Infrastructure Engineering - Research Publications

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    The importance of metadata engines in spatial data infrastructures
    PHILLIPS, ANDREW ; WILLIAMSON, IAN ; Ezigbalike, Chukwudozie ( 1998)
    With the rapid increase in the development of spatial data collection tools, such as GPS and remote sensing technologies, the amount of spatial data being collected and stored on computer networks is becoming vast. Knowing what spatial data is already available for an area is of great benefit to many spatial data users as duplication of spatial data collection and processing is a time consuming and costly exercise. Descriptive data about the data sets are maintained as metadata to provide such information to spatial data users. Current Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) technology allows search engines to search metadata systems within a network to discover what spatial data is in existence. As SDIs evolve, it is expected that spatial data sets will be accessed "live" from their distributed locations, rather than being downloaded before being used. With this development, it is anticipated that metadata systems will evolve into metadata engines and will again be background tools that are used for querying spatial data sets that are distributed across a network. This paper will describe the terms metadata and metadata engines in relation to SDIs. The paper will also discuss the trend towards distributed processing of spatial data and the evolving SDIs. Details will be given about the processes and problems of developing a prototype, using a public-domain package, ISITE, as a starting point, that will allow for simple distributed processing of spatial data to occur.
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    Future directions for Spatial Information Management in Australia-a land administration perspective
    Williamson, I. P. ( 1999)
    Future directions for spatial information management in Australia, from a land administrationperspective, are discussed. Sustainable development, micro-economic reform, globalisation andtechnology are highlighted as the drivers for change. The changing spatial information environment withemphasis on land administration and cadastral issues is examined by drawing on research beingundertaken at the University of Melbourne. Issues concerned with future land administrationinfrastructures such as the changing humankind to land relationship, cadastral reform and native title arehighlighted. Specific cadastral and land administration issues and technologies which impact on spatialinformation strategies are reviewed, including understanding the business-infrastructure relationship inspatial information management, modelling the maintenance of cadastral systems, the changing nature ofspatial data infrastructures, the spatial hierarchy problem, the importance of developing partnerships andthe impact of communications and WWW technologies. The paper concludes by emphasising that anygovernment spatial information strategy is intimately linked to land administration and is influenced byglobal drivers such as sustainable development, micro-economic reform and globalisation, as well astechnology. Understanding the inter-dependence between these global drivers is a key to successfulspatial information management strategies.
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    Land administration, spatial systems and citiesan Australian perspective
    Williamson, I. P. ( 1999)
    The paper argues that any spatial information strategy for urban, local government orcity jurisdiction is intimately linked to and influenced by the state or national landadministration and cadastral systems where it is located. It is these state or nationalsystems which usually provide the spatial infrastructure for urban information systems.Therefore to understand current trends in urban information systems, changes and trendsin state and national land administration systems must also be understood. The paperaddresses this topic by exploring the changing humankind-land relationship and theglobal drivers of sustainable development, micro-economic reform, globalisation andtechnology, with emphasis on Australian state spatial information systems. It draws onresearch being undertaken at the University of Melbourne to highlight some of thetrends and issues