In+ersec+ion for Spatial People

June 18, 2013, Toronto, Canada, NAC Geographic Products Inc. announced that LibanPost - the postal service provider of Lebanon has licensed Global Postal Code System (also called Universal Address System) to establish a nation-wide address database and provide Global Postal Code based postal services in Lebanon.

Before knowing the Universal Address, Mr. Khalil Daoud, Chairman and Managing Director of LibanPost, had worked with public committees for over 10 years to establish an address system in Lebanon without success. Lebanese residents continue using "landmark"-based references to identify the location of their homes, such as “beside the hospital”, “in front of the school”. Postal services rely on locals to deliver mail to households based on somewhat arbitrary knowledge about who lives where.

The introduction of the Universal Address will vastly change the situation. Generated from longitude/latitude coordinates, a Universal Address i.e. an eight or ten character Natural Area Code (NAC) can uniquely specify a house, building or even a fire hydrant anywhere in the world, and can be obtained with a smartphone or an online high resolution satellite image map such as NAC Locator. For example, the Universal Address of Grand Serail is NAC: KXQK NMGG and Lighthouse NAC: KXN7 NMH0. With the Universal Addresses, you can get the turn by turn driving directions from Grand Serail to Lighthouse immediately with http://nactag.info/default.asp?saddr=KXQK NMGG&daddr=KXN7 NMH0.

Unlike conventional addresses, the Universal Address does not need people to assign and is readily available for public use for all location purposes. If it is printed on an evelope of a letter, LibanPost will be able to sort the letter from the world level to final household mailboxes automatically and deliver it right to your home efficiently. In an emergency situation, a given Universal Address can significantly accelerate emergency address dispatching and locating. If you tell the Universal Address to your visitor, he can use a GPS navigation system to get to your home without your directions. Governments can use Universal Addresses to register properties and collect property taxes. Banks and insurance companies can use Universal Addresses to verify the home locations of their clients.

"The adoption of the Universal Address will hopefully solve all Lebanese addressing problems," said Dr. Xinhang Shen, president of NAC Geographic Products Inc., "and it is also another milestone toward the unification of postal code systems in the world."

About NAC Geographic Products Inc.
Incorporated in 1995 in Toronto, Canada, NAC Geographic Products Inc. is a world's leading company in geographic technologies and geo-services, developing GIS/GPS software products and providing APIs for real-time geo-services (geocoding addresses, reverse-geocoding, mapping, routing, etc.) for web applications and wireless location based services, etc.

CONTACT
Lixin Zhou
PR Manager
Tel: +1 416 496 6110
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.nacgeo.com

- New ability to export web tiles compatible with online map services -

Toronto, ON, May 21, 2013 - Avenza Systems Inc., producers of MAPublisher® cartographic software for Adobe Illustrator® and the popular PDF Maps mobile app, is pleased to announce the release of Geographic Imager 4.2 for Adobe Photoshop. New formats are supported, including writing to the DEM TIFF format which saves raw DEM values and exporting web tiles to Google Maps or Microsoft Bing Maps format. In addition, there are a number of new and exciting product features and enhancements. This release also is also available at the Geographic Imager Basic license level which provides support for the geospatial framework in Adobe Photoshop as well as limited import and export abilities at an introductory price level. Also new in this release is the addition of the Georeference feature with the Geographic Imager Basic license.

“We've been working on some very innovative features lately, one of them being the ability to export web tiles using Geographic Imager from Adobe Photoshop,” said Ted Florence, President of Avenza. “The web tiles are compatible with several online map services which allows our users to spend less time worrying about image referencing and more time creating online mapping solutions,“ he added. “Another great feature in this release is the new ability to save to the DEM TIFF format, which is interoperable and can be reopened in Geographic Imager or in other geospatial software packages. There has been a demand for extended format support and we're continuing to listen to our users’ needs.”

Additional Geographic Imager 4.2 features

• Available Geographic Imager Basic license
• DEM TIFF write support, format saves raw DEM values
• Ability to Export Web Tiles to Google Maps or Microsoft Bing Maps format
• Geographic Imager panel improvements, including new Survey and Ruler tabs
• Crop by Vector File Extents, use the geographic extents of a vector file to crop an image
• Streamlined user interactions with command boxes and simpler messages
• Various bug fixes and user experience enhancements.

More about Geographic Imager for Adobe Photoshop

Geographic Imager is software for Adobe Photoshop that leverages the superior image editing capabilities of raster-based image editing software and transforms it into a powerful geospatial imagery editing tool. Work with satellite imagery, aerial photography, orthophotos, and DEMs in GeoTIFF and other major GIS image formats using Adobe Photoshop features such as transparencies, filters, and image adjustments while maintaining georeferencing and support for hundreds of coordinate systems and projections.

