07-17, 16:00–16:30 (Europe/Sarajevo), SA01
Mankind has been flattening the Earth for more than two thousand years to represent and process geo-spatial data. This practice has imposed relevant penalties in accuracy with the distortions inherent to map projections. An holistic approach to global geo-spatial was never really tackled.
But a new era is dawning. Computer Systems are finally brewing the impact on geo-spatial information the were always meant to have. As geo-spatial data are no longer stored on flat sheets, the distortions and liabilities of traditional cartography can be addressed.
Since 1990 researchers and computer programmers have worked on methods and models to partition the surface of the Earth, paving the way for a modern representation of geo-spatial data. Broadly known as Discrete Global Grid Systems (DGGS) these models map any location on the surface to both a unique logical index and a geodetical zone. These zones form a regular or quasi-regular partition of the Earth's surface in its entirety, and may be created at different sizes or scales (also known as grid resolutions).
In recent years the number of institutions and enterprises adopting or developing DGGSs has erupted, leading to numerous tools and implementation, progressively approaching the expectations of regular GIS users. Moreover, members of the OGC have developed two standards, an abstract DGGS specification and just this year a data provision API. These developments usher a new era, in which most users will have some means of working with DGSSs.
This address presents in first place a brief history of DGGS. It then lays out the current spectrum of DGGS tools and their applications. It closes with notes on expected developments in the near future.
- DGGRID
- DGGAL
- H3
1 - no previous knowledge needed
Give indication of resources (video, web pages, papers, etc.) to read in advance, that will help get up to speed on advanced topics. – Select at least one general theme that best defines your proposal –Data access, collection & sharing, Data processing and analysis, State of software, or new features, Standards, SDI, INSPIRE, interoperability, Education
I make my conference contribution available under the CC BY 4.0 license. The conference contribution comprises the abstract, the text contribution for the conference proceedings, the presentation materials as well as the video recording and live transmission of the presentation – yes
Luís Moreira de Sousa completed the Degree on Informatics and Computers
Engineering at the University of Lisbon in 2002, which he complemented with a
Masters on Geographic Information Systems in 2005. In the Department of Civil
Engineering of this university he was a junior researcher from 2002 to 2008,
contributing to applied research projects with Instituto da Água and Estradas
de Portugal. After a year as consultant with SIQuant at the National Laboratory
of Civil Engineering (LNEC), in 2009 he became an independent consultant,
supporting de development of the spatial data infrastructure of the newly
created Administração da Região Hidrográfica do Tejo (ARH-Tejo).
In 2011 he joined the Henri Tudor institute in Luxembourg as Research Engineer,
where he contributed to the development of Spatial Decision Support Systems on
the domains of Energy and Urban Planning. At the time he was already a PhD
candidate on Informatics Engineering at the University of Lisbon, promoted by
Prof. Alberto Silva. In 2016 he concluded this graduation with a thesis on
domain specific languages for the development of spatial simulation programmes.
Still that year he started a post-doc position at EAWAG (Swiss Federal
Institute of Research on the Water Domain) during which he conducted research
on rapid flood modelling and storm water network management. In 2017 Luís
joined ISRIC - World Soil Information in The Netherlands where he conducted
research on the geography and ontology of world soils. In July of 2024 Luís
returned to the University of Lisbon, this time as Assistant Professor.
Luís has relied on open source software for geospatial since 2001, when he
first interacted with GRASS. Since then he contributed code and documentation
to various projects such as OWSLib, OpenLayers or QGis. In 2016 he
became a OSGeo charter member and integrated the first Project Steering
Committee of the PyWPS project. He was one of the founding members of the
European chapter of OSGeo and chaired the Scientific Committee of the
FOSS4G-Europe conference in 2018. Since 2023 Luís shares the role of Chief
Returning Officer at OSGeo.