Today, I finished my last assignment required in my final class required to earn my Certificate in Geographic Information Systems from Penn State. This is a 4 course program (11 credits – all distance learning) that generally takes a year to complete (or at least it did for me, with a break for last summer). What can I say about the program for anyone considering it? Simply put… it has been a great way to learn more about GIS systems.
The program consists of 3 required courses (The Nature of Geographic Information, Problem Solving with GIS, and GIS Database Development) and one elective, for which I chose to take “GIS Programming and Customization”. The first course is an excellent way to build a strong foundational knowledge of geographic information systems, and I certainly learned (and retained) more from taking it than I would have gleaned from reading several books on the subject. The courses that followed used ESRI’s ArcMap product to further teach GIS concepts and procedures with hands-on exercises to illustrate how the course content could be applied.
I have to admit I had some initial concerns during my early stages in the program regarding so much of the content being centered a round ESRI’s ArcMap product. I’m certainly not picking on ESRI as a bad choice, as their products are impressive on many fronts, and they do have quite a significant market share, so it is not exactly as if it would be a waste of time, I was just hoping for a vendor-agnostic education. Having gone through the program though, I do see the strength in focusing on one product to use as a teaching tool to dig more deeply into the possibilities of what can be done with GIS. Though the exercises may contain steps specific to ArcMap, the important concepts learned are not specific to any tool, and can certainly be applied when using other products available in the marketplace.
Speaking specifically about the latest course I took, GIS Programming and Customization, it starts out fairly easy for an experienced programmer, but becomes more challenging as it progresses. The ArcMap Desktop Object Model Diagrams are 81 pages of tiny print, and it often seems like what should be easy to accomplish in ArcMap with automation is terribly difficult until one pays their dues learning the OMDs. The course offers a lot of help though in familiarizing one’s self with the right way to do things, and it even provided free access to some of ESRI’s own training. Overall, well done.
Where to go from here? I’m excited about furthering my studies and work in GIS. The courses up to this point focused on GIS on the desktop, and I would really like to pursue more with regard to web-driven GIS systems development and geospatial database design. I think I’ll take some time working more extensively with some of the open source products and working more intelligently with the free web services available. ESRI’s web server based offerings are also of great interest, and I am likely to be doing additional work with them in the near future. Summing up, the classes offered by Penn State are a great addition to anyone’s GIS education and I’m glad I took them. I highly recommend them to anyone who has the interest in this field.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Patric,
Congratulations on completing the course. Can you provide a list of open source tools you would recommend?
Thanks,
Paul
Great Question! There are so many tools available, one of the toughest things for anyone new to it is to to decide where to begin. A good start would be to try Quantum GIS. Depending on your interests, I would also recommend looking at GRASS GIS, MapServer and PostGIS. These projects have active user communities and recent releases… generally meaning they’re well maintained and going somewhere.