GeoStor - About GeoStor: In The News

ARKANSAS' GEOSTOR SYSTEM, PUBLICLY accessible since January 2001, is the nation's first statewide, seamless, enterprise-class geospatial information system. It currently holds more than two terabytes of vector, image and grid data in an Oracle 8i object-relational database and is the core of a wide suite of applications and software solutions from many different vendors.

The system has been designed for Open GIS Consortium (OGC) interoperability specifications as well as the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) National Spatial Data Infrastructure. Developed through a public/private/university consortium led by the Arkansas State Land Information Board with key collaboration of FGDC, OGC and others, the system is managed by the Arkansas Geographic Information Office (AGIO), technically implemented though the University of Arkansas' Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies (CAST) and accessible via the Web at http://www.gis.state.ar.us . . .

Federal, state, K-12, higher education and private users now have access to a unique GIS clearinghouse, called GeoStor, which is a Web-based geo-data delivery system that runs from a core Oracle database containing all publicly available GIS data for the state of Arkansas. Following initial beta testing the site was released to the public in January 2001 and has hosted 7,000 downloads to date.

The objective of the site was to create an Internet-accessible database or warehouse that could deliver geographic data suitable for use in a range of geographic information systems. Officials also hope that the warehouse will serve as a resource to the general public that can access the information from home or through libraries and other pubic access points.

It runs off an Oracle Enterprise Spatial Database with GeoImage extension running on a Sun Microsystems Enterprise class server. The geographic and attribute components of each feature are stored as an object in the database. The data are indexed using a system that provides fast access. It also provides data in a user-defined projection, format and custom geographic area, and stores 500 layers of GIS information that can be searched, accessed and retrieved. All of this data is Federal Geographic Data Committee-compliant metadata with each data layer fully downloadable.

“GeoStor offers users a single source for GIS data from the state,” said Shelby Johnson, state geographic information coordinator with the Arkansas Geographic Information Office. “Data can be accessed with no fee, the turnaround time for acquiring it has improved by 85 percent, and we now have the ability to have agencies exchange information in a way they couldn’t in the past.”

In the future, Johnson hopes the system will move beyond its capability to provide information that is a snapshot in time toward real-time information. “Our future research looks at how we might provide remote access and write capabilities so that someone who creates GIS information would directly connect to the system and make transactional updates that reflect current records,” said Johnson. “Then any user searching for information would have the same view of information that an agency has.”

Vancouver, BC - June 14, 2001 - Safe Software, the industry leader in spatial data translation solutions, announces that its FME® spatial data translation software and SpatialDirect® data server software are being used as key components in the GeoStor On-line Data Delivery System. The System, developed for the Arkansas State Land Information Board by the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies at the University of Arkansas, gives users seamless access to digital map data of any area in Arkansas with no subscription fee. FME is used to load diverse spatial data into the system's Oracle Enterprise Spatial Database. The SpatialDirect data extraction server is used to query data from the database and perform on-the-fly data format and coordinate system conversions in response to user requests.

"Safe's products are key components in the GeoStor development," said Robert Harris of the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies, University of Arkansas. "We've been very impressed by the capabilities of their solutions," he added.

"The State of Arkansas is aggressively pursuing enterprise level IT projects that lead to reduced costs, improved services for its citizens and improved quality of life. The GeoStor architecture provides a sharing mechanism through the use of spatial technology that government, academia and the private sector can exchange data and address all these issues," said Shelby Johnson, Arkansas State Land Information Coordinator . . .

Fayetteville, AR—Governor Mike Huckabee today announced that GeoStor, Arkansas’ storage warehouse for spatial data, is being recognized as a national leader in electronic government. The Exemplary Systems in Government (ESIG) Review Committee chose GeoStor as one of only three Information Technology projects nationwide for special recognition. GeoStor Representatives officially receive a 2002 honorable mention award, Monday, October 28th during the Urban & Regional Information Systems Association (URISA) 2002 Conference Reception and Awards Ceremony. Approximately 1,000 participants are expected at this year’s conference, October 26-30, 2002 in Chicago, Illinois.

URISA is considered to be the premier organization for the use and integration of spatial information technology to improve the quality of life in urban and regional environments. URISA serves nearly 7,000 professionals worldwide (http://www.urisa.org/), through its international, national and local chapter operations. The award competition is available to all public agencies at the federal, state, regional, and local levels.

"Every Arkansan should be proud of the work which brought our state this national recognition," Huckabee said. "Once again, a respected organization has recognized this state’s focus on e-government. We continue to prove ourselves on the national and global stages while providing the taxpayers with a more accessible, efficient state government." . . .

FAYETTEVILLE - Gov. Mike Huckabee announced Tuesday that the state government's spatial information "warehouse" called GeoStor is on e of three information technology projects nationally recognized by the Urban & Regional Information Systems Association.

GeoStor, designed by the University of Arkansas Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies, stores information from the boundaries of census blocks and school disctricts . . .

FAYETTEVILLE - The state's on-line system for geographical information received an honorable mention from a technology information association, state officals announced Tuesday.

GeoStor, the state's electronic warehouse for spatial and map data, was one of only three projects recognized by the Urban & Regional Information System Association this year. The association's annual conference will be Oct. 26 through Oct. 30 in Chicago, where state officials will recieve the award . . .

A state-wide virtual mapping system that local agencies and groups are just beginning to take advantage of recently garnered national attention as a leader in electronic government efforts.

Governor Mike Huckabee announced the special recognition for GeoStor from Exemplary Systems in Government at the University of Arkansas Reynolds Center for Enterprise Business Tuesday afternoon. The state’s system was one of three information tech- nology projects nationwide to receive the accolade.

Created through the University of Arkansas’ Center for Advanced Spatial Technology, GeoStor is a storehouse of spatial data that provides mapping information for state and local groups that was not easily obtained or compiled in the past. "Every Arkansan should be proud of the work which brought our state this national recognition," Huckabee said Tuesday. "Once again, a respected organization has recognized this state’s focus on e-government. We continue to prove ourselves on the national and global stages while providing the taxpayers with a more accessible, efficient state government." . . .

Imagine trying to gather information from a library where the information is stored in different buildings miles away from one another. After driving from one location to another, you discover that the information is also in different languages, and translating it all into the same language could take months–or years.

Welcome to the world of digital spatial data–a wealth of information collected by various local, state and national agencies: Voting districts and census blocks; dams, harbors and springs; ditches and ferry crossings; boat ramps and power plants; churches, factories and post offices; precipitation levels, crops and soil types–lots of data from vastly different sources, written in different languages for different programs and housed at various agencies across the United States.

What many people saw as a massive morass of data to be gathered and slowly sorted through meant something different to Fred Limp and his colleagues of the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies (CAST): They saw an opportunity. He and a team of researchers at the University of Arkansas created GeoStor, a database that integrates large amounts of information from satellite imagery; local, state and federal agencies; and remote sensing technologies into a useable, readable format that anyone with a Web browser can access . . .