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Geographic Information Systems (GIS)

In a GIS, we can assemble, store, manipulate, analyze, and display spatial information. We can examine any type of data that is spatially referenced. As these exercises indicate, we can include environmental, spatial, economic, and socio-cultural variables in a GIS. Not only is GIS a useful tool for analysis, but it also assists in the formulation of hypotheses about spatial relationships.

A key dimension in a GIS is using our powers of visualization to reveal relationships among variables. Most importantly, GIS will encourage you to think spatially about your data.

Objective

You will:

1. Display map information.
2. Create projects to store your work.
3. Visually overlay map layers.
4. Identify features on a map.
5. Load new information into ArcView.
6. Create maps based on your data classifications.
7. Analyze spatial data.
8. Understand the tables that are the databases for ArcView.
9. Create charts to help interpret spatial data.
10. Create new variables from existing data.
11. Print your maps.

Steps to Learning ArcView

• Step 1: Starting ArcView
• Step 2: Starting a New project and Saving Projects
• Step 3: Navigating in ArcView
• Step 4: Exploring Themes
• Step 5: Identifying and Labeling Features on a Map
• Step 6: Changing Legend Colors and Display
• Step 7: Classifying Data in Themes into Classes
• Step 8: Creating Layouts and Printing Maps
• Step 9: Spatial Analysis I: Querying the Data
• Step 10: Spatial Analysis II: Selecting Features and Creating Shapefiles
• Step 11: Spatial Analysis III: Finding Data that Meet Spatial Criteria--Select by Theme Tool and the Role of Distance
• Step 12: Spatial Analysis IV: Using Database Tables and Creating New Variables
• Step 13: Spatial Analysis V: Working with Charts
• Step 14: Adding, Editing, and Importing Data
• Step 15: Advanced Features in ArcView
• Review: Tools and Buttons in ArcView

Step 1: Starting ArcView

From the Programs choices select ESRI and then ArcView GIS 3.2 and then ArcView GIS Version 3.2a .

ArcView now starts with an empty window.

Once this ArcView window is visible, you may need to re-size the ArcView window so that it fills the computer screen. If your ArcView window does not fill the screen, click on the small box in the upper-right corner

of the large window in ArcView in order to fill the screen.

ArcView Terminology: Projects, Views, and Themes

• Project: A project is the file in which ArcView stores your work. You can keep all related work in a single project, including tables, charts, spatial views of your data, map layouts, etc. A project is saved with an .apr file extension. Thus, the file "Uganda.apr" would have all material, such as maps and tables, related to that project. When you open that project file again, all its component parts will be just as you left them, ready to use again. Each project has a window.
• Project Window: The project window is the smaller window on the left of the initial ArcView window. When you first open a blank project in ArcView, the title of the Project window is "Untitled." After you save a project, this window contains the project file's name ( with an .apr extension). It lists all the components of the project, organized by type (Views, Tables, Charts, etc.). You use this window to add new components to a project or to open existing ones.
• View: A view is the interactive map that you use to display, query, and analyze data in ArcView. Several map layers--called THEMES--are normally displayed in a single view. You can have more than one view in a project (The name of each View will be listed in the Project Window).
• Theme: "Theme" is the term used for a map layer in ArcView containing both spatial and attribute data (the latter are in database tables, which you do not see at first). A Theme is a file containing graphic information required to draw a set of geographic features together with information about those features. Themes are listed on the left side of the view window in the Table of Contents along with their legends that represent them on the map. Examples of themes are streets, buildings, cities, rivers, countries, land parcels, pest traps, soils, etc. Themes can cover geographic phenomena at any scale, from pest traps to the entire world.
• Table: A Table is a data file that contains rows of information about items in a particular geographic category (such as cities, districts, parcels, houses, rivers, and roads, etc.), with each row representing a different named item on a map (ie, for districts in Uganda, one row could represent Iganga, another Jinja, etc.). Tables also have numerous columns, with each column representing a particular attribute ("field" or variable); for example, one column might represent population density, another maize production, etc.

Getting help in ArcView

You can also get "context-sensitive help" for many of the buttons located below the menu at the top of the screen by first clicking on the right-most button (the one with the question mark on it) and then clicking on the item in question.

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