Geographic Imager 4.2 is immediately available and free of charge to all Geographic Imager Maintenance Program members and at US$319 for non-maintenance upgrades. New fixed licenses start at US$699. Geographic Imager Basic licenses start at US$199. Academic and volume license pricing are also available. Geographic Imager 4.2 is compatible with Adobe Photoshop CS5, CS5.1 and CS6. Visit www.avenza.com/geographic-imager for more information.

More about Avenza Systems Inc.

Avenza Systems Inc. is an award-winning, privately held corporation that provides cartographers and GIS professionals with powerful software tools for making better maps and for working with spatial imagery. In addition to software offerings for Mac, Windows and Apple mobile device users, Avenza offers value-added data sets, product training and consulting services. Visit www.avenza.com for more details.

For further information contact:
Tel: 416-487-5116
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.avenza.com

SupergeoM Technologies, the leading global provider of complete GIS software and solutions, announced that DGPS post-processing tool will be introduced to assist SuperPad users in post-processing the collected field data using SuperGIS Desktop 3.1a to improve data accuracy.

SuperPad 3, a full-function mobile GIS application field survey and mapping, allows surveyors to collect, edit, and measure spatial data. Working with GPS, SuperPad 3 performs waypoint guidance and creation with GPS, etc. Therefore, the field workforce is able to promptly identify current position and collect spatial data.

When surveyors collect spatial data with GPS, interferences form ionosphere, atmosphere, anthropogenic factors, and electrical noise may result in positioning error during process of transmitting satellite signal. To avoid such errors occurring frequently, SuperPad 3 will offer an extension to help users accurately collect spatial data and record satellite signals simultaneously. As a result, the data collection can be imported to SuperGIS Desktop 3.1a and rectified with the post-processing tool.

More new product features about Superpad 3, please visit http://www.supergeotek.com/ProductPage_SP3.aspx

The free trial is available at http://www.supergeotek.com/download_6_mobile.aspx

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About Supergeo

Supergeo Technologies Inc. is a leading global provider of GIS software and solutions. Since the establishment, Supergeo has been dedicated to providing state-of-the-art geospatial technologies and comprehensive services for customers around the world. It is our vision to help users utilize geospatial technologies to create a better world.

Supergeo software and applications have been spread over the world to be the backbone of the world’s mapping and spatial analysis. Supergeo is the professional GIS vendor, providing GIS-related users with complete GIS solutions for desktop, mobile, server, and Internet platforms.

- Includes streamlined export options and new automation tools -

Toronto, ON, March 26, 2013 - Avenza Systems Inc., producers of the PDF Maps app for iOS and geospatial plugins for Adobe Creative Suite, including Geographic Imager for Adobe Photoshop, is pleased to announce the release of MAPublisher 9.2 for Adobe Illustrator. This exciting release includes a number of new and exciting product enhancements. Export has been improved and streamlined to make it easier to quickly export MAP Views and MAP layers. Also included in this release are several new tools including Automation and Path Utilities.

"We're delighted to release MAPublisher 9.2 which includes improved export functionality and advanced map-making automation,” said Ted Florence, President of Avenza. “Not only can our users create high-quality maps with MAPublisher, they can also use it to increase file interoperability across multiple platforms and overall workflow efficiency,” he added. “We've improved export to geospatial PDF because we are focused on delivering this very popular format to suit the needs in many industries and agencies in all levels of government and to make it easier to produce maps for our mobile PDF Maps platform.”

Enhancements and new features of MAPublisher 9.2

• Streamlined export document to geospatial PDF with clearer indications of how layers and attributes are being handled and exported to appear in Adobe Acrobat.
• Improved MAP View and MAP layer export with multiple layer export supported.
• Export document to image can export a georeferenced image of the entire artboard.
• New Automation tool to configure settings that initiate MAPublisher operations upon data import to automate map production, such as manage MAP Views, apply MAP Theme stylesheets, create grids and graticules, label using MAP LabelPro, and export to geospatial PDF.
• New Path Utilities tool to perform optimization actions on line and area layers.
• New ability to view attributes in a tear-off panel.
• Various user interface and performance enhancements to improve usability.

More about MAPublisher for Adobe Illustrator

MAPublisher for Adobe Illustrator is powerful map production software for creating cartographic-quality maps from GIS data. MAPublisher tools leverage the superior graphics design capabilities of Adobe Illustrator to manipulate GIS data and to produce high-quality maps with accuracy and efficiency.

MAPublisher 9.2 for Adobe Illustrator is available free of charge to all MAPublisher users with an active maintenance subscription and as an upgrade for non-maintenance users at US$599. New licenses are US$1399. MAPublisher FME Auto and MAPublisher LabelPro are also available as add-ons to MAPublisher 9.2 at prices starting at US$399 per license. Academic, floating and volume pricing are also available. Prices include one year of full maintenance. Visit www.avenza.com/mapublisher for more details.

