Category: Course Student Work

Preface: This was pretty self introductory and self explanatory. I felt that it gave good real world examples of how GIS is used and prepared me for what to expect in the book.

Chapter 1: This was basically how to look at maps and how to turn off and on layers, as well as how to organize them for better analysis. The examples in this chapter were maps of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania with distributions of different urgent cares and medical clinics.  AT the end of the first example, it shows how to export a map to a png.

By the way the images I’m inserting are mostly the your turn activities to show that I was in fact following along!

The next example shows how to select and search different attributes. It can be done by selecting them in the attributes table or on the map.

The next examples go more in depth about organizing and viewing attribute tables. It shows how to remove different features, and more about selecting with the table. It also shows different keyboard shortcuts for selecting multiple features and how to select an area.

Then, how to summarize statistics such as mean, median, and mode. The quantile part was a little bit confusing to me. I liked how you could set it up to do multiple types of summaries at once though! Finally an introduction to the fun part, which is setting up and modifying different symbols on the maps. This part was pretty intuitive. Finally, a little about making 3d layers, but I couldn’t figure out how to scroll to see the 3d-ness effectively.

Chapter 2: All about labeling and more about symbols. There were a few nifty things about determining what pops up when you click on the map and how to make labels more readable.

More about searching by attributes. Then it talks about chloropleth maps, which is not a word in the other book. There’s a lot about balancing the data so it makes sense visually.

Finally, some about manipulating dot maps, which was pretty simple and straightforward.

Chapter 3: Yeah I had technical issues here. I couldn’t get the maps to upload nor could I get the green map in the layout tutorial to show up. The online parts were easy and I’m sure having actual maps would be nice!

Did the chapters and the assignments; less notes because all of this feels pretty intuitive to me, and I try to write notes to help a future me, yknow?

CHAPTER 1:

• A basemap is located in the map section on the top bar and it can be removed in the contents page
•  Layers are ordered top to bottom on the contents menu
• You can check all map files, database files, and others in the catalog menu under view
• You can implement data points with addresses and websites on a GIS map
• Scrolling is standard for most things with a scroll but you can use full extent to zoom out fully and previous extent to go back
• Rastors, just like in photoshop, arent pixel based
• Bookmarks save a spot zoomed into a specific amount
• You can change symbols under symbology when you right click an attribute
• 3d exists and is cool

chap 1 screenshot:

CHAP 2:

• Zoning and Land use is best used in close range
• You can assign multiple symbologies to one thing in the contents tab
  • This is how you do graduated colors and symbols
• you can disable duplicate labels using the conflict resolution tab in labelling
• You can turn maps into 3D, extruding them by value
• In symbology options you can import symbologies from different layers
• Dot densities can be editted for how much a dot represents and all that stuff

chap 2 screenshots

CHAP 3:

Chapter 3 dealt with making maps for people who don’t know GIS.

• You make new layouts in the insert catagory
• when you add a new map in full extent you have to click drag it out to a desired size and then adjust it some more
• You can make graphs under the “data” category found when you click on a content layer
• Web maps are a lot easier to setup than expected, its just a button press
• You can use storymaps to make websites pretty similarly to how you’d make a website in google sites, if thats still a thing. I think carrd is similar but I’ve never used that
• On webGIS you can make dashboards by going to your account profile and clicking the 9 square icon and finding “dashboards” like in google accounts
• Dashboards also feel familiar. Not sure where from.

chap 3 screenshots:

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Preface:
The preface was helpful as it helped me to understand how useful this book was with the fact that you can download tutorials straight from the book. I thought that was very interesting that it included some of the history of GIS as well

Chapter 1:

This was my first time interacting with GIS and I really enjoyed getting to know ARCGIS Pro and getting acquainted with mapping. I was really interested in learning about GIS and the book did a really good job at explaining how to get started with mapping.



Chapter 2:

This chapter really helped me start feeling a little more independent with GIS and the processes within the application. Being able to use everything I just learned on a much larger scale was very helpful to me and allowed me to understand many of the intricacies of GIS much better.

