---

GeoMOOSE is an Open Source Web Client JavaScript Framework for displaying distributed cartographic data.  It is being used by hundreds of units of government around the world display their visual data online.

GeoMOOSE excels at creating a useful web-based GIS environment for those who need something that works from the first download. The GeoMOOSE demo (available on the GeoMOOSE website) contains a fully operating web-based parcel application. It can render, investigate, and even edit layers without the need to write a single line of code.

Click to link to GeoMoose Demo

The GeoMOOSE core is written using JavaScript and HTML. It is entirely possible to run GeoMOOSE with nothing more than a basic web server. But besides the basic client core, GeoMOOSE also comes prepackaged with a number of built in services written in PHP. These services add the ability to perform drill-down identify operations, selection operations, and search data sets. If you have existing scripts that perform similar functions, GeoMOOSE can be tuned to work with those services, no matter which language they were written.

Being an open source project, GeoMOOSE is also built upon other open source projects: MapServer, OpenLayers, and Dojo Toolkit.

Click here to go to the GeoMOOSE informational website to learn more about this amazing software and the ways it can be used.

As FREE software used by a wide variety of units of government, non-profits, and other “common good” efforts where cost of commercial software would otherwise be a deterrent, SharedGeo is proud to support the GeoMOOSE project by hosting the GeoMOOSE website and providing staff time to support, develop and enhance GeoMOOSE.  SharedGeo invites you to contribute to the effort however you can.

If you would like to support through a donation, you can contribute by clicking on the giveMN.org logo below.  All funds donated will be used to pay for needed code improvements that support the worldwide user community. Donations are tax deductible to the full extent allowed by law!

The near-term goal of the GLARS effort is to build an integrated, ongoing, remote sensing program for basin-wide mapping, monitoring, management and protection of Great Lakes coastal wetlands.  The effort has initially focused on developing accurate elevation measurement of coastal wetland features and water level changes across time using two main data sources with frequent collection dates: submeter optical satellite imagery from the NextView program and RADARSAT-2 satellite imagery. To learn more about GLARS, and download data, use the link below.

Great Lakes Alliance for Remote Sensing

Products from this effort were released to the public for free download in May 2022 through the Great Lakes Alliance for Remote Sensing (GLARS) website hosted by SharedGeo.  Please use the link below to learn more and download Great Lakes DSMs.

Great Lakes DSMs 

Beginning in 2010, SharedGeo became involved in research to determine the optimum way to create a marker for outdoor recreation trails and other rural scenarios where there is a need to report a location for an emergency response.  This effort was in response to two significant problems that plague virtually all existing approaches:

1.) Other markers of this type are jurisdictionally unique and consequently do not facilitate geolocation understanding if response resources need to coordinate across administrative borders such as during a Search and Rescue mission, and

2.) Current marker systems do not work with GPS.

Through SharedGeo’s efforts, it was determined that both these problems could be solved by using a sign design which conforms to various national and international standards while leveraging the U.S. National Grid (USNG) – the U.S. portion of the worldwide Military Grid Reference System (MGRS). The result of this effort is shown below.  Because this sign style provides for the report of an emergency location based on a GPS coordinate system (USNG), response efforts are significantly improved.  In some cases, response times have been cut by as much as 90% as additional communities outside of the initial pilot area have adopted the system.

Work on this project originally commenced as a collaborative effort between the MGAC Emergency Preparedness Committee and SharedGeo.  A Local Operational Research Program (OPERA) grant from the Center for Transportation Studies, University of Minnesota to the City of St. Paul helped fund initial marker field trials.  The pilot project area was in Lake County, Minnesota.

Emergency Location Markers (ELMs), along with training for call centers, responders, and the public are now in place in a growing number of areas in the Minnesota Arrowhead region, as well as several municipalities in the Twin Cities metro.  Nationally, installs can now be found in nine states, the Atlanta metro and at one of the nation’s busiest parks – Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park.  In addition, the NASA Science Board selected ELMs for install on the Cape Kennedy Space Center, and North America’s largest cross country ski race, the American Birkebeiner, is installing ELMs on its course in Northern Wisconsin.

Educational and technical support items for this project such as brochures, are available at both the USNG Center, and “ELM Information” section of the USNG Store. ELMs may be purchased using a government purchase order or contractual agreement with SharedGeo or approved vendor. Sample and personal orders may be made at USNG Store.  (USNG Store is currently undergoing a complete rebuild with an expected completion date of mid-summer 2022.)

