The Florida Gazetteer Initiative

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The Florida Gazetteer Initiative
Presented by Stephanie Haas, Assistant Director,
Digital Library Center, University of Florida and
David Stage, FGDC Cadastral Subcommittee,
Eastern Cadastral Coordinator, FL Gazetteer
Consultant
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History Issues

• Place name issues have impacts far beyondthe
  Geography community
• David History and Future Directions
• Stephanie - Implications in the library/museum
  environment.
• Mapping (GIS) Community Business Issues
• Place name for maps
• Tags vs. Named Place Centroids
• Currency of GNIS
• Points vs. Footprints for spatial analysis

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Recent Florida Gazetteer History

• 1997 2000
• Library, Museum and GIS Community Began a Dialog
• 2000 - Business Requirements Assessment (St.
  Petersburg Workshop)
• Feds USGS GNB, Census, USGS Field Offices, Army
  Corps of Engineers
• (Libraries and Museums) FL Biological Consortium
• State Agencies and Water Management Districts
• Alexandria Digital Library Project
• Identify issues
• Currency of Data
• Feature Types unique to Florida (Islands gt
  hammocks)
• Location of Named Features (Points vs.
  Footprints)
• Technical
• Acquisition of meaningful locations
• Implementation
• Administrative and Funding
• Stewardship of data
• Governance

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More Recent History

• 2001 02 Implementation Strategy (USGS Funding)
• Workflow Footprint Issues
• Identified Potential Stewards
• Systems Design Implementation Plan
• 2002 03 Built FL GNIS
• Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Program
  (CERP)
• Army Corps of Engineers SWFWMD Gazetteer in
  CERP Workplan
• Built FL GNIS
• Developed a Conceptual Scheme for Footprint
  Implementation
• LSTA grants written- Florida Digital Gazetteer
  (2002) Mapping Floridas Historic Place Names
  (2003)
• 2004 - SFWMD acquired funding to implement a
  local gazetteer.
• Will not fund an abstract idea or coordination
• Problem Document Management
• Build footprint database
• Build Application
• Address Transfer protocols and synchronization
  with GNIS and FLGNIS
• 2004 05 Establish Florida Geographic Names
  Board Implementation
• Test Implementation strategy developed in 2002
• Develop Training Program

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SEVEN RESEARCH ISSUESAlexandria Digital Library
Project
SFWMD Gazetteer GIS Solutions Green Almost
Resolved Red Problem Area

• Discovery (Structured)
• Classes of data without place names (remote
  sensing data).
• Grid based systems
• Discovery based on textual placename matching is
  unreliable.
• Foot prints
• Gazetteer Integration Seamless and Invisible to
  application
• Spatial Ranking of Query Results
• Strategy for building footprints (Points
  -gtFootprints)
• Google Ranking Atlas of the World coming to the
  Top
• Hausdorf Distance Function Image Recognition

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SEVEN RESEARCH ISSUESAlexandria Digital Library
Project

• Data Typing (architecture) Standard Categories
• Identifier
• Subject, Title, Assigned Term, Originator
• Location, Time Period
• Object Type, Feature Type, Format
• Scalability Large Volumes of Spatial Data
  Imagery
• Spatial context Human Interface
• Resource Access
• GIS
• Map Server
• Grid Based System

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FOOTPRINTSFunding Driver

• Funding Driver
• Applications to meet business requirements
• Spatially enable spatially challenged databases
• Example
• SFWMD Document Management System (200,000 over 3
  years)
• Place Name provides link to GIS

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Future DirectionsIssues to Address

• Administrative Support and Guidance (National and
  Local)
• Names Board - (National - GNB Local - FLGNB)
• Establish Procedures
• Training (I didnt know you could.)
• Transfer protocols
• Research Strategy (National)
• Criteria for the use of different types of
  Geometry (National and Local)
• Points, Bounding Boxes, Lines, Polygons, Grid
  cells
• X Step Approach to Improving Geometry

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Future DirectionsIssues to Address

• Support the User Community Spatial Needs
  (National and Local)
• Applications to meet business requirements
• Document management systems
• Spatially enable spatially challenged databases
• Footprint Warehouse
• Multiple footprints
• Visualization
• Current
• Temporal (historical)
• Query Footprints
• Fuzzy Footprints
• Stewardship (Local)
• Driven by applications

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IMPACT ON LIBRARIES AND MUSEUMS

• The form of geographic entry has a significant
  impact on the information/library world
• Access issues library catalogs, databases
• Metadata creation subject headings, lat/long
  coordinates
• Interoperability across discipline boundaries
• Full text searching initiatives

