. The inde1 coverage contains an item for each layer in the library, the record for each tile is merely the path to that tile. So ,rcInfo &nows to find the library based on an entry in the system0s IN)5 file, then loo&s in the library0s inde1 coverage to see what layers are in there, then loo&s for the tiles wherever that is specified. The advantage of libraries is that the whole layer is not rendered as you !oom in, only the tiles within your e1tent + very similar to S$%0s use of spatial inde1. The disadvantage is that it0s still built on the coverage model and thus does not support 2very well, anyways3 multi+user editing and display. 5ur tests have shown that library layer display comes to a crawl as more users are added. d. GeoTIFFs and other spatiall! registered images" ++

a file based spatial data model for rasters where each pi1el has a spatial representation but rather little attribute depth. e. G#IDs + The ,rcInfo representation of a 'aster image

that allows for greater attribute depth for each pi1el in the file.

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f. Image Catalogs ++ ,n image catalog is similar to a

library layer, but each catalog has its own database file. The database file is nothing more than a table of min6, min7, ma16, ma17, and image location. It specifies the e1tent of an image and where it is stored. In this manner, users can bring in image tiles as an apparent mosaic without finding all the tiles and piecing them together. Image catalogs were not supported at ,rc(ap 8.9.1, but are at 8.:. There are several significant limitations to any file+based

data model. ;oncurrent user access typically degrades performance dramatically and it is not possible to support multiple concurrent users editing a single file. )urther, there are limitations to the si!e of any physical layer in the file system. The file si!e limit is largely a function of the density of the data involved, but in many instances it becomes necessary to subset large contiguous spatial datasets in order to obtain ade4uate performance. The .ibrarian structure was developed to streamline some of the resulting problems inherent in tiling datasets, but it remains a rather in+complete solution. VI. The ne$ spatial data models

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5ver the course of the past five years or so, %sri and most

of the ma/or database vendors have begun the process of developing spatial data models based upon 'elational and 5b/ect+ 'elational $atabase (anagement Systems. The aim of these development efforts is to ta&e advantage of advances in relational database technology in order to provide the %nterprise features lac&ing in a file+based data model. Security, multiple concurrent user access, and spatial inde1es are dramatic improvements to the traditional spatial data models available through the new Spatial $atabase models. <hile many of the ma/or database vendors 25racle, Informi1, I"(3 have introduced their own proprietary spatial database formats, for the purposes of this paper, we will concentrate on %sri#s implementation of Spatial $atabase Technology.

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a. SDE la!ers The %sri Spatial $atabase %ngine 2S$%3 has

been around for several years now and has achieved great performance advantages over file based spatial data models. S$% creates a multi+tiered spatial inde1 scheme on your spatial data allowing a user to e1tract and render very 4uic&ly a subset of a very large spatial data layer. This capability allows a spatial data administrator to move away from the tiled spatial data model and create seamless data layers for the entire geographic e1tent of interest to the users. <hile you can load spatial data into S$% from almost any data format with the appropriate software, S$% enforces a much more rigorous spatial data model than shape files, and shape files can sometimes provide trouble when trying to load into S$%. <e recommend that shape files be converted to coverages before being loaded into S$%. S$% is currently the only spatial data format that is visible to all of the %sri clients. b. The Geodatabase The Geodatabase is, the most

significant advance in the spatial data model in thirty years. The Geodatabase, as implemented with ,rcGIS 8.:, is an ob/ect+ relational data model that enables tremendous new capabilities in our attempts to model the world around us. )or the first time, we can begin to model the behaviors of the spatial ob/ects in the world around us and not /ust the attributes of those ob/ects. ;oupled with the relational database technology that gives these new models their persistence, these new data models will deliver great new fle1ibility to users of spatial data in the years to come.

