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| Tutorial | Description | Tools/Techniques |
|---|---|---|
| Exploring a GIS Map | This exercise introduces the user to the following tools and concepts:
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| Managing GIS Data |
In this exercise, you will work with data for the Acadia National Park area. You will learn to use ArcCatalog to copy and delete features from a workspace. You will also learn about folder connections and how to avoid broken links. |
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| Symbolizing Features |
In this exercise, you will learn how to symbolize features based on their geometric characteristics and their attribute type. You will also learn how to add data frames, modify their coordinate systems and generate a final map layout. |
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| Labels and Annotations |
In this exercise, you will annotate a reference map of the Maine mid-coast region. Steps will include generating dynamic labels (automatically placed by ArcMap) followed by their conversion to geodatabase annotation features. You will then learn how to manually edit/customize the annotations inside of an ArcMap session. |
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| Summarising income values by distance bands |
In this exercise, you will tally weighted county income values by distance bands. |
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| Tutorial | Description | Tools/Techniques |
|---|---|---|
| Tissot's Circle |
In this exercise, you will create geodesic circles on a spheroid representation of the earth. These circles are used as a reference to evaluate the distortion in shape and area that accompany most projected coordinate systems. |
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| Defining and Projecting data |
In this short exercise, you will learn how to read coordinate system information for GIS data, define a coordinate system when one is not present, and re-project your GIS data to a new projection. |
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| Geodesic distance and area measurements |
In this short exercise you will learn how to circumvent coordinate system limitations by adopting geodesic based solutions to distance and area measurements. |
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| Containment in different reference systems |
In this short exercise, you will learn about distortions in polygon or polyline edges associated with changes in reference systems. More specificially, you will learn how a feature contained by another feature in one reference system may not be so in a different reference system. You will also learn how to help preserve this spatial property across reference systems by densifying the features. |
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| Tutorial | Description | Tools/Techniques |
|---|---|---|
| Joining
non-GIS tables |
In this exercise, you learn how to import tables (both comma delimited text files and Excel files) into ArcMap and join theses tables to existing GIS layers. You are taught how the tables are to be properly formatted and you learn to avoid common pitfalls. |
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| Downloading and mapping census data |
In this exercise, you learn how to download and manipulate 2010 census data tables using the Social Explorer website. You also learn how to download Census boundary shapfiles from the Census Bureau's website then join the census table to this census shapefile. |
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| Tutorial | Description | Tools/Techniques |
|---|---|---|
| Local operations |
In this exercise, you will perform local operations on raster data using algebraic and conditional expressions. |
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| Focal operations |
In this exercise, you will perform focal operations on raster data using regular and irregular neighborhood (kernel) definitions. |
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| Zonal and global operations |
In this exercise, you will run a global operation (Euclidean distance) on a point dataset then use a zonal operation to summarise its values across polygons. |
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| Tutorial | Description | Tools/Techniques |
|---|---|---|
| Create a human influence index map | In this exercise, you will create a Human Influence Index (HII) map for the state of Maine following the methodology outlined by E.W. Sanderson (http://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/wildareas/methods.jsp). |
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| Computing a Least-Cost Path Between Two Locations | In this exercise, you will identify the most cost effective path between two locations based on elevation slope and landuse type. |
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| Finding the 5 mile driving distance to the nearest fire station | In this exercise, you will use Network Analyst to identify all road segments that are within a 5 mile driving distance of the nearest fire station. You will then create two outputs: the road segments that are within 5 miles and the road segments that are outside the 5 miles driving distance. |
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| Finding potential sites for a youth center | In this exercise, you will use various selection methods to identify potential youth center sites that are near centers of high youth population density. |
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| Earth work | In this exercise, you will use raster geoprocessing tools to estimate the net amount of fill to be added/removed for the construction of a building on a sloped surface. |
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| Modeling hydrologic flow paths and basins | In this exercise, you will learn to generate flow paths and hydrologic basins from an elevation raster layer. |
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| Viewshed analysis | In this exercise, you will learn to generate viewsheds for given point locations using an elevation raster layer. |
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| Quantifying point patterns | In this exercise, you will learn how to quantify point patterns using density based and distance based approaches. |
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| Tutorial | Description | Tools/Techniques |
|---|---|---|
| Geocoding addresses | In this exercise, you will learn how to geocode addresses using the Census Bureau's geocoding service. |
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| Creating simple shapefiles | In this exercise, you will learn how to create simple shapefiles (polygons, polylines and points). |
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| Advanced editing | In this exercise, you will be introduced to a few of ArcGIS' intermediate editing tools. You will learn how to create and edit polygon and polyline data stored in a geodatabase. You will also learn how to avoid certain editing pitfalls such as the inadvertent creation of "doughnut holes". |
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| Defining and fixing topological errors | In this exercise, you will learn how to define and identify topological errors. Examples of topological rules covered in this tutorial include "must not overlap" and "must not have gaps" rules. |
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| Tutorial | Description | Tools/Techniques |
|---|---|---|
| Downloading Landsat data | In this exercise, you will identify Landsat scene(s) for your study area and use the USGS' Glovis website to select and download the data file(s). |
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| Processing Landsat data | In this exercise, you will learn how to convert Landsat files raw digital numbers to radiance and reflectance measurements. |
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| Image sharpening and classification | In this exercise, you will learn to work with multi-band rasters. You will merge a panchromatic raster with a multiband raster (from a Landsat scene). You will also perform a supervised and unsupervised classification on a multi-band scene. |
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| Computing NDVI from MODIS satellite data | In this exercise, you will use map calculator to compute a NDVI raster from two single band rasters (one red, the other NIR). |
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| Creating NDVI mosaic for parts of Colby using NAIP data | In this exercise, you will use map calculator to compute NDVI rasters from NAIP raster layers. You will also learn how to mosaic several rasters together as well as how to convert a 32-bit float raster to a 16-bit integer raster. |
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