A Geographic Information System: Icloud - Essay Example

Cloud GIS Institution Date Introduction Most software services are already on the cloud while many others are also headed for the cloud. Desktop applications are soon to become a thing of the future as most applications move to the cloud. Today, you can store documents, images, presentations, calendars, articles and many other file types on the cloud. It is only logical follows that the future of GIS is on the cloud just like the other business applications. GIS software on the cloud has many advantages that which will accelerate the shift to cloud-based GIS. One of the distinct advantages of GIS on the cloud is its potential to deliver GIS services to customers beyond the traditional GIS niches. Discussion Moving GIS to the cloud is appealing to many GIS businesses as the shift will enable GIS reach customers beyond the current core markets. Currently, GIS is only used in niche markets such as utilities, government, gas sector, telecommunications and oil (Sui 2014). By moving GIS to the cloud the barriers to uptake of GIS by the wider business community can be eliminated. GIS has value to any organization that needs easily understood reports, charts and maps. However, GIS availability remains significantly constrained by unnecessary complexity, excessive costs and lack of accessibility (Sui 2004). Unlike existing GIS software, GIS cloud can make the process of integrating GIS information easy and less expensive. Demand for GIS is growing beyond the traditional markets partly driven by low-end online GIS applications such as Google Earth and Bing maps (Sui 2014). These low-end GIS applications are still used by hobbyist and consumers and it is still questionable if they can be used as large scale GIS software. The present online applications have proved too costly when used for business purposes (Sui 2014). However, the software serve individual mapping needs very well. Despite the disadvantages, Bing and Google have shown that GIS cloud has immense potential in terms or ease of use of use and availability. Cloud GIS can enable GIS overcome the traditional constraints of complexity, cost and accessibility (Sui 2014). With these constraints resolved, GIS can be made available beyond its traditional niche markets. Cloud computing provides a delivery method for geospatial capabilities to line-of-business information and enterprise information systems. According to Sui (2014), GIS in the cloud can offer much more than just a webified version of the current GIS products. GIS on the cloud will become a multi-layered offering with GIS applications tailored to businesses or industries. The application will have broad GIS functionality and will be built on a robust platform. GIS applications on cloud will also have the same reliability, security and scalability as other online applications (Evangelidis et al 2014). Data volume is one of the biggest challenges of GIS in Client-server environments. The data challenge will remain a problem on GIS on the cloud since data has overarching importance in GIS (Evangelidis et al 2014). Cloud GIS needs to provide deep data integration and versatility to support the requirements of consumers. Cloud computing eases the data challenge associated with GIS by making data and data integration as flexible as possible. For example, customers can access a number of geocoding engines to support their geocoding requirements (Sui 2014). However, Cloud GIS also further complicates the data issue by requiring more data for privacy and security mechanisms. GIS on the cloud will also face the challenge of delivering even more functionality that today’s desktop or clientserver GIS offerings. GIS services on the cloud will be accessed in radically different ways from current applications. Users will expect GIS on the cloud to be able to capture, warehouse, analyze and present data like current GIS applications (Sui 2014). In addition, a user should be able to analyze spatial information, create queries from the information, edit maps and data, and smoothly present the results of these executions. While these functions of cloud GIS are same as those current GIS the main difference is in how there are accessed (Evangelidis et al 2014). Cloud GIS enables all these operations to be executed through a standard browser and eliminates the need to store the data on the client machine. Accessibility is one of the greatest advantages of Cloud GIS over its desktop peers. Cloud GIS can be accessed anytime, anywhere as long as the user has an internet connection (Peng and Wang 2014). Expectations of universal internet access make this a great advantages as people will not require high processing or storage capabilities on their computing devices to use Cloud GIS. GIS on the cloud will also be more attractive if it is able to overcome the challenge GIS faces integrating with other business applications. According to Peng and Wang (2014), GIS would be much more powerful if it could seamlessly