Resource of the Week
by Shirl Kennedy, Deputy Editor

Some of the niftiest stuff on the Internet these days involves GIS data and mapping. For example, see this list of Cool uses of Google Maps, pulled together by Jonathan Dube, over at CyberJournalist.net.

If you’ve never explored TerraFly, from Florida International University, don’t wait one minute longer. “Simply enter an address, and our system will put you at the controls of a bird’s view aerial imagery to explore your digital earth.” (Disable your pop-up blocker first.) Cool, non-obvious feature unearthed by Gary: Once you have an image displayed, you’ll see a scattering of lime green dots superimposed on it. Click on any one of these and another window pops up with tons of local information — population data, schools, local businesses, links to additional satellite images and more. Amazing.

Not quite had your fill of maps and aerial photos? Be on the lookout for Microsoft’s MSN Virtual Earth, schedule to debut this summer.

Our Resource of the Week also comes via the Florida State University System (I’m proud to say). According to the American Library Association, “Florida State’s Public Library Geographic Database (PLGDB) is America’s first ever Web-accessible and digitally-mapped public library database.” Let’s have a look.

Public Libraries–Geography–Database
Source: Florida State University
GeoLib
This database — includes the geographic locations of the roughly 16,000 public libraries in the U.S., along with “population characteristics” from the 2000 Census and library use statistics from the National Center for Education Statistics. For first-time users, there’s a PowerPoint tutorial. I found this somewhat difficult to download. (Your mileage may vary.) Fortunately, there’s also a printable PDF tutorial (352 KB), and for visual learners with a fast Internet connection, a set of instructional movies (in MP4 format). You’ll need to disable your popup blocker to navigate this site, too.

Actually, you may just want to go directly to the map and start experimenting. GeoLib requests that you complete a very brief survey first — name and e-mail address are optional. Mostly they just want to know the purpose for which you are using the site. You can submit your answer and then click the Launch Map Viewer link. (A “quick tutorial” and “help system” are accessible from this page, in case you suddenly feel the need for a life preserver. This resource is not highly intuitive.)

When you first access the map, you’ll see a somewhat compressed view of the United States, with a sidebar offering a variety of “map layers” — data overlays that you can choose. By default, the locations of central libraries are already selected, although you won’t really see this till you hone in on a particular geographic area. Probably the easiest way to start exploring is to click on the Quick Search tab at the top of the map. A Library Quick Search window opens; just for the heck of it, choose your own state from the dropdown menu, click the Branch Library radio button, type the name of your county into the text box and click Search. Up comes another window with a list of branch libraries in your county. Click the Zoom link next to one of the branches and watch what happens to the map. (If you don’t immediately see the branch identified on the map with a little red “read” symbol, make sure you have the Branch Library checkbox selected on the Map Layers sidebar.)

Once you have a library located on the map, you can start viewing demographic data for the surrounding area by using the numerous checkboxes on the Map Layers sidebar. Only one layer can be viewed at a time; color-coding is used to indicate characteristics. You can see what the colors represent (Legend) by clicking the small box to the left of the demographic label. (It’s gray, with a carat mark inside.) Each main demographic category — age, education, income, poverty by age, children under 18, race, etc. — has a plus sign to the right of it that you click to reveal the options. Other layers besides demographics include congressional and state legislative districts, geographic boundaries (states, counties, census tracts, etc.), and physical features like types of highways and bodies of water.

Note: If you want to view U.S. public libraries by congressional district, a feature sponsored by ALA, a tutorial (Word document) is available.

If you’d like to print out the map you have displayed, click the Print PDF tab at the top of the window, near the center. You’ll see a sidebar — Create a Printable Map. Type a name for your map into the text box and click Submit Query. You’ll get yet another window with a printable version of your map. You can also e-mail your map (in PDF or JPG format) to yourself or someone else. Click the little envelope icon; it’s the one at the extreme right end of the row of icons at the top of the window.

I found the Locate tab at the top of the window to be an efficient way of zooming in on a particular geographic area. When you click on it, you get a sidebar that allows you to specify a zip code or a city/state combination. Once you’ve got the relevant map displayed, click the Layers tag to get the demographic options sidebar again. You can zoom in and out by clicking the standard + and – magnifying glass icons at the top and then clicking on the area of the map in which you are interested. If you zoom in close enough, street names are displayed.

It does take some practice to become proficient at using GeoLib — there are so many features I haven’t even touched on here — but the payoff could be high, in terms of gathering statistical information about the users (and potential users) of any public library system. It could, for example, help you plan the location of future branches or decide what types of services to offer based on the characteristics of the local population.

This project is sponsored by the Institute of Museum and Library Services. Enjoy.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 26th, 2005 and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.