Overview
One of the common threads throughout our focus in this course on GIS design is that there is always a dizzying array of choices to make. Nearly every day brings new technology to the forefront. Among other topics we've covered so far, programming languages are one rapidly diversifying aspect of GIS design. Choosing a language can be as simple as extending what has already been done for a legacy product (i.e., you have been developing tools in C++ for the past decade, so you continue down that road for future iterations), or it can be quite complicated if you are faced with a situation where you need desktop and web-capable tools, perhaps delivered via a cloud computing solution, or portable to a mobile device of some sort.
This lesson introduces the range of available programming languages and focuses on how to evaluate this range of options when figuring out the design of a GISystem that will require custom programming.
Objectives
At the successful completion of Lesson 8, students should be able to:
- Describe and justify a programming choice to implement in a GIS mapping project
- Create and describe a UML to illustrate the process of your GISystem design
- Present your term project proposal and collaborate with peers to provide useful comments, suggestions, or questions about the presentations
Assignments
Lesson 8 is one week in length. Please refer to the syllabus or the course calendar for specific assignment instructions and due dates.
Questions?
If you have questions now or at any point during this week, please feel free to post them in the General Questions Discussion Forum. While you are there, feel free to post your own responses and comments if you are able to help out a classmate.