integrate with other business applications such as accounting, planning applications and customer relationship management system. Integration with these applications has been among the biggest hurdle preventing the usage of GIS beyond its traditional niche markets. The poor integration has led to long project lead times and rising costs which are a main disadvantage of current GIS. In contrast, cloud GIS will ease the integration of business systems with GIS. The cloud has already allowed the creation of pre-packaged platforms and applications such as SharePoint and Salesforce.com (Peng and Wang 2014). In addition, easily configured APIs are available on the cloud and provide a fast way to integrate with any business application including Business Intelligence (BI), Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Customers Relationship Management (CRM) and even traditional client-server GIS applications. GIS on the cloud will also enable unprecented collaboration that is not possible on offline GIS. Today, isolated GIS silos remain a major hurdle to collaboration when developing solution. In contrast, Cloud GIS is easily accessible by teams working together from different locations (Peng and Wang 2014). Collaboration on Cloud GIS is easier as it enables distribution of data, systems, and analysis to groups of remote users. It eliminates the need to send data and download the data into large datasets which are later updated on the server. GIS on the cloud provides greater flexibility that will see business move from a one-size-fits-all GIS application to tailored applications. GIS on the cloud enable the faster development and deployment of applications that can be accessed by customers on the same GIS platform. Cloud GIS will adopted faster if it will provide the same functionality as existing cloud applications such as Netsuite, Salesforce.com and Webex. Cloud GIS will have to meet the high expectations set by current Cloud and business software (Peng and Wang 2014). This will mean the Cloud GIS has to deliver new services such as locations intelligence and geospatial business intelligence that is not available on current GIS applications. Cloud GIS will also change the way data is captured in GIS application. With cloud GIS, data can be captured in real time and displayed onto the user system (Evangelidis et al 2014). Cloud GIS can integrate with applications that allow data captured by the general public to added and verified by users. Open street maps owes much of its success to information provided by users. Another huge advantage of Cloud GIS is its potential to turn GIS into an ecommerce business. Cloud GIS has opened up the opportunity to sell data or online services to customers across the globe (Evangelidis et al 2014). GIS vendors will take advantage of this opportunity to open new revenue streams for their business. In addition, Cloud GIS will ease the need to dedicated IT administrators for GIS system as these will be outsourced to the hosting company. However, Cloud GIS also has some significant disadvantages that may slow down migration of GIS applications to the cloud (Sui 2014). First, data access can only be through the internet and those who do not have a good internet connection will be frustrated by Cloud GIS. Secondly, security is a major concern on cloud GIS as data may be accessed by unauthorized users if the host does not have good security in place. Thirdly, GIS data takes gigabytes of space on servers and it may be an issue migrating current data to cloud servers (Evangelidis et al 2014). Access to voluminous GIS data may also be an issue for users with weak internet connections. Cloud GIS may also not be a good solution if the hosting organization does not have the interest of its customers at heart. Cloud GIS hosting organization must provide back-up services that guarantee recovery in case of failure. In addition, the users of cloud GIS lose control over how data is manipulated, used, analyzed or displayed. It is harder to add a new function on Cloud GIS than on convectional GIS systems. Conclusion Undoubtedly, the future of GIS is on the cloud. The many advantages of Cloud GIS overshadow the disadvantages. Cloud GIS in a few year will make desktop GIS a distant memory as it offers better accessibility, flexibility, and lower costs. However, Cloud GIS has a number of significant disadvantages such as the concern about availability and security. These problems should be addressed to ensure that the opportunities offered to both customers and GIS vendors are exploited. References Evangelidis, K., Ntouros, K., Makridis, S. and Papatheodorou, C., 2014. Geospatial services in the Cloud. Computers & Geosciences, 63, pp.116-122. Peng, Y. and Wang, Y., 2014. Geographic information system in the cloud computing environment. In Computer Engineering and Networking (pp. 893-902). Springer International Publishing. Sui, D., 2014. Opportunities and impediments for open GIS.Transactions in GIS, 18(1), pp.1-24. Read More