WINTER SCHOOL: SEMINAR FLEXIBLE LEARNING

25 June

Presenter Prof Denise Wood, University of South Australia

Prof Denise Wood visited us earlier in the year and presented a very interesting workshoping on Three-Dimensional Virtual Learning Environment (3DVLE).  She followed this up with another seminar and workshop hosted in our 3D GIS Lab.  This seminar provided an introduction to 3D virtual worlds, both publicly owned and open source platforms, and background information on how these virtual worlds are being used in education,research and for a range of social activities.

 For more information on Prof Denise Wood's research see:

http://www.unisanet.unisa.edu.au/staff/Homepage.asp?Name=denise.wood

WINTER SCHOOL: GOOGLE MAP MAKER & GOOGLE MAP ENGINE

25-27 June (Monday – Wednesday)
Presenters  Dr Alta de Vos (MAPA), March Turnball (MAPA) and Evans Arabu (Google International)

This workshop  introduced Google Map Maker, the tool that allows users to add the points of interests to Google Maps, that was launched in South Africa just over a week ago. Another relatively new tool  presented was Google Geo Tool that will feature the Google Maps Engine, a revolutionary geospatial tool that allows organisations to manage their data in the cloud and easily make and share maps using Google Earth, Maps and Android phones. Globally, it’s already being successfully utilised by organisations like World Wildlife Fund, Eyes on the Forest and the Living Oceans Society to manage and publish critical environmental data.

The workshop was highly practical and interactive and, on the third day, participants got the opportunity to design and work on their own maps and visualisations.

For more information: https://sites.google.com/site/mapacapegw2012/home

WINTER SCHOOL: BIODIVERSITY DATA QUALITY, DATA CLEANING AND DATA VALIDATION TECHNIQUES

14 and 15 June

Presenter:  Arthur D. Chapman (an International Expert on Scientific Coordinator of Biodiversity Information from Queensland Australia)

The ability to electronically exchange biodiversity data is leading to improved opportunities for better environmental decision making, conservation, policy and management.  However, much of the data being integrated is of varying quality and is thus of questionable value to many end users.  With biodiversity data, the quality is often dependent on two key sources of error – the taxonomic names and the locality information, including the georeferencing. This course examines the problems that are most commonly encountered and discusses ways of identifying them and correcting them in collections databases, as well as ways of digitizing information in order to reduce resultant error.  

Many tools have been developed in recent years to aid in the identification of errors in species names and these are now being incorporated as on-line data validation tools that can be used in batch format to identify errors and to provide feedback to data custodians of possible errors in their data.

This was a highly successful workshop organised by the South African National Biodiversity Institute and hosted here at the Biodiversity and Conservation Biology Department. I will be implementing some of the web-based tools in my upcoming course in Resource Mapping.

WINTER SCHOOL: BGIS TRAINING WORKSHOP

June 11 Monday 

Presenters:Jeff Manuel (SANBI Deputy Director: Land Use and Environmental Management),Sediqa Khatieb (SANBI BGIS project manager),Martin Cocks (BGIS web developer)

The Biodiversity GIS (BGIS) website, offers free and comprehensive spatial biodiversity datasets and tools to support decision-making, research, policy formulation and biodiversity monitoring and was developed and hosted here at Biodiversity and Conservation Biology Department, University of the Western Cape. It is a web-based GIS that provides extensive coveration of spatial environmental data for South Africa. The project is managed through South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI).  The training course provided an introduction to systematic conservation planning, followed by the practical applications of the BGIS website. 

Visit http://bgis.sanbi.org

Welcome to Carbon Campus

This is the blog spot for our new initiative here at the University of the Western Cape.  It is Carbon Campus and reflects academic endeavors to promote a carbon-neutral campus society.