[DDI-ADG] FW: Survey Research tools

Wendy Thomas wlt at pop.umn.edu
Mon Nov 7 17:57:15 EST 2005


You remember the point | line | polygon debate from discussion of the
original proposal for geography submitted at the time the bounding box was
added. At that time we tried to get this information into the DDI so that
we could indicate the geographic level of the data. I don't remember why
it was not accepted but most likely because there was not a collective
understanding of how this would be used.

coverage areas (whether they consist of point line or polygon data) are
polygons. Thats what we were describing.

Wendy

On Mon, 7 Nov 2005, Katherine McNeill-Harman wrote:

> Mary,
>
> I'm not quite sure whether what we've already proposed covers all they
> discuss.  The Geographic Coverage/Bounding Box was supposed to be the link
> to FGDC.  I guess a main point is the DDI's ability to define a geographic
> area by either a) a constructed area (e.g. political or other boundary) or
> b) an arbitrarily-requested geographic area (point, line, user-defined
> polygon (like agricultural plot in their scenario)).
>
> I guess maybe a question is how well we allowed for points or lines (not
> just polygons).  I can't seem to find that explicitly in the geography
> spreadsheet, but thought I remembered us discussing it.  Anyone remember?
>
> Kate
>
> At 04:44 PM 11/7/2005 -0500, Mary Vardigan wrote:
>
> >Dear ADG Working Group members,
> >
> >I just received the attached information about spatial data from the
> >Spatial Analysis Unit at UNC and am not sure how it fits in with what we
> >have proposed in terms of geography. Is there anything in this document
> >that we should pass on to inform the creation of Version 3.0? The group at
> >UNC is very eager to have the DDI expand to cover spatial data effectively.
> >
> >Mary
> >
> >----------
> >From: John Spencer [mailto:spence2 at email.unc.edu]
> >Sent: Monday, November 07, 2005 2:22 PM
> >To: Mary Vardigan
> >Subject: Re: Survey Research tools
> >
> >
> >
> >Mary and others,
> >Here is the document I wrote with Phil Page (the director of the Spatial
> >Analysis Unit here at CPC) that outlines some scenarios where spatial data
> >was part of a survey and key things we'd need to know to use the data
> >effectively. What we tried to do was present the things that we'd want to
> >know if we were presented with spatial data from the scenarios. Each
> >scenario reflects examples we have encountered here at the Spatial
> >Analysis Unit. Our assumption was that the spatial component corresponded
> >to one (or more) records in the database. I should point out, that this
> >assumption is by no means the only way spatial data could be associate
> >with a survey. There could be contextual information that's integrated
> >with the survey that comes from spatial databases, e.g. Census, Land
> >Cover, Elevation, etc that is at the survey level and not at the
> >respondent level.
> >
> >Anyway, hope this helps clarify some issues. I think the addition of
> >spatial data capabilities would represent a valuable advancement for DDI.
> >If you have any questions or would like more information, or if there's
> >additional help I can provide, just let me know.
> >
> >John
> >
> >
> >--
> >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> >John Spencer
> >Senior Spatial Analyst
> >Carolina Population Center
> >University of North Carolina
> >123 W. Franklin St.
> >Chapel Hill, NC 27516 USA
> >919.966.1721
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >_______________________________________________
> >DDI-ADG mailing list
> >DDI-ADG at icpsr.umich.edu
> >http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/mailman/listinfo/ddi-adg
>
> ___________________________________________
> Katherine McNeill-Harman
> Data Services Librarian
> Dewey Library for Management and Social Sciences
> Massachusetts Institute of Technology
> 77 Massachusetts Avenue, E53-100
> Cambridge, MA 02139
> mcneillh at mit.edu
> 617-253-0787

Wendy L. Thomas                          Phone: +1 612.624.4389
Data Access Core Director		 Fax:   +1 612.626.8375
Minnesota Population Center              Email: wlt at pop.umn.edu
University of Minnesota
50 Willey Hall
225 19th Avenue South
Minneapolis, MN 55455



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