Public Safety and Projections
This week was tough. Definitely more time consuming that the last. I really did not like the fact that the work summary combined both the Public Safety and Projections into one Lab. It very quickly became convoluted and confusing to go from one .PDF to another while still working out of the same word document.
I think there was an elevated stress level during this module 3 due to the fact I almost neurotically kept going back and reviewing what was done vs. what wasn't started yet.
I really enjoyed the first part of the lab learning how to capture field data, using ArcGIS Online and seeing how easily its been made to share data with non-ArcGIS users. Seeing the different ways to create .KML files that can be opened in Google earth was useful.
The public safety data I collected was on the local License Plate Readers in the north side of Crestview, Florida. I have a strong dislike of proactive policing and the feeling that I live under the ever watchful eye of "Big Brother" so it made sense to collect data to show the fact that it really is impossible to navigate in or out of any city these days without law enforcement tracking your every move.
Of course they say they aren't collecting data continuously all the time but we know that's not true. If you give government an inch they'll take a mile.
One of my favorite quotes from one of the founding fathers Benjamin Franklin once said,
‘They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.’
As for the second half of the lab I really struggled with. Even with all of my experience in surveying through out my career, projecting spacial or aspacial data in GIS was headache city for me.
I have a tentative grasp on the general idea that when importing data in to an existing map layer, it is vital to know whether your varying numbers of data are either using the same coordinate reference planes or they are converted correctly to a common projected system.
Understanding how to project those systems in GIS without chaos is something that will take time to become proficient at for certain.
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