Cool Client-Side Heatmaps

The MapDotNet blog has a slick example of client side heatmapping capability.

I think the public is starting to realize the value of heatmaps as an alternative to the cartographic clutter of piles upon piles of markers.

Of course it would be helpful to normalize accident rates based on traffic volumes. Maybe it’s time to web enable the FHWA Safety Analysis tools.

GIS for the Nation of Chimerica

If we are to build a National GIS, we need to consider who will actually be paying for it: the Chinese. Let’s face it, we’ve been pwnt by China. China has reportedly replaced Germany as the world’s third largest economy.

Harvard Economics professor Naill Ferguson describes the Chinese and US economy as a single entity – Chimerica. Ferguson says:

There needs to be agreement on a gradual reduction of the Chimerican imbalance via increased U.S. exports and increased Chinese imports. The alternative — a sudden reduction of the imbalance via lower U.S. imports and lower Chinese exports — would be horrible.

Since China will be paying for it, we need to more clearly show benefits for them.

China recently announced plans to spend a half trillion on their internal infrastructure. This project will no doubt require a lot of GIS technology. Therefore, it is important that requirements for the National GIS include Chinese requirements too. They are, after all, stakeholders. Increased GIS technology exports to China would benefit both countries.

Oracle and Parentheses (x86)

I could connect just fine in a standalone exe to Oracle, but the same code running inside of Arcmap extension was unable to connect, giving error ORA-12154.

It turns out the problem is the parenthesis in the path – C:\Program Files (x86)\ArcGIS\bin\Arcmap.exe.

I’m running 64 bit Vista, which (finally!) supports symbolic links similar to those found in Unix. The solution was to create a symbolic link with MkLink named C:\Program Filesx86 that points to C:\Program Files (x86). I changed the path used in visual studio debugger as well as my desktop shortcut to Arcmap so they use the symbolic link folder instead of the parenthesized one. So far so good.

This will be deployed to 32bit systems, so no need to set the link there.

Oracle supposedly has a patch for this (5059238 ) but downloading requires paid support.

I wonder if my inability to install ArcSDE Oracle on 64 bit Vista stem from this parenthesis issue. In 9.2 ArcSDE would install under C:\arcgis\ArcSDE, but with 9.3 it goes into C:\Program Files (x86)\ArcGIS\ArcSDE.