Light mode and dark mode: Which one is suitable when using public-facing web maps? An experimental evaluation using eye-tracking

Dark maps, which are also called dark modes or dark themes, have gained popularity, but their usability has not been experimentally evaluated. This article presents a user experiment that uses eye-tracking to assess the usability of dark and light maps. Here, two widely used web maps, Google Maps and Gaode Maps, are selected at the street and city scales. Eight map-use tasks are designed and cover four operations (identify, compare, rank, and associate) with space-alone and attributes-in-space distinctions. Four pairs of map-use tasks (light-during-the-day, dark-during-the-day, dark-at-night, and light-at-night) are examined from three aspects: effectiveness, efficiency, and cognitive load. The results provide preliminary evidence that the light-during-the-day performance is generally the best in most cases, followed by the dark-at-night performance; the dark-during-the-day performance is the worst in all cases, followed by the light-at-night performance, which suggests that aligning the map design with the environment (i.e., lighting environment) is critical for better communication. The light-during-the-day performance is the best for space-alone tasks, and the dark-at-night performance is the best for attributes-in-space tasks. Our investigation also indicates that dark maps are far less favored in practice, which suggests that users' preference for using the dark mode of public-facing web maps needs to be shaped. Since light and dark maps are associated with photopic and scotopic vision, respectively, the results indicate the need for future studies on how to leverage scotopic vision to design better dark maps.     

Multi‐Scale Qualitative Location: A Topology‐Based Model

Qualitative locations describe spatial objects by relating the spatial objects to a frame of reference (e.g. a regional partition in this study) with qualitative relations. Existing models only formalize spatial objects, frames of reference, and their relations at one scale, thus limiting their applicability in representing location changes of spatial objects across scales. A topology‐based, multi‐scale qualitative location model is proposed to represent the associations of multiple representations of the same objects with respect to the frames of reference at different levels. Multi‐scale regional partitions are first presented to be the frames of reference at multiple levels of scale. Multi‐scale locations are then formalized to relate multiple representations of the same objects to the multiple frames of reference by topological relations. Since spatial objects, frames of reference, and topological relations in qualitative locations are scale dependent, scale transformation approaches are presented to derive possible coarse locations from detailed locations by incorporating polygon merging, polygon‐to‐line and polygon‐to‐point operators.     

一种新的近似平行沟渠群的典型化方法

提出并实现了一种针对近似平行沟渠群的典型化方法。首先,建立沟渠的方位关系图,通过生成关系图中各连通分量的极大完全子图,提取近似平行的沟渠;然后,依据视觉认知规律定义沟渠间的认知距离,并基于最小生成树的剪枝对沟渠进行分组;接着,运用K-means ++算法对分组后的沟渠进行重新表达;最后,通过比较综合前后沟渠群的外轮廓相似性以及沟渠分布密度的差异,对典型化结果进行了评价。对广州市数据进行了实验,结果表明该方法能有效进行近似平行的沟渠群的典型化。     

测绘地理信息标准一致性测试研究——框架、流程与系统构建

测绘地理信息标准间存在的不协调及不一致在一定程度上制约了测绘地理信息服务的应用与推广,需要通过测绘地理信息标准一致性测试来解决。根据测绘地理信息标准的类型对测试内容进行分类,研究适用于测绘地理信息标准一致性测试的方法,通过标准拆解构建一致性测试框架,描述一致性测试流程及其需要进行的工作、测试结果的分析方法、测试结论的判定依据和测试报告的内容等,同时还对一致性测试系统的构建进行介绍。     

基于AM/FM/GIS的燃气管线信息系统的设计与实现

针对燃气管线建设和维护的实际需求,综合应用AM／FM／GIS技术建立燃气管线系统,以行政区划和地形等基础数据为背景,实现了燃气管线信息的可视化管理,并对系统的架构、功能以及适用性进行了讨论,为管线的建设和维护提供了高效的技术支持手段。应用结果表明AM／FM／GIS技术对燃气行业信息化建设具有重要的促进作用。     

基于遥感技术的大安市土地利用现状分析

随着人类活动对环境的影响,人口、资源与环境问题日益突出,由此引起的土地利用变化尤其引起普遍关注。随着遥感平台的多样化和图像分辨率的提高,遥感技术已成为土地利用现状调查研究中不可或缺的手段。遥感技术以其宏观性、实时性、周期性及综合性等特点,为快速、客观、准确地获取土地利用现状信息提供了可能。通过采用2007年大安市SPOT 5遥感影像,对大安市的土地利用类型进行解译,最终得到各类土地的分类数据,以此为基础开展土地利用现状分析。     

基于GIS的专题地图编制及其应用研究

从专题地图的种类、特点、用途及其发展演变出发,运用专题地图编制、数字制图技术以及GIS的观点与方法,并结合相关应用实例,阐述基于GIS的专题地图编制的有关思路与要求,对实际工作有一定的参考价值.     

复杂地貌形态多比例尺表达的二维小波分析研究

针对复杂地貌形态的多比例尺表达中的等高线容易相交、地性特征描述困难和表达过程缺乏自适应等难题，提出了基于小波理论的复杂地貌形态的多比例尺表达模型，为上述问题的解决提供了新的思路和有效途径。     

中国西部地区生态环境现状遥感调查

针对“中国西部地区生态环境现状遥感调查”的需要,综合运用景观生态学理论、生态系统服务功能理论、可持续发展理论、遥感和地理信息系统技术,研究中国西部地区生态环境现状遥感数据的处理与集成,开展中国西部地区土地覆被和生态要素结构变化分析、沙漠化和水土流失强度评价、生态脆弱特征及时空分布规律分析、基于遥感调查的生态环境质量评价、基于多时相遥感数据对比的典型区生态环境遥感分析和生态环境变化成因对策分析等综合性的研究,并以量化和可视化的形式系统地反映西部地区生态环境现状及其变化的空间分布、空间统计和空间特征规律。     

规则格网DEM地形综合方法分析

针对当前丰富多样的DEM地形综合模型,分类阐述其综合原理、关键技术及优缺点,以黄土丘陵1：1万DEM为基础,对其地形综合效果进行对比分析。研究结果表明：现有的DEM地形综合模型各有优缺点;不同综合模型综合后的地形,高程数值随着综合尺度的增加,存在显著差异,而且不同综合模型对流域边界的综合处理也存在显著差异,没有形成客观有效的流域边界描述;当前困扰DEM地形综合的关键问题,是缺乏不同尺度下地形综合质量的客观评价标准,致使现有综合模型地形综合结果和DEM格网分辨率之间没有建立本应存在的内在联系,有待进一步深入研究。