If you would like to learn more about the ELM system, the video below provides information on ELM history, design philosophy, product development and how to plan an installation.

Realizing that across jurisdictions in the United States there is no uniform way for members of the Emergency Service Sector (ESS) to effectively communicate location, in 2001 the Federal Geographic Data Committee endorsed use of the Military Grid Reference System as the solution for this problem.  Specific to the United States and territories, this geolocation coordinate system – with some slight modifications – is referred to as the U.S. National Grid (USNG).  Despite subsequent endorsement by multiple federal departments and agencies (including FEMA), states, and professional organizations, adoption has been thin and supporting resources marginal.  In an effort to solve this issue, in 2011 SharedGeo established and has since maintained the nation’s principal informational resource center about the USNG.  The USNG Information Center can be accessed using the link below:

U.S. National Grid Information Center

In response to growing interest in SharedGeo’s U.S. National Grid based Emergency Location Marker (ELM) system, in 2012 SharedGeo launched the U.S. National Grid Store as a way to promote and offer these and related USNG products online.  Since that time, a product line of five items has grown to more than 30, some of which are shown in the above slide show.  In order to properly position the U.S. National Grid Store to accommodate current products and anticipated future growth, a complete rebuild of the USNG Store is underway with an expected completion date of mid-summer 2022.  Until the new store is completed, please contact ShareGeo at usngstore@sharedgeo.org if you need information on USNG products.

If you would like to review the store as it currently exists, please use the link below.

U.S. National Grid Store

Based on an understanding that the GIS profession was rapidly changing and that an exchange of ideas across borders would be valuable to the Upper Midwest, in 2015 SharedGeo took steps to develop the Upper Midwest Geospatial Conference (UNMGEOCON).  Held at the University of Wisconsin – La Crosse in 2016 and again in 2018, this riverboat town proved to be an ideal location for Upper Midwest participants to hear about emerging trends while broadening their individual GIS knowledge and community connections.  In addition, by being a vendor neutral regional conference, attendees were able to hear from national experts about topics seldom explored at state or commercial focused conferences.

All conference revenues in excess of expenses are shared equally among host organizations.  To date, UMGEOCON has distributed nearly $30,000 to the Upper Midwest nonprofit geospatial associations hosts of UMGEOCON.

UMGEOCON was not held in 2020 due to COVID-19 and was delayed again in 2022 for an additional year to offset the conference’s biennial schedule from that of the MidAmerica GIS Consortium (MAGIC) Conference.  SharedGeo is anticipating UMGEOCON will return in May 2023.  Use the link below to learn more.

Upper Midwest Geospatial Conference

Based on research and development into Automatic Vehicle Location (AVL) tracking already underway by SharedGeo staff, in 2012 SharedGeo was recruited by AmeriTrak Fleet Solutions LLC to participate in a proof of concept project at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.  The goal of this project was to create an in-cab system which could warn a ground services driver of an impending collision with an aircraft or other ground equipment.  In support of this concept, there was a need for a robust visualization interface which could provide both a Common Operating Picture view of the airport environment to all users, and visually warn and record instances of runway incursion.  DragonEye was developed as a web-based solution in response to these requirements.

Although the basis of the DragonEye code owed its origin to simpler uses like the tracking snow plows for a municipality, over nearly four years of follow on development it not only retained these basic capabilities but evolved into a highly versatile platform capable of supporting the needs of the aviation sector where display accuracy and high data throughput rates are critical to safe operations. Furthermore, in its final version, DragonEye gained the absolutely unique ability to receive and track every type of GPS enabled device.

By mutual agreement, in early 2017 SharedGeo and hardware vendor AmeriTrak terminated their business relationship.  The SharedGeo Board of Directors subsequently voted to mothball the project in early 2019 in order to devote development time to higher priority projects.

An informational brochure is available by clicking here.  A link to a PPT which shows screenshots and highlights DragonEye capabilities can be found below.

