ArcMap is the main component of ESRI's ArcGIS suite of geospatial processing programs, and is used primarily to view, edit, create, and analyse geospatial data. ArcMap allows the user to explore data within a data set, symbolize features accordingly, and create maps. This is done through two distinct sections of the program, the table of contents and the data frame.
AutoCAD DXF (Drawing Interchange Format, or Drawing Exchange Format) is a CAD data file format developed by Autodesk for enabling data interoperability between AutoCAD and other programs. AutoCAD is a commercial computer-aided design (CAD) and drafting software application.
Comma-separated values (CSV) In computing, a comma-separated values (CSV) file stores tabular data (numbers and text) in plain text. Each line of the file is a data record. Each record consists of one or more fields, separated by commas. The use of the comma as a field separator is the source of the name for this file format.
Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language that defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable through use of tags that can be created and defined by users. Much like natural language is extensible (that is, can grow) when speakers create new words and agree on what they mean, XML is a markup language that can grow when users create new elements and agree on what they mean. This makes XML able to capture intent in a way much broader than a nonextensible markup language such as HTML.
ESRI Feature Services allow you to serve features over the Internet and provide the symbology to use when displaying the features. Clients can execute queries to get features and perform edits that can be applied to the server. Feature services provide templates that can be used for an enhanced editing experience on the client. Data from relationship classes and nonspatial tables can also be queried and edited using feature services.
A File Geodatabase is a collection of files in a folder on disk that can store, query, and manage both spatial and nonspatial data. Each dataset is held as a file that can scale up to 1 TB in size. The file geodatabase is recommended over personal geodatabases.
Geography Markup Language (GML) is the XML grammar defined by the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) to express geographical features. GML serves as a modelling language for geographic systems as well as an open interchange format for geographic transactions on the Internet. Key to GML's utility is its ability to integrate all forms of geographic information, including not only conventional "vector" or discrete objects, but coverages and sensor data.
GeoJSON is an open standard format designed for representing simple geographical features, along with their non-spatial attributes, based on JavaScript Object Notation.
The features include points (therefore addresses and locations), line strings (therefore streets, highways and boundaries), polygons (countries, provinces, tracts of land), and multi-part collections of these types. GeoJSON features need not represent entities of the physical world only; mobile routing and navigation apps, for example, might describe their service coverage using GeoJSON.
The GeoJSON format differs from other GIS standards in that it was written and is maintained not by a formal standards organization, but by an Internet working group of developers.
Geospatial Data Abstraction Library (GDAL) is a computer software library for reading and writing raster and vector geospatial data formats, and is released under the permissive X/MIT style free software license by the Open Source Geospatial Foundation. As a library, it presents a single abstract data model to the calling application for all supported formats. It may also be built with a variety of useful command line interface utilities for data translation and processing. Projections and transformations are supported by the PROJ.4 library.
Keyhole Markup Language (KML) is an XML notation for expressing geographic annotation and visualization within Internet-based, two-dimensional maps and three-dimensional Earth browsers. KML was developed for use with Google Earth, which was originally named Keyhole Earth Viewer.
Map Packages (.mpk) make it easy to share complete map documents with others. A map package contains a map document (.mxd) and the data referenced by the layers it contains, packaged into one convenient, portable file. Map packages can be used for easy sharing of maps between colleagues in a work group, across departments in an organization, or with any other ArcGIS users via ArcGIS Online. Map packages have other uses, too, such as the ability to create an archive of a particular map that contains a snapshot of the current state of the data used in the map.
MapInfo TAB format is a popular geospatial vector data format for geographic information systems software. It is developed and regulated by MapInfo Corporation as a proprietary format.
Personal Geodatabase is a Microsoft Access database that can store, query, and manage both spatial and nonspatial data. Because they are stored in Access databases, personal geodatabases have a maximum size of 2 GB. Additionally, only one person at a time can edit data in a personal geodatabase.
Point cloud is a set of data points in some coordinate system.
In a three-dimensional coordinate system, these points are usually defined by X, Y, and Z coordinates, and often are intended to represent the external surface of an object.
Point clouds may be created by 3D scanners. These devices measure a large number of points on an object's surface, and often output a point cloud as a data file. The point cloud represents the set of points that the device has measured.
As the output of 3D scanning processes, point clouds are used for many purposes, including to create 3D CAD models for manufactured parts, metrology/quality inspection, and a multitude of visualization, animation, rendering and mass customization applications.
A Shapefile is an ESRI vector data storage format for storing the location, shape, and attributes of geographic features. It is stored as a set of related files and contains one feature class. Shapefiles often contain large features with a lot of associated data and historically have been used in GIS desktop applications such as ArcMap.
Vector Tiles, tiled vectors or vectiles are packets of geographic data, packaged into pre-defined roughly-square shaped "tiles" for transfer over the web. This is an emerging method for delivering styled web maps, combining certain benefits of pre-rendered raster map tiles with vector map data. As with the widely used raster tiled web maps, map data is requested by a client as a set of "tiles" corresponding to square areas of land of a pre-defined size and location. Unlike raster tiled web maps, however, the server returns vector map data, which has been clipped to the boundaries of each tile, instead of a pre-rendered map image.
Web Feature Service (WFS) - Open Geospatial Consortium Web Feature Service Interface Standard (WFS) provides an interface allowing requests for geographical features across the web using platform-independent calls. One can think of geographical features as the "source code" behind a map, whereas the WMS interface or online tiled mapping portals like Google Maps return only an image, which end-users cannot edit or spatially analyze.
Web Map Service (WMS) is a standard protocol for serving (over the Internet) georeferenced map images which a map server generates using data from a GIS database. The Open Geospatial Consortium developed the specification and first published it in 1999. A WMS server usually serves the map in a bitmap format, e.g. PNG, GIF or JPEG. In addition, vector graphics can be included: such as points, lines, curves and text, expressed in SVG or WebCGM format.