MoreIntergraph Mapping and Geospatial Solutions, Huntsville, Ala., announced GeoMedia Fusion, its new product that automates and standardizes geospatial data collection, integration and maintenance. With the increased emphasis on data access and sharing and the immediate need for geospatial information, it has become more common for organizations and agencies to ingest multiple data sources in their enterprisewide databases on a regular basis. By using GeoMedia Fusion, users can improve the accuracy and currency of their enterprise database as they bring in new data, thereby streamlining and improving decision support. GeoMedia Fusion, available in April, is targeted for geospatial professionals in transportation, photogrammetry, local and state government, federal and national government and military and intelligence markets.
GeoMedia Fusion is ideally suited to help countries produce data for exchange with allies in national defense scenarios; fuse data holdings from national, state, county and local agencies in homeland security situations; and create large volumes of data from multiple, disparate sources, avoiding the need for data recollection within commercial or governmental data production agencies.
Because geospatial data is collected using differing methods and sources, organizations can receive data that varies in content and quality. When comparing sources for integration into the enterprise database, data may contain redundant feature and attribute information, good geometry with missing attribute and feature details or precise feature and attribute information but structures or levels defined differently than an enterprise's data model.
For example, geospatial data collected by several departments within a state transportation organization for the same area may include diverse content and different assigned values and geometry. Information from the mapping department may contain the topography needed but with route information represented as point features. Data from the road construction and maintenance department may contain the bridge, mile marker and other asset information as area features. And, the GIS department data may include precise geometry for the highway and right of ways in line features with asset information represented as point features. Previously, to bring all this information together, a user had to manually compare, select and edit the features, attributes and geometry data to decide what information should be included in the enterprise database.
GeoMedia Fusion allows users to interactively and/or automatically resolve these data inconsistencies so that valuable information can be integrated more quickly into the enterprise database. Through its toolbox of functionality, the product enables users to transform geospatial data from disparate sources to match an enterprise data model. GeoMedia Fusion addresses the data integration process from data ingestion to selection, filtering and restructuring content through validation and quality assurance. Delivered with pre-defined rules that allow users to automatically begin the data ingestion workflow, GeoMedia Fusion also provides capabilities for customizing mapping rules in a database. The initial product release includes functionality for:
-- Schema remodeling - Available in the initial release as a separate technology preview component, this module provides capabilities to create, modify and manage data schemas. Problems solved with schema remodeling can be as simple as changing the feature name from "route" to "road" or as complex as mapping a "route" feature with a "surface material" attribute of "concrete" to a "highway" feature with a "weather use" attribute of "all weather."
-- Conflation - These tools compare two datasets containing multiple representations of the same features and selectively combine their geometries and attributes to create a singular representation. Most commonly, conflation is used to combine the geometry of dataset A with the attributes of dataset B, but it also incorporates functionality to combine geometries from datasets A and B.
-- Advanced geometric validation - This functionality verifies the reliability of individual features by automatically checking geometry with characteristics that have been defined by the user as being potentially problematic. A wide variety of geometric checks are available, including capabilities to identify kinks; loops in line or area features; zero-length lines; empty geometry and z-values out of range; and checks for monotonic drainage.
-- Queued editing - This functionality enables users to manage and step through each change suggested by schema remodeling, conflation and validation functionality. A list of data is displayed graphically in a separate window for review and resolution.
A subsequent release of GeoMedia Fusion will add functionality for attribute validation, automated edge matching, model generation and quality assurance. GeoMedia Fusion is the latest extension product in the suite of GeoMedia products that lets users manage, analyze and distribute spatial data throughout an enterprise. The product requires GeoMedia Professional to run.
Source: Intergraph, March 30, 2005