Chapter 3:

Chapter 3 was helpful and I liked being able to make the key for the map in question and the graph. Learning how to share maps online was very helpful as well. Overall, I thought that these 3 chapters were very interesting and gave me a much better understanding and appreciation of map making

Preface:

The preface went over what this tutorial/book is about. It briefly talked about what the chapters are over and what applications you will be using GIS for. It went over the software and different websites of ArcGIS to expand upon your map. It talked about the different tutorial sets along with this content being a learning system of 25 years of experience.

Chapter 1:

Chapter 1 had us exploring a map and getting familiar with a lot of the tools and things you change on a map. It went over navigation of a map, symbology, working with the attribute tables along with labeling maps and using keys.

Chapter 2:

Chapter 2 took a look at map design and how to visually look at qualitative attributes. Things like dot density, symbolizing these values and changing their color, doing a definition query to look at a specific set of the attributes visually, and a choropleth map.

Chapter 3:

This chapter dealt with building map layouts, presenting your maps, and sharing them. Made a map key for the 3-1 tutorial map, fooled around a bit with the sizes and colors. I learned to share a map to ArcGIS online along with writing a summary and putting tags. When I tried sharing, it looked like the OWU wifi was too slow (?) and wouldn’t let me upload, because of this I couldn’t do the 3-3 tutorial but I read through the steps and got the gist of creating a story. I was able to upload 3-4 map and went into ArcGIS online dashboard.

This week, I read chapters 1,2, and 3 of the GIS tutorial book and made some maps!

Chapter 1: This was my first dive into making these maps, and I will say it did take me a second to figure everything out. But the book did do a really good job of giving good directions on what to click and when, along with providing pictures so we know if we’re on track. 

Chapter 2: In this chapter, I made maps of just an area, looking at certain characteristics. This map did take me a little bit longer to figure out, just because of all the different colors and details the book was having us add, which led me to get a little confused at times. Although I did realize how easy the map was to read once I got all the colors and layers onto the map. 

Chapter 3: I think that sharing maps online is a very good thing and much easier than I had thought it would be. I appreciate that I was able to get ARCGIS right onto my personal computer, which made the process and the entirety of this week’s work a lot easier and more convenient. Overall, the processes of making all these maps is a lot easier than I had originally anticipated. 

Preface

The preface to GIS Tutorial for ArcGIS Pro 3.1 greets readers to the fifth edition of this comprehensive, step-by-step workbook. The workbook strongly focuses on creating, analyzing, and sharing 2D and 3D maps through portals such as ArcGIS Online and Living Atlas. It uses a systematic learning approach that combines lectures, lab work, and student-driven projects and provides step-by-step tutorials, assignments, and lecture notes to support learning.
Furthermore, the book illustrates actual-world, real-world applications such as poor population’s health access analysis, crime data mining to detect patterns, mapping poverty indices, and urban planning based on LIDAR data. The learning process is organized into three divisions: working with maps already available, preparing and managing spatial data, and problem-solving through spatial data analysis.

Chapter 1

At first, I didn’t know where things were, and it took me some time to figure it out. However, I tried to take my time and carefully follow the steps in the text.
I was especially happy when the bookmark I created actually worked.

Chapter 2

In this chapter, I operated the Symbolize function many times, which helped me understand how it works in depth. What I found especially interesting was learning how pop-ups disappear when zooming in and reappear when zooming out. I had often seen this behavior in Google Maps, so it was fascinating to understand how it actually works.I also realized that combining colors and symbols makes the map much easier to understand. In Tutorial 2-6, I learned that simply changing where to set custom classifications can make information on the map much more readable.

Chapter 3

I learned how to actually share a map and also how to edit a shared map. I realized that many of the tasks in Chapter 3 can be done from my own computer, and once a map is created and shared, it can be edited anytime and anywhere, with the option to add graphs and tables. I thought this was very convenient. Moreover, I felt that not only sharing the map but also including it in a web-based story helps readers understand more deeply. I was glad to learn how to create this as well.

