MWR Geospatial News
Fall 2008/Winter 2009

New Tool Eliminates Need for Custom Code

Start Planning for the 2009 Trimble GPS Bulk Purchase

How to: ESRI Customer Care Site (NPS only)

LizardTech GeoExpress 7 Now Available (NPS only)

MWR Fire Program adds new web pages

2009 GPS for Fire Mgmt & ICS Course Materials Online

Landsat Index on the NPS Data Store-Updated Jan 2009

Final Geospatial Briefing for DOI (NPS only)

GIS "cheat sheets" from Alaska (NPS only)

Jump to Google Maps from ArcMap

GIS Self Help!

Great Lakes Land Cover Analysis

Map of the Quarter:

GIS TIP:To share an ArcGIS 9.3 project with a colleague using a pre-9.3 version, use the "Save a Copy" feature found under the "File" drop-down menu. In the "Save a Copy" dialog box select the desired ArcGIS project level using the "Save as Type" setting.

Midwest GeoFact: There are 8,573 total miles of National Historic Trail in the NPS Midwest Region; however, if you take into account that the Oregon, Mormon Pioneer, and Pony Express trails all follow the California Trail for much of the way, there are actually only 6,850 miles of trail within the Midwest Region.

Did you know... You can request ESRI Virtual Campus (web-based) training courses via http://data2.itc.nps.gov/gis/esri/vc.cfm

IATR Planning -- Hiring of Brynda Hatch

The Ice Age Trail recently hired Brynda Hatch as a GIS Analyst to work in the general management planning process of the Trail's new interpretative site at Cross Plains, WI. Brynda comes from the WI DNR and brings a host of practical GIS experience and an MS from UW-Madison in Environmental Monitoring: Remote Sensing and Spatial Info. Analysis. In addition to the planning process, Brynda will be busy managing the Trail's geo data and incorporating them into the NPS Data Store.

MW GSC Hiring of New Students

The Midwest Geospatial Support Center hired three new UW-Madison students to assist with various tasks dealing with GIS support, web development and management, and much more. Dan Kolstad, Matthew Colwin, and Nicholas Bokas work part-time and will be part of the staff until at least September 2009.

Map Catalog for the MW

The MW GSC is developing a static map catalog for custom NPS maps created in the Midwest. Staff in the region will have the option of submitting maps (as .jpg) to the system as well as browsing the work of other map makers in Midwest units.

Park GIS Conf. Calls

Each month (roughly every second Thursday), GIS-minded employees in the NPS hold a conference call that's open to anyone. You can join the call by dialing 877-989-1671 (code 894050). Topics range widely but are always engaging and you can expect to come away better informed about GIS goings on in the Service. Contact Ben Zank for more info.

Custom maps on Garmin

The NPS's Tim Smith posted an excellent slide show on how to load custom maps on Garmin units. Jon Paynter (Denali NP) also found a way to manage custom data layers along with Garmin basemaps from the Mapsource product. For that he uses the MapSetToolKit.

Training: Spring into GPS...

The Midwest Geospatial Support Center in Madison, WI will be conducting spring GPS training in May. The 4-day course will focus on GPS field season equipment preparation and data collection training. Trainees can expect to leave the course with a breadth of knowledge concerning GPS fundamentals, data management, introduction to various software, and much more. Visit the Midwest GIS training page to read a draft syllabus and sign up for the course. This training represents the first part of MW Geospatial's "Spring into GPS, Fall into GIS" training cycle.

New Option for ESRI Licensing?
There has been discussion in the NPS GIS Council regarding the latest 9.3 ArcGIS license server update supporting MAC addresses. This could allow the ability to have a dongle-less, Non-Single Use (Keyless) option that cooperators, contractors, etc. could use.

2010 DOI EGIM Conference
The NPS GIS Conference planned for 2010 may be superceded by the planned 2010 DOI Enterprise Geographic Information Management (EGIM) Conference which will be a much larger conference held for the entire Department of the Interior as opposed to just NPS employees. For more information and updates, visit http://www.nps.gov/gis/egim/.

Service: ArcGIS 9.3 Migration

Our region's move to ArcGIS 9.3 continues! While there are occasional networking issues, the remote installation offering appears to be well received. 

To date, 63 PCs at 16 MWR parks and program offices have had ArcGIS remotely installed along with a system tune-up such as Microsoft updates, system BIOS and video driver updates, hard drive defragmentation, and updates of key system utilities. Twelve parks have requested the media for in-house installation.

We are planning another round of remote installations beginning the first week in February. If you are still waiting for either remote installation or the install media and do not hear from us by February 9th, please feel free to contact Reese Hirth at 608-263-7715 or to make arrangements.

Please Return Keys!

With our region's move to "keyless" ArcGIS, the USB and parallel port hardware keys are no longer required. The hardware keys are however, still being used for some installations as required by the ESRI License Agreement (ELA). For example, contractors requiring mobile access to ArcGIS and NPS cooperative entities are only permitted to use the "keyed" version.

With the move to national ArcGIS license servers and keyless ArcGIS, the current ELA no longer covers the cost of new hardware keys. New requests for keyed installations are quickly exhausting supplies at the regional GIS support offices. When they are gone, ESRI will charge us for new hardware keys.

So we are asking that all hardware keys be returned to our office as soon as practical. We have kept records of all hardware keys issued and will check off keys as they are returned. In a few months, we will begin contacting outstanding key owners to collect as many of the keys out there as possible. Your assistance with this effort is greatly appreciated.

New DOI Operations Center

Dubbed the "IOC", this office provides an operational view of emergences throughout DOI's domain (i.e., the world) including special events such as the Jan 21 inauguration. ESRI is involved and plans to deploy the new "SAB" (Situation Awarness Bundle) as part of the IOC. Some photos of the IOC may be found here courtesy of David Duran.

GIS Software list (NPS only)

A list of approved GIS software is now available on the RIM sharepoint. The DOI also maintains an approved list of software. The DOI list was established in 2006 and is expected to be updated soon by the DOI Chief Technology Officer Council (CTOC).

ArcPad License Tracking (NPS only)

There are 343 licenses of ArcPad available to approved NPS users. Many have been distributed. Contact Tim Smith if you are interested in obtaining a license. The list of distributed licenses is available to NPS users on the RIM sharepoint.

Park Building "footprints" (NPS only)

The fifth data collection cycle began on January 14, 2009. Since the initial data collection cycle in 2007, over 15,600 building points and over 10,300 building polygons have been loaded into the enterprise database. This represents nearly half of the approximately 30,000 buildings documented in the NPS facilities asset management system (FMSS).

Isle Royale Aircraft Tracking

Researchers at ISRO are using a commercial system that automatically maps GPS coordinates from survey aircraft onto an online map every 10 minutes. The system is designed to aid in possible emergencies and also automatically sends emails and text messages of coordinates to predetermined recipients. Read more here about the ISRO wolf survey using this technology.

40 Years of Wildlife Observation

A recently completed student intern project in the GIS certificate program at UW-Madison examined forty years of wildlife obersvations made at Badlands NP by park visitors. The data were entered into a geodatabase and viewshed analysis was conducted for the park's main observation platforms to compare sightings with potential viewpoints. The results show a majority of observations were made from the park's Pinnacles Overlook. If you'd like to host a student intern, please contact Doug Wilder.