Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Vocab 2

Discrete object view

World is conceptualized and visualized as a series of separate objects with fixed boundaries/points

Continuous field view

World consists of continuously varying fields with less defined boundaries

Nominal attribute data

No way to order data aside from unique identifiers, e.g. business name, land type

Ordinal attribute data 

Can be ranked from, for example, “highest to lowest”, but nothing else; e.g. road type (good, fair, poor)

Interval attribute data

Numerical differences are significant, but no true zero point, e.g. temperature in Fahrenheit

Ratio attribute data

Numerical differences are significant, with fixed zero point, e.g. elevation above sea level

Attribute tables

Made up of records (particular things) and fields (characteristics of those things)

File geodatabase 

A folder that contains a collection of files. It is used to store, query, and manage geospatial and attribute data

Feature class

A single layer in GIS

Feature dataset

A grouping of feature classes (which usually share a coordinate system)

Metadata

The descriptive/background information provided about a dataset

Spatial analysis 

The process of examining the spatial characteristics of data or how objects relate to each other across distances 

Queries

Asking the database about attributes; a category of spatial analysis

Measurements

Calculating distance, area, etc.; a category of spatial analysis

Transformations

Calculating new data; converting raster to vector and vice versa; a category of spatial analysis

Descriptive summaries 

Analysis which describes trends in the data; a category of spatial analysis

Optimization

Mathematical, computational methods to solve geographic problems; a category of spatial analysis

Hypothesis testing

Analysis to see if predicted patterns are actually there; a category of spatial analysis