DragonEye

After the extended economic downturn of 2008 led to layoff of the Geospatial Information & Technology Association (GITA) nine full-time personnel in spring 2012, the GITA Board of Directors asked SharedGeo to take over management of the association.  In assuming this role, SharedGeo was faced with the daunting task of transitioning nearly 32 years of hard copy administrative records and established business practices into online solutions for the nation’s largest geospatial organization focused on the infrastructure sector. This situation required transitioning scores of business accounts, the complete rebuild of GITA’s website and association management system, creation of a collaborative online work environment leveraging Google’s Nonprofit Business suite, and significantly expanding social media platforms.  SharedGeo accomplished these tasks while simultaneously managing the association’s day-to-day business and developing or supporting 20 some international, national or regional conferences. Despite these significant challenges, SharedGeo was able to provide these services for approximately 15% of what the association had previously paid by implementing a variety of administrative technologies.

After completing transition of GITA into a virtually managed association, in late summer 2018, SharedGeo handed off management responsibility to Civica Associations Conferences & Exhibitions of Aurora, Colorado.

Download Great Lakes Geospatial Data Access Project Summary

The goal of the SharedGeo Great Lakes Geospatail Data Access Project was to demonstrate the ability to serve and share current and historical spatial data that are related to the Great Lakes area, surrounding watersheds and wildlife habitats. This effort was a Great Lakes Restoration Initiative funded project by the US Environmental Protection Agency and administered by the US Fish and Wildlife Service.

In this project which ran from 2010 to 2016, SharedGeo researched and developed techniques to use open-source tools to serve, catalog, map and distribute spatial data.  The project had 3 main parts: 1) spatial data web services & data download; 2) a spatial data catalog; and 3) a web map integration tool.

1. Spatial Data Web Services & Data Download

SharedGeo created a hardware and software system that has initial capacity to store and serve up to 50 terabytes of data. SharedGeo’s focus for this system is to serve large imagery and remotely-sensed datasets for the entire Great Lakes basin in fast and reliable services. The datasets include current and historical oblique photography, aerial imagery and remotely sensed data such as LiDAR and RADAR.

The datasets were loaded, indexed, tiled and then served in the most appropriate way for each data type. Many datasets were served as OGC-compliant Web Map Service (WMS) and/or Web Feature Service (WFS) services. The scalable software and hardware configuration ensured that the services are delivered with maximum speed and reliability. The services could be used by GIS and mapping desktop and web applications and so can be easily integrated into an organization’s work flow.

In addition to the data services, imagery and remotely sensed data were downloadable. Data could be clipped to a user-defined area of interest and downloaded for use on a local computer. This might be useful for project-specific needs or for field work where web connections are unavailable.

By delivering these spatial data web services and downloadable datasets, SharedGeo contributed to the base data necessary to inventory, evaluate, prepare remedies for, and monitor results of projects in the GLRI core focus areas such as combating invasive species, protecting watersheds and restoring wetlands and other habitats.

2. Spatial Data Catalog

SharedGeo set up a GeoNetwork data catalog node which aggregates metadata describing spatial data for the Great Lakes area. The GeoNetwork tool did this by “harvesting” existing data catalogs such as the Great Lakes Information Network hosted by the Great Lakes Commission. Other harvested data catalogs include those by State, Province and Non-Governmental Organizations doing work in and around the Great Lakes.

The harvested metadata provided a robust list of spatial data layers that can be queried by topic, geography or keyword. GeoNetwork outputs an Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC)-compliant catalog service (CS-W). This allowed other tools (not just GeoNetwork) to be used to query the catalog. For this project, SharedGeo decided it would be most useful if metadata and layers could be searched inside the web map interface, so this was built within Co-map, the GLRI SharedGeo web map.

3. “Co-map” Web Map

2012 GLRI Co-Map Prototype Web Interface

Spatial data could be viewed, queried and browsed using the SharedGeo web map tool, Co-map. Co-map included the SharedGeo-hosted imagery and remotely-sensed data services along with an OpenStreetMap basemap. In addition, Co-map allowed a search of all the metadata inventoried in the GeoNetwork data catalog. If those data had map services available, then those data could be added right into the map. This allowed potential integration of hundreds of Great Lakes spatial datasets and allowed users to make custom maps. It is this flexibility that SharedGeo hoped will help both support and expedite user decisions on whether data layers are useful and appropriate for their needs.

Co-map also allowed for data download. Imagery and remotely sensed data that are hosted by SharedGeo could be clipped to a user-defined area of interest and downloaded for use on a local computer. This could be useful for project-specific needs or for field work where web connections are unavailable.

This proof of concept project successfully concluded in 2016.