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<hile the underlying technology that supports a

Geodatabase is a group of relational database tables administered by S$%, the Geodatabase itself e1ists as a group of ;5( ob/ects within ,rcGIS as it is running on a (S <indows platform. )or this reason, technologies that are not running within the (S <indows memory space 2,rcI(S, ,rc %1plorer3 or applications that have not been built to see the new Geodatabase ob/ects 2,rc -iew =.63 will not be able to ta&e advantage of the e1citing new opportunities made available by these new data models. It is important to reali!e that while S$% may manage the storage aspects of a Geodatabase, S$% does not understand any of the custom behaviors that may have been defined for Geodatabase ob/ects or the relationships that have been established within the Geodatabase. VII. Implementing an Enterprise GIS $esigning an %nterprise GIS that is appropriate for the

organi!ation will re4uire much more thought and planning to get it right. >ere are /ust a few other minor considerations that should go into the planning of an %nterprise GIS for any organi!ation* a. %rchitect&re Design

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T!pe of &sers application of GIS $ithin the "efore one can develop an %nterprise GIS that fulfills users#

needs, one has to document what these needs are and incorporate.. ii. 'ind of band$idth available GIS datasets can be very large and dense. (oving even

subsets of these datasets across the %nterprise networ& for manipulation or viewing purposes can have serious networ& performance implications. , high capacity networ& and a relatively small number of GIS users each with a relatively powerful wor&station, then connecting each wor&station directly to the %nterprise Geodatabase over the networ& is a very viable solution. iii. Capabilities of &sers( des'top machines ,s /ust

described, ,rcGIS re4uires a pretty substantial wor&station for optimal performance. delivering a high performance software pac&age on inade4uate hardware has to be avoided..

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iv. #e)&irement of &sing GIS data or services o&tside

internal net$or'* It is very important to recogni!e that ,rcI(S is N5T a GIS

des&top application, but rather is a tool for publishing pre+defined maps over the internet. ,rcI(S as a replacement for ,rc-iew. Secondly, remember that ,rcI(S can utili!e S$% layers, but will not be able to ta&e advantage of most of the sophisticated capabilities of the Geodatabase. If you need to have access to Geodatabase ob/ects from within ,rcI(S, you will need to do some pretty sophisticated programming an utili!e ,rcGIS 8.: as a Geo5b/ect server 2not something that is handled within the current licensing language of ,rcGIS3. b. Capacit! planning hard$are" i. large and comple+ data* )eature ;lass. Spatial

database tuning is an interesting blend of art and science and involves a lot of trial and error. ii. ,resent n&mber of &sers* There is an e1cellent white

paper available on the %sri web site on System ,rchitecture $esign by $ave ?eters of %sri. This paper will give you some good guidelines for hardware capacity planning. iii. 'ind of spatial operations - &sers $ant

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Users who are concurrently editing a networ&ed data layer

will re4uire more hardware resources than those that are selecting and drawing points layers. c. Sec&rit! ,lanning i. <hat are the editing needs of the users@ <hich layers

should be visible to which groups of users@ <hich groups of users should be able to edit which layers@ Using any sensitive data@ will need to develop a security plan for your enterprise that ta&es these issues into consideration. d. #D./S Soft$are Selection The choice of a particular '$"(S vendor for your %nterprise

will li&ely not be determined by a list of re4uired functionality that one vendor supports while others do not. )or the most part, all of the ma/or '$"(S vendors will be able to support the ma/ority of your re4uirements. 7our spatial '$"(S vendor selection will therefore fall on several other criteria* Does #D./S s'ills alread! e+ist in ho&se*

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'$"(S e1perience with a particular %nterprise database in

house 2(S ,ccess is N5T an %nterprise database3 then this vendor is most is the best choice to implement %nterprise Geodatabase. ii. 0o$ large the installation li'el! to get* If the %nterprise Geodatabase is li&ely to get very large and

be distributed among several different offices, then 5racle and I"( probably offer the most scalable '$"(S platforms supporting advanced database replication. iii.#e)&irement of spatial data $ith non-spatial

applications If non+spatial database applications within the organi!ation

is scheduled be enhanced by GIS integration, then it ma&es the most sense to &eep the '$"(S platform consistent across all applications. e. GIS Soft$are Selection A