More about Avenza Systems Inc.

Avenza Systems Inc. is an award-winning, privately held corporation that provides cartographers and GIS professionals with powerful software tools to make better maps. In addition to software offerings for Mac and Windows users, Avenza offers value-added data sets, product training and consulting services, as well as the PDF Maps app for purchasing and using maps on iPhones, iPads and iPod Touch devices. Visit www.avenza.com for more details.

For further information contact: Tel: 416-487-5116
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.avenza.com

In must-be-aware category, Google yesterday shared studies on the importance of the geo services industry.

From the entry: "In summary, the global geo services industry is valued at up to $270 billion per year and pays out $90 billion in wages. In the U.S., it employs more than 500,000 people and is worth $73 billion. The infographic below illustrates some examples of the many benefits of maps, whether it’s improving agriculture irrigation systems or helping emergency response teams save lives. [...] That’s why it’s important we all understand the need to invest in the geo services industry so it continues to grow and drive the global economy. Investments can come from the public and private sectors in many forms—product innovation, support of open data policies, more geography education programs in schools and more."

Here's the Oxera 6-pages summary [pdf] and 31-pages full report [pdf], along with the 12-slides of the BCG report [pdf].

- MrSID export ability available with Geographic Imager 4.1 -

Toronto, ON, January 7, 2013 - Avenza Systems Inc., producers of MAPublisher® cartographic software for Adobe Illustrator® and PDF Maps for Apple iOS and LizardTech, a provider of software solutions for managing and distributing geospatial content, today announced the integration of LizardTech® GeoExpress® 8.5 and the ability to produce MrSID format files into the latest release of Geographic Imager 4.1 for Adobe Photoshop.

LizardTech, based in Seattle, WA, specializes in developing the MrSID format, which handles high-resolution geospatial data. Previous versions of Geographic Imager have already provided read capability for raster and LiDAR MrSID via the integration of LizardTech MG4 Decode Software Development Kit (DSDK). With the current release, Avenza customers can take advantage of the ability to write to MrSID format directly from Adobe Photoshop provided they have the current version of LizardTech GeoExpress installed. This ability expands the number of supported file formats Geographic Imager can write and increases workflow options when working with high-resolution imagery.

“As the leading GIS vendor to support both viewing and writing of MrSID files in Adobe Photoshop, we're excited at the opportunity to partner with LizardTech to provide our users with access to MrSID technology,” said Ted Florence, President of Avenza. “With this integration, customers on both sides will be able to use MrSID images with the entire Geographic Imager toolset without compromise. The capability of tools in Geographic Imager and Adobe Photoshop with the ability to export to MrSID format is an invaluable workflow and shows how committed we are at bringing formats to the platform that may have never been thought possible.” he added.

Jon Skiffington, director of product management at LizardTech, notes, “We're thrilled at the opportunity to work with Avenza Systems to expand the reach of MrSID technology into viable platforms like Geographic Imager for Adobe Photoshop for the benefit of our mutual users.” Additionally, Jeff Young, business development manager at LizardTech, commented, “Collaboration with Avenza allows for more effective support of the Avenza/LizardTech world-wide user community with smoother workflows and more transparent data exchanges.

More information about MrSID support in Geographic Imager is available at www.avenza.com/geographic-imager/lizardtech-mrsid.

More about Geographic Imager for Adobe Photoshop

Geographic Imager is software for Adobe Photoshop that leverages the superior image editing capabilities of raster-based image editing software and transforms it into a powerful geospatial imagery editing tool. Work with satellite imagery, aerial photography, orthophotos, and DEMs in GeoTIFF and other major GIS image formats using Adobe Photoshop features such as transparencies, filters, and image adjustments while maintaining georeferencing and support for hundreds of coordinate systems and projections.

Geographic Imager 4.1 is immediately available free of charge to all Geographic Imager Maintenance Program members and at prices starting at US$319 for non-maintenance members. Academic and volume license pricing are also available. Geographic Imager 4.1 is available for Adobe Photoshop CS5, CS5.1 and CS6. LizardTech GeoExpress licenses and data cartridges are also available through Avenza Systems.

More about Avenza Systems Inc.

Avenza Systems Inc. is an award-winning, privately held corporation that provides cartographers and GIS professionals with powerful software tools for making better maps and for working with spatial imagery. In addition to software offerings for Mac, Windows and Apple mobile device users, Avenza offers value-added data sets, product training and consulting services. Visit www.avenza.com for more details.

More about LizardTech

Since 1992, LizardTech has delivered state-of-the-art software products for managing and distributing massive, high-resolution geospatial data such as aerial and satellite imagery and LiDAR data. LizardTech pioneered the MrSID technology, a powerful wavelet-based image encoder, viewer, and file format. LizardTech has offices in Seattle, Denver, London, and Tokyo. For more information, visit www.lizardtech.com.