Chapter 4-

• Right click on fields in an attribute table to edit and remove them.
• On field view of an attribute table, you can add fields. Be sure to click save!
• Joining a data table to a feature class attribute – Joins and relates -> Join -> Input join field -> Join table field -> Validate -> OK
• Exporting a feature class – Contents pane -> Right click -> Data -> Export features -> Enter relevant info -> Run tool
• Calculating sum of fields -> Fields view of attribute table -> Right click field -> Calculate field (calculating % is same except expressions)
• Creating a query – Map tab -> Selection group -> Select by attributes -> Add clauses
• Aggregating data with spatial joins – Search spatial join tool -> Fill in fields -> Run

Chapter 5-

• State plane coordinate system – livingatlas.arcgis.com
• Could not get shapefile to work. File would not be extracted and uploaded.
• Adding X,Y data -Contents pane -> right-click ie. Libraries > Display XY Data -> Output Feature Class: ie. Libraries -> X field: XCOORD -> Y field: YCOORD -> Coordinate System: Current Map -> Run
• Use the KML to Layer tool to convert a KML file to a feature class
• Not going to lie, couldn’t get half of these chapter 5 tutorials to work so there isn’t much to note

Chapter 6-

• Pairwise Dissolve tool – Dissolves block groups to create neighborhoods.
• Select attributes to create a study area, then remove original layer to leave only what you want to see.
• Use Select by Location to create study area block groups
• While holding shift, select different block groups. Then, use export features tool to separate them from the rest of the blocks and remove the original layer.
• Pairwise clip tool is for clipping streets
• Merging water features – Merge tool -> choose inputs/outputs -> run tool -> turn off original water layers
• use the Append tool to add features to an existing feature class, considering that both have the same attributes
• The Union tool overlays the geometry and attributes of two input polygon layers to generate a new output polygon layer aka helps determine area.

Mitchell Chapter 4 – Mapping Density – 

Density mapping highlights concentrations of features, making it useful for identifying patterns rather than exact locations. Density maps rely on areal unit to show distribution. Mapping density is especially useful when mapping areas, such as census tracts or counties, which vary greatly in size. The next step is deciding what to map, whether you need to represent features themselves, or their values, as this choice shapes the patterns revealed. Points or lines are usually mapped with a density surface, while summarized data is mapped within defined areas. there are two main approaches: mapping density by defined areas or creating a density surface. Defined areas can show density through calculated values or dot maps, where each dot represents as set amount. A density surface, on the other hand, is a raster layer where each cell holds a density value. To build one, you set parameters and units, which influence how patterns appear – call size control detail, search radius controls generalization, and calculation methods vary by approach. Finally, density surfaces can be displayed with graduated colors or contour lines. The patterns in a density surface are affected by the distribution of sample points. The more sample points, and the more dispersed they are, the more valid the patterns will be. Be aware that the values in the areas between the points are estimates. Looking at the results are very important to determine what the information is telling you.

Mitchell Chapter 5 – Finding What’s Inside –

Mitchell Chapter 6 – Finding What’s Nearby – 

Finding what’s nearby is a key GIS function used to evaluate events in an area, determine the reach of a service, or identify features affected by a condition—for example, homes impacted by flooding. Understanding what occurs within a set distance or travel range is critical for many applications. There are three main approaches to measuring what’s nearby: straight-line distance, distance or cost over a network, and cost over a surface. Straight-line distance is appropriate when there is no movement between the source and surrounding features. When movement is involved, travel can be measured across a geometric network, such as streets, or across the landscape itself. Cost surfaces add another layer of analysis by incorporating factors like time, money, or effort, rather than just physical distance. GIS calculations also consider the shape of the Earth. On a small scale, distances can be measured using the planar model, which assumes a flat Earth. For larger areas, where distortion becomes significant, the geodesic model is used to account for Earth’s curvature and provide more accurate results. When analyzing nearby features, it is important to determine whether the goal is to produce a list, a count, or a summary of attributes. Another consideration is how to structure distance or cost ranges. For example, if evaluating the accessibility of fire stations, you might want to know how many streets fall within one, two, or three miles. In such cases, GIS can create inclusive rings, where each range builds on the previous one, or distinct bands, where each ring represents a separate distance category. Ultimately, finding what’s nearby helps answer practical questions about proximity, accessibility, and impact. Whether measuring straight-line distances, network travel times, or cost surfaces, GIS provides flexible tools to analyze spatial relationships and support decision-making.