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LIBRARY CATALOG ACCESS
Libraries use GNIS as the primary authority for
U.S. place names. The rule of thumb in library
cataloging is to qualify place names by country
with certain exceptions including the US where
1st order political divisions are used, e.g.,
Tampa Bay (Fla.) Headings are created for works
in hand.
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The format for most U.S. place names in library
catalogs is the place followed by a state
abbreviation in parenthesis.
If duplicate names exist, the county is added. ,
e.g., Orange Lake (Alachua County, Fla.) 
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If a name is not found in GNIS, other resources
are used to develop the name which is then
submitted through the Subject Authority
Cooperative Program (SACO) to the Library of
Congress, but not to GNIS!
Authority Record for Jacksonville in LC system
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SURFACTANT BOX 1 In a recent survey,
catalogers were asked When you create subject
headings for U.S. places that arent in GNIS, do
you submit the names to GNIS? All seven
respondents answered NO.
When asked why not? The unanimous answer was I
didn't know that you could do that.
RINSE Having catalogers contribute their work
to GNIS would build a resource used by both
communities, as well as nationally and
internationally. SPIN SACO at LC and GNIS could
discuss collaborating.
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METADATA CREATION
Increasingly, access to geographic/spatial data
and avoidance of duplicating costly data
gathering are priorities throughout all levels of
US government.One of the key difficulties for
research communities in developing metadata is
defining appropriate geographic access.The
following screens show some of the variations.
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Federal Geographic Data Committees - Digital
Geospatial MetadataGeographic element
Geographic the quantities of latitude and
longitude which define the position of a point on
the Earth's surface with respect to a reference
spheroid.
Shoreline Data Profile of the CSDGM
Biological Data Profile of the CSDGM
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DUBLIN CORE (the scarecrow version of MARC) was
developed as the Web resource metadata
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24 DARWIN CORE elements for museum metadata
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INTEROPERABILITY QUESTIONS What happens when
we try to search across metadata schemes?
In 1997, an IMLS grant Linking Floridas Natural
Heritage was funded to use the Z39.50 protocol
to tiemuseum specimen records to MARC
bibliographicrecords. We found that the critical
semantic elements missing in MARC were taxonomic
and geographic.
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Query Blacktip shark in Tampa Bay
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Author, etc. Killam, Kristie A. Title The
reproductive biology, age, and growth of the
blacktip shark, Carcharhinus limbatus
(Valenciennes) near Tampa Bay, Florida / by
Kristie A. Killam. Published 1987
Description x, 109 leaves ill. 29 cm.
Notes Thesis (M.S.)--University of South
Florida, 1987. Contents Introduction --
Literature review -- Materials and methods --
Results and discussion -- Summary -- List of
references Subjects, general
NO SUBJECT Blacktip
shark--Florida--Reproduction. ACCESS TO
TAMPA Blacktip shark--Florida--Growth.
BAY! Carcharhinus limbatus.  
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GEOGRAPHIC ENHANCEMENTS TO MARC
Author, etc. Killam, Kristie A. Title The
reproductive biology, age, and growth of the
blacktip shark, Carcharhinus limbatus
(Valenciennes) near Tampa Bay, Florida
electronic resource / by Kristie A. Killam.
Published 1987 Description x, 109 leaves
ill. 29 cm. Notes Thesis (M.S.)--University
of South Florida, 1987. Geographic location
United States Florida Hillsborough Tampa Bay
Westernmost longitude -82.5725 Northernmost
latitude 27.68833 Subjects, other Tampa
Bay--3100206 Hillsborough--12057
Added GNIS hierarchy, lat/long coordinates, and
HUC, FIP codes
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SURFACTANT BOX 2 Although there is a rising
awareness of the need to provide compatibility
between various metadata formats, the geographic
element is probably one of the least useful in
library metadata.
RINSE Consider revising and/or incorporating
additional geographic access elements to MARC
records to facilitate data exchange. Geographic
search interfaces need to be developed for online
catalogs. SPIN Add a preformated GNIS hierarchy
or lat/long to LC geographic subject headings
that could be cut and pasted into cataloging
records as they are created, e.g, 752 a
United States b Florida c Hillsborough d Tampa
Bay or 0341 d -82.5725 f 27.68833
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FULL TEXT SEARCHING INITIATIVES
The usefulness of full text research documents
will be greatly enhanced when users can enter the
text through a map interface.
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Roving Naturalists Pilot Project on the
Bartrams in Florida
Map of the Road from Pensacola in W. Florida to
St. Augustine in East Florida 1778 associated
with John Bartrams Diary of a Journal through
the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida from July 1,
1765 to April 10,1766                  
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LC authority
GNISauthority
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SURFACTANT BOX 3 The last comprehensive update
of Florida named features was done in 1987.
Until accurate, comprehensive, and
spatiallyenhanced place name authorities are
available, all projects requiring geographic
functionality will reflect existing inadequacies.
RINSE Increasingly digital projects have a
geographic component.
SPIN Enlist all of the stakeholders including
library catalogers who are involved in U.S. place
name issues to help build GNIS.
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