GIS+and+Spatial+Analysis+Resources

=**1. GIS & Spatial Analysis Resources **=  GIS is a mature field and as such there are many websites and resource one could direct you to. Those listed here are some useful starting points.


 * 1.1. ****GIS & Spatial Perspectives Websites **


 * Academic Websites **

Center for Spatially Integrated Social Science (UC Santa Barbara) [|http://www.csiss.org] The CSISS mission recognizes the growing significance of space, spatiality, location, and place in social science research. It seeks to develop unrestricted access to tools and perspectives that will advance tspatial analytic capabilities of researchers throughout the social sciences. CSISS was funded in 1999 with support from the National Science Foundation under its program to promote research infrastructure in the social and behavioral sciences. This website contains many useful resources including but not limited to Learning Resources (how to cookbooks and course syllabi), Spatial Resources (bibliographies) and Spatial Tools (software and software portal sites).

Spatial@UCSB (Spatial at UC Santa Barbara) []

Until recently, the university had no place where all this knowledge, infrastructure and effort could come together to focus on the spatial-thinking theme. With spatial@ucsb, the campus now hosts one of the world's leading centers devoted to the possibilities of analyzing, understanding and describing the world in multiple dimensions. Spatial@ucsb offers new capacity for growth through its strong existing programs and facilities. It expands their scope and effectiveness by creating new opportunities for collaboration. In addition to building on the strengths of the present, it looks to the future by growing the young science of spatial thinking into a major field of research and teaching.

PRI GIA Core webpage on GIS in the Social Sciences []

PRI GIA Core webpage on GIS Research at Association of Population Centers []


 * GIS Organizations’ Websites **

University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS) []

The University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS) is a non-profit organization of over fifty universities and research institutions dedicated to advancing our understanding of geographic processes and spatial relationships through improved theory, methods, technology and data. A UCGIS report on the research challenges and emerging themes in GIScience was published in 2005. McMaster RB, Usery EL. 2005. //UCGIS: A Research Agenda for Geographic Information Science. // Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.

The Open Geospatial Consortium []

The Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.® (OGC) is a non-profit, international, voluntary consensus standards organization that is leading the development of standards for geospatial and location based services.

U.S. Government’s GeoSpatial One Stop []


 * 1.2. GIS and Spatial Analysis Publications **


 * Books **

de Smith M, Goodchild MF, Longley PA (2006-2008) //Geospatial analysis: a comprehensive guide //. An Internet version is available at URL:[] Fotheringham AS, Rogerson PA. 2009. The SAGE Handbook of Spatial Analysis. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Longley PA, Goodchild MF, Maguire DJ, Rhind DW. 2005. //Geographic information systems and science //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. John Wiley & Sons: New York, NY. Goodchild MF, Janelle DG. 2004. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Spatially Integrated Social Science //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

A listing of selected GIS text books can be found at both

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The GIS textbook market:

The best word to describe the GIS textbook market in terms of coverage of spatial analysis is bifurcated (see also the suggested reading sections of Geospatial Analysis by de Smith, Goodchild, and Longley (2007)). At one end of the spectrum there are numerous introductory textbooks on GIS (100+) and in recent years several reasonable workbooks have also emerged (e.g., Gorr and Kurland (2005, 2007) and Price (2005)) as well as the vendor workbooks such as Ormley et al. (2004) and general guides such as Mitchell (1999 and 2005). In these GIS textbooks and workbooks the treatment of spatial analysis beyond cartography, spatial querying, overlay, and buffer analysis is either non-existent or minimal. That is, these workbooks provide limited coverage of advanced spatial analysis tools and spatial statistical methods; even for those functions or tools available within packages like ArcGIS. It should be added that these textbooks typically offer up a sanitized GIS experience unlike the real world. At the other end of the spatial analysis textbook market there are several advanced spatial statistics texts; Cressie’s (1991) classic text on //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Statistics for Spatial Data //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">immediately comes to mind. In addition there are several spatial econometric texts (Anselin, 1988) or edited collections (Anselin and Florax 1995, Anselin et al., 2004, and Getis et al., 2004). Complete bifurcation would be an exaggeration as there are a few high-end/intermediate texts (Haining, 1990 and 2003) and primers (Fotheringham et al., 2002) as well as geographic/spatial analysis texts that provide more coverage of advanced techniques than the GIS-oriented texts; good examples of this latter group include the books on //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Interactive Spatial Data Analysis //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> by Bailey and Gatrell (1996), //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Geographic Information Analysis //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> by O’Sullivan and Unwin (2002), //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Statistical Analysis of Geographic Information with ArcView GIS and ArcGIS //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> by Wong and Lee (2005), //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Quantitative Geography //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> by Fotheringham, Brunsdon and Charlton (2000), and in a more focused application the book on //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GIS and Public Health //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> by Cromley and McLafferty (2002).

