From wendy@asmmag.com Sun Apr 3 12:56:42 2005
Date: Sat, 19 Mar 2005 20:02:59 +1300
From: Wendy Chapman
To: T V Ramachandra
Subject: ASM Newsletter - Asian GIS, remote sensing, positioning and surveying
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Asian Surveying and Mapping
March 2005
NEWS HEADLINES
FEATURES
OTHER NEWS
NEW PRODUCTS
EVENTS
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Asian Surveying and Mappingis published monthlyby South Pacific
Science Press International Pty Ltd (ACN 082 312 810)
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Alexandria NSW 2015
Australia
Ph: +61-2-9565-2223
Fax: +61-2-9550-2142
Publisher:Wendy Chapman
wendy@asmmag.com
Editor:Jon Fairall
jon@asmmag.com
COPYRIGHT of this message is asserted by South Pacific Science Press
Intl Pty Ltd 2003. This newsletter may be forwarded to your
contacts. However the content may not be reprinted without
acknowledging the source.
NEWS HEADLINES
Air Bali Enters Aerial Surveying Market
PT Air Bali has been given a licence to operate a new aerial surveying
system, opening up new markets in South East Asia.
To Read More ...
ESRI SA/Leica Geosystems
ESRI South Asia is to discontinue distribution of Leica Geosystems' ERDAS
Imagine image manipulation product.
To Read More ...
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FEATURES
Tsunami Wave Patterns
On 10 January, Agence France Presse reported that some Sri Lankan Muslims
claimed to see the name 'Allah' spelt out in Arabic in the waves as the
tsunami came ashore in Sri Lanka. The aim of this investigation is to
explain how the pattern of water that appears in the image was generated
by natural causes.
To Read More ...
ESRI South Asia User Conference
The 12 th ESRI South Asia User Conference was held at the Westin Resort
at Nusa Dua, 2-4 March. Almost 130 users from eight countries in the
region attended.
To Read More ...
Saving The Orang-Utan
The Orang-Utan Foundation International is building a GIS of the habitat
of the most endangered of the great apes, the Bornean Orang-Utan.
To Read More ...
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OTHER NEWS
Thailand buys Total Stations
SDM Company has supplied the Thai Department of Lands with 151 Sokkia
RED-Tech reflectorless total stations. SDM Company is Sokkia's
distributor in Thailand.
The Royal Thai Government is attempting to stimulate the national economy
by encouraging asset capitalisation among the Thai people.
A key element of this policy drive is creating opportunities for the
holders of assets, rights and permits to access sources of capital. The
policy focuses mainly on minor holders and small businesses.
In order to achieve this, the DOL has embarked on a nation-wide cadastral
survey project so that land rights can be issued throughout the country
by October 2006.
StreetPro Singapore
MapInfo has launched the second edition of StreetPro Singapore.
This latest version provides updates and additions to layers within the
product. The modifications address changes in Singapore and customer
feedback.
StreetPro products now exist for a large number of localities in Asia
Pacific. All StreetPro databases are built to the same standard, and
contain address ranges, points of interest and street centrelines.
Coral Damage Assessment
Suchana Apple Chavanich at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok is
undertaking field surveys of coral reefs in the southern part of
Thailand. The project will model and analyse the damage caused to the
reefs by the tsunami that hit the area on 26 December.
Ms Chavanich has received funding from the Thai Department of Natural
Resources. C Tech in the US has supplied its flagship MVS software free
of charge for the project.
For more information visit the website.
ECW vs MrSID Compression
The battle for control of the market for image compression has been
fierce between Earth Resource Mapper and Lizardtech.
But now it appears Lizardtech, at least, is focussing on differentiating
the products. Speaking at the ESRI South Asia user conference, marketing
director Hyung Lim said that, while both companies produced a product
that used wavelet compression, the two products were being used in
different ways.
Lizardtech is concentrating on making MrSid the format of choice for ESRI
users. ER Mapper is concentrating on getting developers to use its
software development kits. The kits will allow developers to use
compressed imagery inside their own applications. ER Mapper recently
released the source code for its JPEG 2000 SDK.
Lim also noted that while both companies have developed implementations
of JPEG 2000, these are not identical. "JPEG 2000", he said, "is a
standard, it is not a format, so it can be implemented in many different
ways."
DMC certified to DO-160D
Intergraph Mapping and Geospatial Solutions have certified the Digital
Mapping Camera (DMC) against the DO-160D aircraft standard. This is a
standard used for equipment that flies to more than 8000 metres in
non-pressurised aircraft.
DO-160D certification is achieved through performing environmental
conditions and test procedures to assess the equipment's reliability over
a wide range of temperatures and altitudes. It is subject to shock and
vibration, electromagnetic interference and electrostatic discharge.
DO-160D is equivalent to ISO-7137.
The certification is important because it means the DMC can use
non-pressured aircraft versus more expensive aircraft with pressurised
cabins.