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There are essentially three different categories of ,rcGIS to

choose from each implemented with different capabilities of ,rc(ap, ,rc;atalog, and ,rcToolbo1. ,rc-iew 8.: is able to select and analy!e data from an %nterprise Geodatabase, but is unable to edit within this environment. ,rc-iew 8.: is only able to edit shape files and personal geodatabases. ,rc%ditor is able to edit data within an %nterprise Geodatabase, but does not have all of the geo+processing tools available with ,rcInfo wor&station. ,rcInfo 8.: is the full blown, top of the line product. f. Training A There is generic training on how to use the software

products available through %sri 2Introduction to ,rcGIS etc.3 but %nterprise Geodatabases are very uni4ue installations and one should plan on investing a fair amount of time and energy in developing user training that is specific to the installation VIII Enterprise GIS management.

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(any benefits can be derived from the use of GIS technology and the integration of GIS technology with facility management technologies* decreased pro/ect schedules, increased productivity, faster decision ma&ing leading to earlier program implementation and increased efficiencies. ,s with all relatively new applications of e1isting technology applied to new business problems, it can be difficult to determine the business case, much less the actual return on investment 2'5I3 of integrated GIS )( 4uantitatively. This section of the paper provides 4ualitative information that facility mangers can use to help ma&e the business case to implement GIS for several different applications, including site selection, mar&et and customer analysis, emergency action planning, developing efficient wor&flows, and business processes and visuali!ation .

1 Site Selection

<ith GIS the site selection process can be faster, less costly and more li&ely to result in successful location identification because of the amalgamation of comprehensive data about the site. GIS allows for more data to be utili!ed, beyond the traditional use of traffic counts and population statistics, providing the ability to visuali!e and analy!e data in more meaningful ways.

2 /ar'et and C&stomer %nal!sis

Utili!ing GIS delivers a better

understanding of mar&et potential before underta&ing e1pensive on+site evaluations and investigations, saving time and money in initial stages of pro/ect development. ,n accurate understanding of the mar&et potential of a location increases the li&elihood of attaining revenue goals or determining e1penses for a location.

3 Emergenc! preparedness pg. 16

Storing all data in a centrali!ed geodatabase in a server environment provides faster, more coordinated distribution of accurate data to multiple emergency agencies. This results in safer, more effective and more coordinated interagency emergency response.

Developing Efficient 4or'flo$s and .&siness ,rocesses

The use of GIS can increase wor&flow and business process

efficiencies. "enefits from efficiency include reduced costs and greater productivity. ?roductivity is gained by*

C Grouping tas&s by location C ,llocating resources in real time based on best or nearest available personnel

and or inventory

Scale

C (odeling and understanding of spatial distribution of resources by department

C 5

Increasing communication and collaboration Vis&ali6ation of Time-.ased ,henomena From the Local to the Global

The use of GIS provides a better understanding of temporal 2time+based3 trends to support better decision ma&ing. "etter+ informed decisions lead to cost and time savings

Table 1/ar'et and c&stomer anal!sis $ith and $itho&t GIS

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4itho&t GIS
On-site, time-consuming manual

4ith GIS
Transportation and infrastructure

surveys, focus groups and analysis

modeling, including drive time and physical proximity of existing stores and/or facility location to competitors, other services and population densities representing potential customers

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High-cost physical visits to multiple

Comparison of existing

locations to initially determine viability

store/market/customer profile with potential locations for new construction or renovation using do ens of demographic variables

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Tabular data used to derive

Geospatial analysis and

processes without ta&ing into account complete, landscape+level analysis of spatial phenomena, such as pro1imity of resources to one another

wor&flow optimi!ation based on location intelligence for routing, buffer, line of sight, overlay analysis and pro1imity analysis for geographic grouping and routing of wor& orders assignments to dispatch maintenance management and fleet vehicles

)unctions departments within

Increased facility and

an organi!ation are often fragmented across the physical location based on space available and assignments

occupancy yield in pro/ects related to space utili!ation, facility rationali!ation, ad/acencies and fragmentation by space and facility use and type

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