Hawaii SWARS Workshop Group Picture (missing 4)

Hawaii SWARS Workshop Day 2

Did I say yesterday that the workshop was gonna get more intense? There you had it! What say you?!

Congratulations to everybody! If you survived today, it's gonna be a very smooth ride for the rest of the week. Indeed, all of our participants did a great job. Congratulations!

I have repeatedly said that, for this SWARS analysis, the actual model building and running are probably the least you should be concerned about. Those tasks are very mechanical and straightforward. Tools are already provided by ArcGIS. All you need to do is to fill in the blanks. The real challenge, for us the GIS specialists, is to get the input layers ready.

And getting all the input layers ready, from whereever the starting point is, can be a very long, boring, tedious, and frustrating march. You should see why that is now already after today. Did you not?

Having a thorough understanding of this data preparation process as well as all the techniques involved is absolutely critical. Only by truly understanding the process can you then be able to conduct the actaul SWARS analysis on your own, and handle any but definitely will occur "variations" along the way.

Let's review a few key points here:

• The ISSUE will dictate what layers should be used and how they should be ranked. Therefore, having a clear and well refined definition of the issue is the first crucial step!
• How a layer should be used to address a particular issue should be carefully studied. The same layer could be used completedly differently depending on the issue. For example, the same slope layer, should you give the maximum value to areas with slope greater than 45 degrees or areas with slope <>
• You could use the exact same set of input layers for different issues but have not only very different layers weights but also different value classification/scheme for the individual raster layers.
• Selecting the raster value classification/scheme is a quite subjective task. Say you need 5 values. You can use (1, 2, 3, 4, 5), or you can use (10, 20, 20, 40, 50). But because what we are pursuing is the relative importance, these two seemingly very different value classifications/schemes should produce the same result, as long as we apply the same value classification/scheme across all the input layers.
• To go from the original vector shapefile or feature class to the model ready raster layer with the corerct value classification/scheme, you have more than just one way to achieve that. You could run the feature class to raster conversion first and then reclassfiy the raster into the slected value classfication/scheme; or you could first add the correctly value classfication/scheme to the feature class/shapefile's attribute table, and then run the feature class to raster conversion based on the values you already put in.
• It's always beneficial, and preferably, to create a "master" or "boundary" raster first that will cover and only cover your land area. This "master" raster should have the right Cell Size, Projection, and Spatial Extent. You will use this master raster to set your spatial analysis Environment which avoid many unnecessary errors. You can also use this master raster to fill in holes (NODATA cells) as well as mask out ocean cells after the model running.

Well, that's a lot to digest already.

Hawaii SWARS Workshop Day 1

It surely has been a very long day for a first day of this kind of highly technical workshop, especially for those who just flew in last night. But it surely can be called a very successful day for a first day of this kind of workshop, highly technical!

(pic.1: Lisa welcoming the group)

Special thanks to Mr. Ron Cannarella (pic.2) and his office for providing such a wonderful environment to host this workshop, and for the all the tasty coffee and snacks!

What we did? Well, after the brief but warm welcome from Lisa and Ron, and a very quick overview of the SWARS spatial analysis process from myself, we jumped right into the battle. Not much else to describe but everybody worked very hard.

Our speical guest Mr. Jamie Carter from NOAA Coastal Services Center joined us after lunch and gave a very nice presentation on a cool mapping project they are doing in the pacific region. Please visit the CSC website for more details.

A more detailed timeline was planned out and provided at the day end based on the assessment of where everybody was. Milestones/targets were set for each of the next 4 days. Yes, most of us got really tired already after this long day. Unfortunately, it might just get more intense...

Oh! Did I mention, it is always great to see all the old friends again!!

(pic.3: "super-charged students" from FSM still working hard after others already left)

Preparing for the Honolulu SWARS Workshop

Hey, friends. The workshop is coming up soon next week. I am very excited and really looking forward to seeing you all again. You have done a lot of great work so far. Let's work together and get the SWARS thing done next week, sort of. :))

To help me better prepare for the workshop and make more effiicent use of this opportunity, I'd like to hear from you on thoughts and ideas for the workshop. Are there any specific questions and issues you want to have addressed? Are there any specific techniques or tools you want to learn in ArcGIS? Do you have any other GIS related questions at all?

Well, inspired by our friend Mr. Ron Canarrela's wonderful work with the latest web/multimedia technology, I'm starting this blog just for our island projects. This should provide a better platform for improving communications.

To make clear, this is more of a personal effort, thus nothing here should be seen as official opinion from the USDA Forest Service or my direct employer GDIT. Hey, but on the other hand, we can keep it loose and express more freely, just like chats between friends.

All and any comments and ideas and questions are welcomed!