2013 - Geoinformatics

38
R e v i e w
By Eric van Rees
Esri Press recently published an updated version of the second part of its GIS
Tutorial series, offering exercises and data for the latest version of its ArcGIS
software.
U p d a t e d E s r i G I S T u t o r i a l
Spatial Analysis Workbook for ArcGIS 10.1
Contents and target audience
This book was published early 2013 and
has been updated for ArcGIS 10.1, which
is the latest version of this software. It offers
nine tutorials or hands-on exercises for performing
spatial analysis, and comes with a
DVD that includes data and a 180-day trial
of ArcGIS 10.1 for Desktop Advanced software.
The book’s key objective is to assist
the reader in developing their knowledge
of the analysis tools of ArcGIS and teaching
them how to design the right sequences to
bring the big picture into view. The tutorials
focus on data representation and equip
readers with the skills to build ‘big picture’
maps. As stated in the preface of this book,
the user won’t create new data, but will create
new files based on existing data.
The contents can roughly be divided into
two categories: tutorials 1-6 correspond
with another Esri publication, called ‘The
Esri Guide to GIS Analysis, Volume 1’, and
tutorials 7-9 correspond with the second
volume. It is recommended that the user of
this book reads the corresponding chapters
of these two volumes before each tutorial.
Some of the tutorials require the ArcGIS
10.1 Spatial Analyst for Desktop extension,
which accompanies the book.
Title: GIS Tutorial 2: Spatial Analysis Workbook for ArcGIS 10.1
Author: David W. Allen
Publisher: Esri Press
Language: English
Number of pages: 344
ISBN: 9781589483378
The book starts off with relatively easy instructions, but the tasks gradually
become more complex and involve multiple steps in order to obtain
the final results for analysis. The first four chapters are more about map
visualization than complex spatial analysis, but from then on things get
more interesting: creating buffers, performing distance analysis, measuring
geographic distribution, and finally, analyzing patterns and identifying
clusters through statistical analysis tools.
In each tutorial, the reader has to fulfill a task that requires a number of
steps for analysis. These are shown step-by-step, through helpful screenshots
of the final results. In addition, there are tasks which support independent
skill demonstration, as well as study questions and review sections
after the exercises. At the end of the book there are a number of
extra independent projects which combine the analysis functions described
in the previous chapters.
This publication is geared towards a more advanced readership than
the first part of this series (‘GIS Tutorial 1:
Basic Workbook) and requires use of
ArcGIS and ArcGIS extensions, knowledge
of ArcMap and ArcCatalog, as well as thirdparty
tools and scripts.
Verdict
For a hands-on do-it-yourself course in performing
GIS analysis with ArcGIS 10.1, or
as material for a face-to-face course in a classroom,
this book is an excellent choice. It
has everything you could possibly need: you
get the data, the software and helpful tutorials
all in one package. The book is wellwritten,
the layout is very good, the imagery
is helpful in working your way through
the exercises and the review sections are
useful. You don’t get the answers to the extra
tasks, but this isn’t a major issue.
Although the book has information on the
theoretical background of the analysis functions
which are covered, this is not the key
objective of the book. This becomes a problem
in the last few chapters, which cover
complex mathematical methods used in statistics,
for instance when it comes to interpreting
results after applying a certain function.
The Help function of ArcGIS provides a lot
of information on spatial analysis, as does
the online Esri Resource Center, so there’s no need to pay for an additional
publication offering this information.
Since the book does cover a lot of ground, it can be a good thing to
read through the whole tutorial again after finishing it to get ‘the big picture’
and distinguish between multiple analysis functions which may seem
very similar, but should be used under specific circumstances and for
specific purposes only. This is important, because if you’re not aware of
what you’re doing, you might end up drawing the wrong conclusions
from your dataset. What is a plus about this book is that the data provided
on the DVD is ready for use, which is good for a learning environment.
It’s important to remember, however, that the real world situation
might be a bit more complex than shown in the book.
For more information, have a look at: esripress.esri.com.
June 2013