Info@Sea
BMT Asia Pacific used the ESRI South Asia user conference last week to
announce a new company that will build and operate a maritime web portal
for ships at sea - Info@Sea,.
BMT says the growing availability of broadband access to ships at sea
makes the provision of internet content intended for mariners worthwhile.
The first product on the new portal will be Straitsforecast. It is
intended for ships as well as for terminal and port operators. It will
contain hydro-dynamic information about conditions in the Singapore
Strait and the Port of Singapore.
The system uses a suite of ESRI products, including ArcSDE, PLTS and
ArcIMS to store, query and transmit meterological and oceanographic data.
Development Gateway Award
The deadline for nominations for the 2005 Development Gateway Award is 15
March.
The US$100,000 award recognises outstanding achievement in using
information and communication technologies to improve people's lives in
developing nations.
Chairing the panel of jurors this year is Danilo Piaggesi, chief of
information technology at the Inter-American Development Bank. The panel
includes: Vallampadugai Arunachalam, Vice Chairman, State Planning
Commission, State of Tamil Nadu, India, Lídia Brito, Assistant Professor,
Eduardo Mondlane University, Mozambique; Ning Jiajun, a member of the
advisory committee for State Information in China; and Geert van der
Linden from the Asian Development Bank.
The award will be hosted by China's State Council Information Office, the
Ministries of Finance and of Information Industry, and the advisory
committee for state information.
The award ceremony will take place at the 2005 Development Gateway Forum
in Beijing in June.
For more information visit the website.
NGIS visualises Environment
NGIS in Hong Kong has shown its new 3D Environmental Impact Assessment
(3DEIA) demonstration website to a meeting of the Hong Kong government's
interdepartmental EIA Liaison Group.
Senior representatives from all government departments attended the
meeting.
NGIS developed the 3DEIA website for the Environmental Protection
Department to demonstrate mechanisms for improved visualisation and
interaction with models of proposed projects and their impacts.
The company says it has also been working with one of Australia's largest
timber companies, Great Southern Plantations, to create ForMS (Forestry
Management System) - an intranet-based environmental management system.
The company says ForMS has reduced operational costs by 400 per cent per
hectare.
For more information call Chris Hoar at NGIS China on + 852 2180 8784 or
email.
Optech Rollei Fusion
Optech Incorporated and Rollei have entered a technology partnership to
develop a new airborne digital camera for exclusive use in the Optech
Airborne Laser Terrain Mapper. Optech are based in Canada and manufacture
laser-based survey instruments. Rollei are a European camera
manufacturer.
The partners did not say when the camera will be delivered, but they did
say it will feature a 1/1000 second shutter, four-second cycle time,
built-in light sensor and be integrated with Optech's Flight Management
Software.
For more information visit the Optech website or the Rollei website.
World's Largest Image?
WebBased Ltd in the UK is serving what it claims is the world's largest
image, a 3.9 Terabyte file. The image of the south west of England is
available, via the internet, to schools in England's South West Grid for
Learning.
Students use the image across the learning curriculum. For example, in
History the image is overlaid and morphed with a map of the same area
from 1880.
Citizenship classes use the imagery when studying local areas and
environments.
UKP, Britain's largest aerial photographer, was commissioned to create
the ECW format image. It was composed from 24,000 individual 1km tiles of
aerial photography. The tiles had a mixture of 10cm and 25cm resolutions.
ER Mapper was used to mosaic the entire dataset into one seamless image.
The image is served using InfoMapper, powered by ERM's Image Web Server
technology.
New LBS in Maylasia
CPS (Cambridge Positioning Systems Ltd) is to partner eClip Wireless
Portal to produce high accuracy location based services for the Malaysian
mobile market.
The two companies will target corporate users with a range of telematics
and asset tracking services based on CPS's Matrix location technology.
eClip, which is based in Kuala Lumpur, already offers a range of mobile
data services in Malaysia and is looking to expand into other parts of
the region.
EClip CEO, Dato' M. Redzuan Kushairi said that in the last two years
there has been very encouraging growth in the mobile data services
market.
For more information visit the CPS website or the eClip website.
Visualisation Software Price Reduction
McMullen Nolan have halved the price of the Terragate internet
visualisation software package in half. McMullen Nolan distribute
Terragate for Skyline Software in the Asia Pacific region.
Terragate server is an Internet delivery system for interactive 3D
visualisation. It is said to be capable of streaming unlimited sized 3D
databases to unlimited numbers of users.
The offer is available for six months from McMullen Nolan, authorised
re-sellers in Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and China.
For more information email Stuart Bowd or visit the website.
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NEW PRODUCTS
Pythagoras 10.30
ADW in Germany has released version 10.30 of its Pythagoras software.
Pythagoras is a drawing and calculation program for land surveyors, civil
engineering companies and utilities.
Version 10.30 adds forced import of adjusted GPS co-ordinates, better
AutoCad compatibiltiy, an extended VBA object model and better links to
total stations and to Thales' Z-Max receivers.
