SDI Convergence - Global Spatial Data Infrastructure Association

ConsultCo now executes their geocoding software from machines at their offices,
which reads the customer address from the server at AirMiles offices, matches it to the
address data providers from the relevant country, and writes the resulting coordinate
into the geocoding attribute in the AirMiles customer database. Thus, from the point of
view of the geocoding software a single integrated address dataset is used for geocoding.
When it is time for the property valuation, ConsultCo access the customer geocoding
attribute (coordinates) and compare it to the other datasets (e.g. public transport,
which in turn could each come from a different grid resource). The resulting valuation
information is written into the valuation attribute on the AirMiles customer database.
Refer to Figure 1 for this scenario.
110
Figure 1: Geocoding a customer database.
There is no need for ConsultCo employees to be on-site at the AirMiles offices and the
logistics are simplified as the employees can continue with the work from the desktops
in their respective offices. ConsultCo does not have to purchase the address data for
the whole country, nor does it have to consolidate the data from multiple sources,
rather it only uses and/or pays for the specific data that is required to geocode the addresses.
Thus, the data grid, through data integration, has simplified the logistics and
therefore the costs of the project, and more importantly, the costs and network traffic
for the address data have been significantly reduced since ConsultCo accesses relevant
address data only.