References cited above.

Anselin L. 1988. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Spatial Econometrics, Methods, and Models //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic. Anselin L, Florax RJGM. 1995. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">New Directions in Spatial Econometrics //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Berlin, Germany: Springer. Anselin L, Florax RJGM, Rey SJ [Editors]. 2004. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Advances in Spatial Econometrics: Methodology, Tools and Applications //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Berlin, Germany: Springer. Bailey TC, Gatrell AC. 1996. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Interactive Spatial Data Analysis //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Harlow, UK: Longman. Cressie N. 1991. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Statistics for Spatial Data //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. New York, NY: John Wiley and Sons. Cromley EK, McLafferty SL. 2002. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GIS and Public Health //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. New York: Guilford Press. Fotheringham AS, Brunsdon C, Charlton ME. 2000. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Quantitative Geography: Perspectives on Spatial Data Analysis. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Sage Publications. Fotheringham AS, Brunsdon C, Charlton ME. 2002. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Geographically Weighted Regression: The Analysis of Spatially Varying Relationships //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons. Getis A, Mur J, Zoller HG [Editors]. 2004. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Spatial Econometrics and Spatial Statistics //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave MacMillian. Gorr WL, Kurland KS. 2005. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GIS Tutorial: Workbook for ArcView 9 //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Redlands, California: ESRI Press. Gorr WL, Kurland KS. 2007. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GIS Tutorial for Health (second edition) //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Redlands, California: ESRI Press Haining R. 1990. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Spatial Data Analysis in the Social and Environmental Sciences //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Haining R. 2003. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Spatial Data Analysis: Theory and Practice. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Mitchell A. 1999. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The ESRI Guide to GIS Analysis Volume 1: Geographic Patterns & Relationships //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Redlands, CA: ESRI Press. Mitchell A. 2005. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The ESRI Guide to GIS Analysis: Volume 2: Spatial Measurements and Statistics //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Redlands, CA: ESRI Press. O’Sullivan D, Unwin DJ. 2002. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Geographic Information Analysis //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. New York: John Wiley. Ormley T, Napoleon E, Burke R, Groess C, Feaster L. 2004. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Getting to Know ArcGIS Desktop: The Basics of Arcview, ArcEditor, and ArcInfo Updated for ArcGIS 9 //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Redlands, CA: ESRI Press. Price M. 2005. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Mastering ArcGIS. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Redlands, CA: ESRI Press. Wong DWS, Lee J. 2005. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Statistical Analysis of Geographic Information (with ArcView GIS and ArcGIS) //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. Hoboken; NJ: John Wiley.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GIS articles – bibliographies/searches **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

Advanced Spatial Analysis Workshop Related Literature Searches []

I created this webpage in preparation for the Advanced Spatial Analysis Training Program. Several targeted literature searches focusing on 'spatial analysis' and specific spatial statistical methods are summarized here. These reference lists were prepared Fall 2007 though we will be updating these documents later in Spring 2009. The publications are grouped by general themes (health; environment/natural resources; social sciences; economics/urban economics; methods).

ESRI’s online bibliographic search engine [] As of February 13, 2009 there are **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">75,143 entries **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> in the bibliography.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GIS Journal listings and homepages **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

Fogler Library, University of Maine – GIS Journal Listing []


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Geovisualization **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

International Cartographic Association (ICA): Commission on GeoVisualization []

Web Portal for GeoSpatial Visual Analytics [|http://geoanalytics.net]

ICA Conference on GeoVisualization of Dynamics, Movement and Change [] Information Visualization Vol 7 (3-4) is a special issue on Geovisualization

Andrienko N, Andrienko G. 2006. Exploratory Analysis of Spatial and Temporal Data: A Systematic Approach. Springer. ( []) Dykes, J, MacEachren A, Kraak M-J. 2005. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Exploring Geovisualization. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Amsterdam: Elsevier.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">1.3. GIS Software **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

Spatial Analysis – Summary Listing []

Spatial Analysis Online Listing of Free GIS Software []

Spatial Analysis Online – Listing of Commercial GIS Software []

These links include software names, web links and brief descriptions for almost 70+ free and 90+ commercial packages.

GeoCommunity.com Software page []


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GIS Software Portals **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

A good starting point for GIS and spatial analysis software are portals such as:

CSISS Spatial Tools Clearinghouse []

AI-Geostats (A Web Resource for Geostatistics and Spatial Statistics) []

For more than 10 years, this web server has been promoting communication about geostatistics and spatial statistics (GIS, geostatistics, point statistics, lattice statistics, geoinformatics, sampling strategies, etc.) between people working in many different fields.