For more information visit the website.
ImageView 3.0
Applanix in Canada has released version 3.0 of its Image View software.
This version is designed for use with its Digital Sensor System. Image
View processes raw digital camera data to produce input for standard
mapping software.
The new software incorporates an extensive toolset designed to maximise
the system's capabilities in generating digital imagery for the aerial
survey and remote sensing industry.
The new release includes a routine to automatically correct for
radiometric lens fall off and a calibration tool to compensate for
image-to-image intensity differences.
Image View 3.0 is available to DSS Digital Sensor System customers free
of charge.
For more information visit the website.
LISCAD 7
LisTech in Melbourne has released version 7 of its LISCAD survey and
engineering software.
New instruments and formats are supported in this version, including
Leica Geosystems System 1200, SmartStation, Geo Office, RoadRunner,
GradeStar and LandXML as well as XML and Autodesk's AutoCad 2004/2005.
Customised HTML or ASCII reports and data exchange formats can be created
in version 7. It also features several new methods for transforming
between any projections, including MGA Grid File (NTv2).
For more information email or visit the website.
ArcIMS 9 Route Server
ESRI has released version 9 of the ArcIMS Route Server. It is an
extension to ArcIMS. With this new version, users have a wider selection
of data and can determine routes between points, although ESRI itself
only supplies data for North America and Europe.
The new version can use data sets from Navteq, Tele Atlas (GDT), and
DMTI. The new version also supports .NET in addition to Java, Active
Server Pages, Java Server Pages, ColdFusion, or ArcXML.
It is now supported on Sun Microsystems Solaris operating system.
For more information visit the website.
GIS Editor
TatukGIS have released GIS Editor. The Editor supports all the formats,
features, and functionality of the free Viewer, plus features to
digitise/edit vector geometry and attributes, convert between vector file
types, import/export attribute data, merge vector layers, build and
correct topology, unions and splitting, clipping, buffers, etc.
The Editor saves vector layers to the following formats: SHP, GML, MIF,
DXF, DLG, and to SQL geodatabase files based on a choice of two methods:
i) the TatukGIS method or ii) with OpenGIS SQL Features implementation.
Like the free Viewer, the Editor can be used to create ASP.NET projects
for easy web publishing with the TatukGIS Internet Server.
For more information visit the website.
What's New in AutoCAD 2006?
UpFront.eZine Publishing, Ltd in Canada has published a PDF electronic
book called What's Inside AutoCAD 2006. The book is intended for users
considering upgrading and competitors worrying about AutoCAD 2006.
The book details changes in Autodesk's latest release of its AutoCAD
flagship software. It contains information on 43 new commands, 56 new
system variables, changes to 40 existing commands and a series of
undocumented commands.
Price is $14.10; extra for delivery on CD.
For more information visit the website.
LPS V 8.7
Leica Geosystems GIS & Mapping, LLC has upgraded its Erdas Imagine and
Leica Photogrammetry Suite (LPS) products.
Imagine 8.7 Service Pack 2 contains performance enhancements and
maintenance fixes. Leica Photogrammetry Suite 8.7 Feature Update contains
performance enhancements for frame and satellite photogrammetry users.
For more information visit the website.
go to top
EVENTS
IMTA for Tokyo; Singapore
The International Map Trade Association, (IMTA) Asia Pacific, will
participate in the 2005 Tokyo International Book Fair.
The IMTA will be providing a co-operative stand for members at the Tokyo
International Book Fair 7-10 July. The stand will provide an opportunity
for members to display their products to the Asian marketplace at a
reasonable cost.
The 2006 IMTA Global Conference and Trade Show will bring IMTA members
from around the world to Singapore. This will be the first time that an
IMTA conference and trade show has been held in Asia.
Planning is well underway for this event which will be held in November
2006. Information will be posted on the IMTA website as planning
progresses.
For more information visit the website.
Dynamic Planet
Dynamic Planet 2005 will be a joint assembly of three international
associations: the International Association of Geodesy, the International
Association for the Physical Sciences of the Ocean, and the International
Association for Biological Oceanography. It will be held 22-26 August in
Cairns, Australia.
The theme is Monitoring and Understanding a Dynamic Planet with Geodetic
and Oceanographic Tools - an especially relevant topic given the
devastation caused by last December's tsunami in the Indian Ocean.
For more information contact Chris Rizos at the University of New South
Wales by email; or visit the website.
Kuwait Remote Sensing Conference
Promedia International has issued a call for papers for the first Kuwait
Remote Sensing Conference.
The conference is being held 26-28 September. The scientific committee
consists of Dr. Jasim Al-Ali, the chair of the consultation unit for GIS
& RS at Kuwait University, Prof. G. Konecny Hannover University in
Germany and Dr. Mohamed M. Yagoub from UAE University, UAE.
Papers that deal with mineral and petroleum explorations, desertification
assessment and water are encouraged. The deadline for abstracts is 30
June; for papers 4 August. For more information visit the website.
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