A review of: “National Transfer Format,Release 1.0, January, 1987.” By THE WORKING PARTY TO PRODUCE NATIONAL STANDARDS FOR THE TRANSFER OF NATIONAL DIGITAL MAP DATA. (Southampton: The NTF Secretariat,Ordnance Survey, 1987. [Pp. 191: appendices and looseleaf annex.]

Metonymically used location names (toponyms) refer to other, related entities and thus possess a meaning different from their literal, geographic sense. Metonymic uses are to be treated differently to improve the performance of geographic information retrieval (GIR). Statistics on toponym senses show that 75.06% of all location names are used in their literal sense, 17.05% are used metonymically, and 7.89% have a mixed sense. This article presents a method for disambiguating location names in texts between literal and metonymic senses, based on shallow features.

The evaluation of this method is two‐fold. First, we use a memory‐based learner (TiMBL) to train a classifier and determine standard evaluation measures such as F‐score and accuracy. The classifier achieved an F‐score of 0.842 and an accuracy of 0.846 for identifying toponym senses in a subset of the CoNLL (Conference on Natural Language Learning) data.

Second, we perform retrieval experiments based on the GeoCLEF data (newspaper article corpus and queries) from 2005 and 2006. We compare searching location names in a database index containing both their literal and metonymic senses with searching in an index containing their literal senses only. Evaluation results indicate that removing metonymic senses from the index yields a higher mean average precision (MAP) for GIR. In total, we observed a significant gain in MAP: an increase from 0.0704 to 0.0715 MAP for the GeoCLEF 2005 data, and an increase from 0.1944 to 0.2100 MAP for the GeoCLEF 2006 data.     

Measuring complexity in OGC web services XML schemas: pragmatic use and solutions

The use of standards in the geospatial domain, such as those defined by the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC), for exchanging data has brought a great deal of interoperability upon which systems can be built in a reliable way. Unfortunately, these standards are becoming increasingly complex, making their implementation an arduous task. The use of appropriate software metrics can be very useful to quantify different properties of the standards that ultimately may suggest different solutions to deal with problems related to their complexity. In this regard, we present in this article an attempt to measure the complexity of the schemas associated with the OGC implementation specifications. We use a comprehensive set of metrics to provide a multidimensional view of this complexity. These metrics can be used to evaluate the impact of design decisions, study the evolution of schemas, and so on. We also present and evaluate different solutions that could be applied to overcome some of the problems associated with the complexity of the schemas.     

Forest fire risk maps: a GIS open source application – a case study in Norwest of Portugal

Forest fires are widely recognized as one of the most critical events in global change. Successful fire management depends on effective fire prevention, detection, and presuppression, having an adequate fire suppression capability, and consideration of fire ecology relationships. Geographical information systems (GIS) provide tools to create, transform, and combine georeferenced variables. In Portugal, as in many other countries, it is mandatory that all the municipalities produce forest fire risk maps on an annual basis, following the rules of the Portuguese Forest Authority, a governmental association. This article presents the results of a research project aimed at producing forest fire risk maps in a GIS open source environment in Portugal. The requirements of an open source application are better quality, higher reliability, more flexibility, lower cost, and an end to predatory vendor lock-in. Three different open source desktop GIS software projects were evaluated: Quantum GIS (QGIS), generalitat valenciana, Sistema d'Informacio Geografica, and Kosmo. Taking into account the skills and experience of the authors, the main advantage of QGIS relies on the easiness and quickness in developing new plug-ins, using Python language. Therefore, this project was developed in QGIS platform and the interface was created in Python. This application incorporates seven procedures under a single toolbar. The production of the forest fire risk map comprises several steps and the production of several maps: probability, susceptibility, hazard, vulnerability, economic value, potential loss, and finally the forest fire risk map. The forest fire risk map comprises five classes: very low risk (dark green), low risk (green), medium risk (yellow), high risk (orange), and very high risk (red). This application was tested in three different municipal governments of the Norwest zone of Portugal. This application has the advantages of grouping in a unique toolbar all the procedures needed to produce forest fire risk maps and is free for the institution/user. Beyond being an open source application, this application may be faster and easier when compared with the GIS proprietary solutions that usually comprise several steps and the use of different software extensions. This work presents several contributions for the area of the GIS open source applications to forest fire risk management.     