A partial listing of spatial analysis software can be found at the following sites:

GIS and Population Science (PRI/CSISS) Spatial Analysis Tools []

Dr. Atsuyuki Okabe (University of Tokyo) links to FREE Spatial Analysis Tools []

PRI’s GIA Core Software links page []


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Some Open Source GIS websites **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

The Open Source Geospatial Foundation. []

Created to support and build the highest-quality open source geospatial software. Our goal is to encourage the use and collaborative development of community-led projects.

GRASS (Geographic Resources Analysis Support System) []

Quantum GIS []

GeoTools []

Geo Tools is an open source (LGPL) Java code library which provides standards compliant methods for the manipulation of geospatial data, for example to implement GIS. The Geo Tools library implements Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) specifications as they are developed, in close collaboration with the GeoAPI project.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Add-on tools for commercial products **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

Hawth’s Analysis Tools for ArcGIS [] Hawthorn Beyer has developed Hawth's Analysis Tools. This is an extension for ESRI's ArcGIS (specifically ArcMap) designed to perform spatial analysis and functions that cannot be conveniently accomplished with out-of-the-box ArcGIS. Most of these analysis tools have been written within the context of the ecological applications (Hawth works in the area of movement analysis, resource selection, predator prey interactions and trophic cascades).


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Selected Specialized Software and Centers **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

The GeoDa Center, Arizona State University []

The GeoDa Center is directed by Luc Anselin the developer of **//<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GeoDa //**<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">. GeoDa is a package that facilitates exploratory spatial data analysis (ESDA) and spatial regression modeling. The GeoDa Center develops state-of-the-art methods for geospatial analysis, geovisualization, geosimulation, and spatial process modeling, implements them through software tools applies them to policy-relevant research in the social and environmental sciences, and disseminates them through training and support to a growing worldwide geospatial community. The GeoVista Center, Penn State []

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The GeoVISTA Center conduct and coordinate integrated and innovative research in GIScience, with a strong emphasis on geovisualization. Their goal is to develop powerful human-centered methods and technologies that make it possible for scientists and decision makers to solve scientific, social, and environmental problems through computer-supported, visually-enabled analysis of the growing wealth of geospatial data. **//<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GeoVista Studio //** <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> is the center's core software, an open software development environment designed for geospatial data. //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Studio //<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> allows users to quickly build applications for geocomputation and geographic visualization, with no programming required.

Center for Advanced Spatial Analysis (UCL, UK) []

The Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis is a (CASA) is an initiative within University College London to develop emerging computer technologies in several disciplines which deal with geography, space, location, and the built environment. As an interdisciplinary research centre expertise is drawn from archaeology, architecture, cartography, computer science, environmental science, geography, planning, remote sensing, geomatic engineering, and transport studies. CAPABLE Project – modeling children’s activities, perceptions, and spatial behavior []


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">1.4. ****<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GIS Training **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

It is always worth checking your home campus. If your institute is a member of the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science there is probably a centralized GIS website that identifies local capacity in the areas of GIS instruction, research and outreach. The current listing of UCGIS members can be found at []. regardless of UCGIS affiliation the departments typically offering GIS courses on campus include but would not be limited to Geography, Planning, Landscape Architecture, Anthropology/Archaeology, Forestry, and Earth Science.

The links on the following two websites include institutions with considerable in-house GIS/Spatial analysis capacity.

PRI GIA Core webpage on GIS in the Social Sciences []

PRI GIA Core webpage on GIS Research at Association of Population Centers []


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">GIS Vendor Training Options **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

ESRI Training (Virtual Campus) [|http://training.esri.com]

MapInfo Training []

GeoCommunity.Com Training Links []


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Advanced spatial analysis training methods **<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">

Despite the facts that there are 70+ U.S. academic institutions that are fee-paying members of the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS), that the number of GIS-related courses at the undergraduate and graduate level is growing, that the number of on-line GIS certificate and Masters programs has grown, and that model GIS curricula have been developed (UCGIS in 2006), the actual number of formal training programs offering courses on advanced spatial analysis techniques that are tailored towards social, population and health science applications are very few.

Advanced Spatial Analysis Training Program for Population Scientists [] ASA Proposal []

The GeoDa Center, Arizona State University []

Andrew Lawson, University of South Carolina offers short courses in advanced Bayesian methods and spatial epidemiology (using WinBugs) []

University of Michigan, ICPSR Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research occasionally hosts spatial analysis workshops []