EuroConference on Methods to Define Geovisualisation Contents for Users Needs

Supported by the European Commission, Research DG, Human Potential Programme, High-Level Scientific Conferences (Contract No: HPCF-CT-2001-00050).

Today’s technology allows us to collect, process, and store large amounts of geospatial data. However, in many cases it is not simple to make proper use of this wealth of data because of technical and methodical constraints. Currently researchers and industry are working on the integration of data from different scientific and business communities and for the first time it has become a practical reality. In order to address social, political and environmental concerns, geoscientists and decision-makers are linking disparate datasets together across place, scale, time, theme and discipline. They are now beginning to ask new types of questions that were hitherto not possible to answer. The resulting databases are rich in terms of attribute depth and large in the sense of having many records or objects represented. Consequently, it is a difficult challenge to uncover and understand real-world structures, patterns, phenomena, or processes, which are stored in these databases. These databases may span many different areas of expertise, providing vast, dense and hidden information.

Geovisualisation is part of the solution to manage, explore and present such large databases and an interdisciplinary approach. Developments in Geovisualisation can be traced back into various disciplines; among them are the fields of computer science, database design, statistics, geoinformatics, geography, cartography and other geosciences. Computer science has introduced the field of Visualisation in Scientific Computing (ViSC), database and statistics research provided new ways on data mining and knowledge discovery, geoinformatics introduced new approaches to spatially analyse datasets, where cartography and geography approaches led to geographical visualisation or geovisualisation. Therefore it is most important to issue a common European conference series where scientists and industry of all these fields involved meet and exchange approaches and research goals. This will guarantee the full use of every particular discipline’s experience and stimulate State of the Art research in Europe.

The set up of the proposed Euresco conference series is based on current developments in the above mentioned disciplines. The project is well embedded in the current international research and development activities. The interdisciplinary approach on Geovisualisation explains the structure of the proposed programme as well as the timing for 2002 and 2004. Fast and new developments will be recognised by the conference chairs and included in the programme schema to keep the conference series at a high quality level. The complexity of the topic requires multiple conferences. The conferences series is guided by research questions. The first meeting is planned towards the user (what can be done with visualisation?) while the second meeting is oriented towards user interaction (how can the user interact with visualisation environments?). A potential third conference could address a question that brings the results of the previous two meetings together (does it work?).

Saturday 9 March
Late afternoon / early evening	Registration at the hotel reception and ESF desk
19.30	Supper
21.00	Get-together-drinks

Sunday 10 March

Geoscientific Viewpoints
09.00	Conference Opening Menno-Jan Kraak (NL, ITC, NL) Introduction of the conference theme
09.30	Keynote address Alan MacEachren (US, Penn State University, US)
10.30	Discussion and introduction of topics of the day
11.00	Coffee break
11.30	Monica Wachowicz (NL, University of Wageningen, NL) Knowledge discovery
12.15	Discussion
12.45	Lunch
14.30	Alexandra Fonsesca (P, University of Lisbon, P) Multimedia
15.15	Discussion
15.45	Bin Jiang (CN, University of G�vle, S) Web environments
16.30	Discussion
16.45	Coffee break
17.00	Paula Ahonen (FIN, Technical U. of Helsinki, FIN) Metadata and Standards
17.45	Discussion
18.15	Introduction of posters (young scientists)
18.45	Wrap-up of the day

Monday 11 March

Computer Science Viewpoints
09.00	Keynote address J�rgen D�llner (D, University of Potsdam, D)
10.00	Discussion and introduction of topics of the day
10.45	Coffee break
11.00	Jason Dykes (UK, City University of London, UK) Software development
11.45	Discussion
12.15	Lunch
14.30	Selected poster presentations
15.45	Discussion
16.00	Coffee break
16.15	Christoph Schlieder (D, University of Bremen, D) Spatial thinking
17.00	Discussion
17.30	Jo Woods (UK, City University of London, UK) Terrain visualisation
18.15	Discussion
18.45	Wrap-up of the day

Tuesday 12 March

Representation
09.00	Keynote address Sara Fabrikant (F, University of California, US)
10.00	Discussion and introduction of topics of the day
10.45	Coffee break
11.00	Lars Bodum (DK, University of Aalborg, DK) Virtual reality
11.45	Discussion
12.15	Lunch
14.15	Andreas Riedl (A, University of Vienne, A) Vrml
15.00	Discussion
15.30	Jonathan Raper (UK, City University of London, UK) 3D terrain
16.15	Discussion
16.30	Coffee break
16.45	Round table discussion link representation-exploration Introduction by Wolfgang Kainz (A, ITC Enschede, NL)
17.30	Discussion
18.00	Wrap-up of the day
19.30	Conference Dinner

Wednesday 13 March

Exploration
09.00	Keynote address Mark Gahegan (UK, Penn State University, US)
10.00	Discussion and introduction of topics of the day
10.45	Coffee break
11.00	Liqiu Meng (S, University of Munich, D) 3D
11.45	Discussion
12.15	Lunch
14.30	Selected poster presentations
15.00	Menno-Jan Kraak (NL, ITC, NL) Time
15.45	Discussion
16.00	Coffee break
16.15	Peter Galatsky (UA, Fraunhofer Institute AiS, D) Tools
17.00	Discussion
17.30	Nataliya Andrienko (UA, Fraunhofer Institute AiS, D) Data mining
18.15	Discussion
18.45	Wrap-up of the day

Thursday 14 March

Synthesis
09.00	Keynote address Werner Kuhn (CH, University of M�nster, D)
10.00	Panel discussion with keynote speakers
11.00	Coffee break
11.30	Wrap-up and special discussion about the future of this conference series
	Lunch and departure