For further information contact:
Avenza Systems: Tel: 416-487-5116 - Email: [email protected] - Web: www.avenza.com
LizardTech: Tel: 206-902-2839 - Email: [email protected] - Web: www.lizardtech.com

- Entry level version is perfect for budget-conscious users -

Toronto, ON, December 26, 2012 - Avenza Systems Inc., producers of MAPublisher® cartographic software for Adobe Illustrator® and PDF Maps for Apple iOS, is pleased to announce the release of the Geographic Imager 4.1 Basic License for Adobe Photoshop. The newly available Basic license provides the well-known georeference framework of Geographic Imager to Adobe Photoshop and the ability to import and export limited file formats at an introductory price point. The Basic license can import all supported spatial imagery that the Full license can (some file size restrictions apply to non-native Adobe Photoshop formats), and allows for limited export to major GIS formats including GeoTIFF and geospatial PDF.

“Geographic Imager is recognized in the geospatial software industry as a powerful geospatial import and export tool and as an important framework for enabling geospatial referencing thorough a Photoshop workflow. The Basic license lowers the price of entry by offering the most essential geospatial functions to users who may not necessarily need the full Geographic Imager toolset,” said Ted Florence, President of Avenza Systems. “An upgrade to a Full license is available for users who decide to jump to the entire Geographic Imager suite of tools to take advantage of features like transforming, cropping, mosaicking and tiling”, he added.

Geographic Imager Basic License features

• Maintains the georeference framework of Geographic Imager in Adobe Photoshop.
• Ability to read Geographic Imager supported file formats up to 1 GB - no limit on native Adobe Photoshop file formats.
• Ability to export to major GIS raster formats including GeoTIFF, geospatial PDF, and JPEG 2000.

More about Geographic Imager for Adobe Photoshop

Geographic Imager is software for Adobe Photoshop that leverages the superior image editing capabilities of raster-based image editing software and transforms it into a powerful geospatial imagery editing tool. Work with satellite imagery, aerial photography, orthophotos, and DEMs in GeoTIFF and other major GIS image formats using Adobe Photoshop features such as transparencies, filters, and image adjustments while maintaining georeferencing and support for hundreds of coordinate systems and projections.

Geographic Imager 4.1 Basic license is immediately available at US$199 with a special introductory price of US$149 through Janaury 31, 2013. An upgrade to a Full license is available at US$500 within the first 60 days of activating a Basic license, $549 thereafter. Academic and volume license pricing are also available. Geographic Imager 4.1 Basic license is available for Adobe Photoshop CS5, CS5.1 and CS6 for both Mac and Windows.

More about Avenza Systems Inc.

Avenza Systems Inc. is an award-winning, privately held corporation that provides cartographers and GIS professionals with powerful software tools for making better maps and for working with spatial imagery. In addition to software offerings for Mac, Windows and Apple mobile device users, Avenza offers value-added data sets, product training and consulting services. Visit www.avenza.com for more details.

For further information contact:
Tel: 416-487-5116
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.avenza.com

In the wake of Hurricane Sandy on one side of the world is the gradual disappearance from maps of Sandy Island (Sable Isle in French, apparently) on the other side of the world. Richard Chirgwin notes that amateur radio "DXers" had concluded a decade ago that there was no good evidence for the island's existence. 

Seeing that navigation charts claimed depths of 1400 m at the location of the supposed island, Dr. Maria Seton of the University of Sydney directed the research ship she was on to travel right over the coordinates of the island, and the popular press has taken this as proof that there never was or will be a Sandy Island.

A tumblr.com site excerpts maps which cover the area in question. While popular accounts state that even modern navigational charts include this island, no examples seem to be readily apparent.

Randall Munroe has exhibited his geeky map side (another, another, 'nother, triumph) before in his xkcd.com comic. Today he reveals his Pet Peeve #208 and nose-tweaks those who think a pretty map is worth a thousand hours of real data collection. (Well, if that's not what he is tweaking, he is definitely tweaking something.)

Everyone in the geospatial industry should read this, If Mapping is So Big, Why Does GIS Feel So Small?

Brian Timoney offers another great article, which includes: "The continued presence of GIS database middleware in an era where SQL Server, Oracle, and Postgresql/PostGIS all come equipped with native spatial capabilities (the latter two handle raster) has important consequences. First, DBAs in IT want nothing to do with GIS implementations mediated by quirky middleware. [...] But let’s not kid ourselves: what ends up in the geodatabase is a fraction of an enterprise’s valuable spatial data. [...] When Google Earth and Google Maps stormed onto the scene, GIS professionals sniffed that it wasn’t “real GIS”. Of course, Google proved the masses didn’t mind that it wasn’t real GIS –whatever that was– and their basemaps and new easy-to-use file format KML led the web mapping revolution." I encourage you to read the full article.