DIY GIS

摘要

Everyone touts the benefits of a GIS. But vendors sometimes gloss over the painstaking and time-consuming steps required to develop a viable system-gathering and inputting the reference points for each and every asset and importing that location information into a mapping program-and the expertise required to set up a geo-database and run queries. It can take years to become skilled in GIS applications. When faced with a March federal deadline for developing a program to manage storm sewer discharges, the public service department of Pataskala, Ohio, had neither the time nor the resources to complete a key step: mapping stormwater outfalls.