Welcome back to part two on our post about words associated with GIS. If you missed our previous blog post be sure to visit back with it so you’ll be more familiar with all the GIS terminology. If your firm is in need of affordable CAD drafting services keep reading to see how Indovance can help!
GIS Terminology
- North Arrow: The graphical representation of which direction north is on the map.
- Map: A graphic representation of geographically distributed phenomena. The information displayed may be in the form of symbols or signs.
- Legend: The description of the symbols representing features on a map.
- Geocoding: The process by which the geographic coordinates of a location are determined by its address, postal code, or other explicitly non-geographic descriptor.
- Field: A location in a data record in which a unit of information is stored. For example, in a database of addresses, one field would be ‘city’.
- Feature: A spatial element which represent a real-world entity by having specific characteristics. A generalized description of a point, line or polygon.
- Data: A collection of facts, concepts or instructions in a formalized manner suitable for communication or processing by human or automatic means. Generally used in the GIS field as a reference to all spatial information.
- Coverage: A file format used in Arc/INFO software developed by ESRI that contain a set of points, arcs, or polygons (or features) that hold tabular data and a spatial location.
- Coordinate System: A fixed reference framework superimposed onto the surface of an area to designate the position of a point within it by using x and y coordinates. The State Plane Coordinate System and the system of latitude and longitude used on the Earth’s surface are common examples.
- Centroid: The center point of a polygon, often used to attach attribute information to an area such as a census ward.
- Cell: The basic element within a grid or raster data set.
- Cadastre: A data set containing information related to land ownership and rights. This usually takes the form of maps and descriptions of uniquely identifiable land parcels. For each parcel, legal information such as ownership, easements and mortgages are recorded.
- CAD – Computer Aided Design: Software programs for the design, drafting and presentation of graphics. Originally designed for manufacturing drawing, now also widely used for mapping.
- Area: A description of the dimension or content of a polygon.
