CommonGIS history and functionality

Appendix 1. Survey of CommonGIS history and functionality

The Spatial Decision Support team has a unique experience in building interactive Internet-based systems for visual data analysis and electronic publishing of spatial maps and data. The roots of our approach originate from the software system IRIS (Information Retrieval Intelligent System) that was developed for Windows in the early nineties. IRIS was implemented in C++. IRIS already realized several innovative ideas:

Concept of interactive maps that change their appearance in real-time upon user’s activation of interactive manipulators.
Knowledge-based approach for the automated selection of map symbolism depending on data characteristics and user’s needs.
Dynamic linking between maps and statistical graphics displays (brushing).

The development of IRIS continued by applying the Java programming language and environment for the Internet. IRIS, then renamed to Descartes, became one of the first interactive mapping systems available in the Internet. As early as September 1996, it was included to the Top 1% web applets and Top 10 web applets lists by the independent Java Applet Rating Service ( http://www.jars.com/).
In 1998-2001 the further development continued in the framework of ESPRIT project 28983, CommonGIS (http://www.commongis.com/), which was proposed and coordinated by AIS. In the course of the project, the software was finally renamed to CommonGIS.
CommonGIS is a powerful system that combines traditional GIS methods with innovative tools for visual data analysis and decision making. CommonGIS can be used in combination with commercial GIS software (ESRI ArcGIS, MapInfo, etc.). This is ensured by its ability to process spatial data in many standard formats.
The main features of CommonGIS are the following:

Powerful tools for Internet mapping that support a variety of standard formats of map and table data.
A flexible client-server architecture that optimises download time and supports integration of data from network-distributed servers.
A variety of interactive mapping techniques combined with statistical graphics displays and computations.
Novel information visualization tools (dynamic query, table lens, parallel coordinate plots, etc.) dynamically linked to maps and graphics via highlighting, selection, and brushing.
Tools for interactive multi-criteria decision making and sensitivity analysis for individuals and small groups of decision makers.
Possibility to complement interactive visual data analysis by mathematical methods of statistics and data mining.
Intelligent user guidance (task support module) helps users to follow problem solving scenarios and utilise all tools of interactive graphics. In particular, CommonGIS is able to suggest tools and recommend how to use them depending on data and task context.
Original methods of applying multivariate graphics (in particular, parallel coordinates plots) to the analysis of spatial data. Also, original methods for calculating degrees of similarity in multidimensional attribute space are available.

The development of CommonGIS and its predecessors has always been oriented towards user’s needs. To ensure the friendliness of the user interface several usability tests were performed. Their results demonstrated that only short training is sufficient for understanding and memorising the handling of the novel, and sometimes – but only prima facie - sophisticated looking tools, and their successful utilisation in problem solving. Our general experience is that new users must first learn and “feel” the very high interactivity of the direct manipulation tools of CommonGIS by way of some examples. A short introduction of 30 to 60 minutes, and some hands-on experience of some 2 hours, would generally induce enough fun and courage so that users can continue with their own exploration of the further tools and mechanisms.