基于XRF的紫金山铜矿床硫地质特征

福建紫金山铜矿床属高硫浅成中低温热液矿床,矿石中主要含铜矿物为蓝辉铜矿、铜蓝和硫砷铜矿等,且铜矿物与黄铁矿密切共生。由于铜矿石中硫含量较高,导致铜精矿中硫含量超标,w(S)/w(Cu)比值为2.0~2.1,远高于冶炼要求的1.15~1.20,影响其经济价值。使用X射线荧光(XRF)光谱分析对紫金山铜矿中S元素的分布进行数字化研究,查明硫的空间分布规律和赋存状态,划分铜矿石类型,为紫金山铜矿今后的采选工作提供参考。     

软件设计模式在农业气象系统开发中的应用

通过分析当前农业气象业务服务发展与变化的需求, 农业气象业务系统架构、数据管理、产品制作等方面仍然存在不统一、不规范的问题,应用先进的软件设计模式与开发技术,该文提出了农业气象业务服务系统采用的以策略模式为主、工厂方法模式为辅的设计方式,以适应运行时用户不同功能选择和功能不断扩充的需求,提高软件的复用效率, 进一步形成通用、规范的应用系统,实现资源共享、集约化的系统设计模式。文章重点讨论了该模式下的总体框架模型、数据控制模型、数据服务模型、数据组件封装模型、插件管理与专业模块复用模型几方面的关键技术, 并通过基于ArcMap的农业气象评价系统和Oracle的农业气象数据库应用系统研发的两个实例,说明以动态库插件技术和数据组件封装技术的开发与业务应用效果。     

测震日报数据复核软件的开发与应用

为了提高地震台站测震日报数据的质量和工作效率,减轻人员工作负担,针对新源地震台工作实际,利用Delphi软件开发环境,结合批处理技术,研制了一套测震日报数据复核软件,使测震日报数据复核工作和月报数据整理工作得到简化,同时提高了工作效率.     

中国数字测震台网专业软件评测

介绍我国“十五”期间建设测震台网专业软件评测平台基本架构及原理,举例描述了专业软件评测平台运行效果.认为,测震专业软件测试与评估对我国“十五”测震台网建设项目实施和提高台网运行质量发挥重要作用.     

矩形和钟形震源时间函数对地震动模拟结果的影响比较

首先介绍了用于地震动数值模拟的国际通用软件COMPSYN程序,并对此进行了二次开发,将其震源时间函数由矩形函数改为钟形函数,通过与全空间的解析解计算结果的对比,验证了修改后程序的正确性。通过对比2种震源时间函数的频谱特点,指出矩形函数的高频成分丰富,不利于地震动的模拟。2种震源时间函数下用COMPSYN程序对同一观测点地震动模拟的结果表明,矩形函数模拟的时程出现＂振铃＂和＂锯齿＂现象,且随截止频率的增加而加重,影响了对模拟地震图的识别,而钟形函数模拟的时程较为平滑,说明采用钟形函数进行地震动数值模拟是比较合理的。     

BP神经网络模型在采水地面沉降中的应用研究

随着我国各项建设对水资源的需求越来越大,导致由地下水开采而引起的沉降问题成为当前研究的热点课题。本文对某矿区采水地面沉降进行了模型设计,通过对部分实测数据的训练,优选出该模型的网络结构和网络参数,并且用Matlab软件编程实现对其他监测点的计算和预测。通过研究表明本文所建立的BP神经网络模型能较准确反映采水地面沉降的规律,同时也能较准确地预测地下水开采引起的地面沉降。     

GIS软件项目管理特点分析

软件项目管理是实施软件工程的核心。GIS软件是以地理空间环境为研究对象的,空间数据的多维特性以及地学方法本身的复杂性都决定了GIS软件项目管理具有自身独特的特点。本文结合GIS软件项目管理实践,对GIS软件项目管理的特点进行详细剖析,能为GIS软件工程的组织与实施提供借鉴和参考。