Latest Contributions by Suzanne-Boden

Why is it that a new year combined with a new decade somehow quadruples the sense that new possibilities for “living your best life” have opened up? If living your best life involves growing professionally or seizing opportunities to feed your curiosity, you may be interested in our new, no-cost MOOC (massive open online course), which starts February 26 and runs for six weeks. Spatial Data Science: The New Frontier in Analytics introduces a term that may be new to some. Most people are familiar with “data science,” not as many with “spatial data science.” If you’re wondering if this is just a new term for spatial analysis, the answer is, “Spatial data science includes spatial analysis, AND it’s much more than that." Spatial data science refers to the application of spatial data, analysis techniques, and methods that account for spatial properties, like shape, distance, area, and direction. Spatial data science also incorporates Tobler’s Law, something GIS professionals know like the back of their hand, and (simplified) states: “Things that are close to one another are more related than things that are farther apart.” When you’re analyzing massive amounts of data, taking a spatial approach often reveals patterns that aren’t obvious with nonspatial approaches. Visualizing these patterns on a map often raises questions that spark further analysis, which leads to more insight. Spatial data science also incorporates things like machine learning models, scripting, and statistics. Most importantly, like data science, spatial data science helps analysts solve problems and make predictions that may lead to breakthroughs on some of our toughest challenges related to the environment, human health, and more. If you've never participated in an Esri MOOC before, know that they're a hybrid learning model—they contain elements of e-Learning and instructor-led training. Like e-Learning, MOOCs are self-paced. But like an instructor-led class, they have a defined duration (in this case, six weeks). A new section opens each week, but there are no formal class times—the logistics of holding a set class time would be difficult considering the number of times zones involved in a MOOC. Participants are literally all over the map. You attend the course when it’s convenient for you. If you want to pull an all-nighter and complete every section on the last day the course is open, you can (though we don’t recommend it). Based on six years of offering MOOCs, participants tend to be more successful when they complete each section during its opening week (or at least start the section). In the discussion forums, participants can interact and learn together in real time if they choose, just like in an instructor-led class. Sharing questions, ideas, and solutions is a key part of the MOOC experience. Course videos are recordings but you’ll see Esri experts discussing topics, having real conversations, and sharing valuable information—also just like an instructor-led class. Participants get free access to ArcGIS software products for use in the course, including ArcGIS Pro. This is cool because not only do you get to try out some of the latest and greatest tech, you get to apply the software in the context of guided exercises—no need to figure out how to get started or which tool does what. Instead, you’ll be introduced to realistic scenarios and stepped through the workflows to solve a problem. If you’re someone who prefers learning without a lot of hand-holding, there will be opportunities to challenge yourself by extending an analysis or performing a similar analysis on your own. Note: We provide the software licenses, but participants need to download the software and run it on a machine that meets ArcGIS Pro system requirements. If the new year finds you wanting to expand your professional horizons and explore new technology possibilities, join us and see for yourself what spatial data science is all about. View course details and register at http://bit.ly/2QUlq3f. Oh, and MOOCs have one more similarity to an instructor-led class: completing all course content earns you a certificate of completion from Esri. ... View more

  If your job involves regularly performing GIS analysis, you're probably familiar with sharing analysis workflows as Python scripts or geoprocessing models. Both of these options allow you to quickly repeat an analysis workflow using different data or parameters and easily share your workflows with colleagues. Sharing, unlike starting from scratch every time you need to do an analysis, saves a lot of time and effort—a win for analysts and the organizations where they work.   A sharing option in ArcGIS that you may be less familiar with is called a web tool. On December 5, join our free live training seminar to learn what web tools are and how they support enterprise-wide analysis capabilities.   Esri presenters Jian Lange and Monica Joseph will give an overview of how web tools work and show the steps to publish a web tool from ArcGIS Pro to ArcGIS Enterprise.   Three, one-hour sessions will be broadcast live, and each session includes Q&A with the presenters. View more details and get a calendar reminder at the link below.   What: Sharing Analysis Workflows on the Web When: Thursday, December 5, 2019 — 9:00 a.m., 11:00 a.m., and 3:00 p.m. Pacific time Where: Online at the Esri Training website ... View more

How do organizations achieve the promise of GIS technology? A simple question, but one that may inspire a multitude of answers. From saving money by eliminating inefficient workflows to enabling smarter, data-driven decisions, the business benefits of GIS are huge—enormous when the technology is deployed at enterprise scale. While GIS apps have become much easier to use in recent years, a learning curve remains, especially for those with no previous exposure. This is to be expected since GIS provides numerous and powerful capabilities. One doesn't develop the skills and stamina to summit Mount Everest in a day, but the view is magnificent when you get there. (Don't take this metaphor to mean that producing impactful results from GIS requires years of training—it doesn't. It's just a metaphor.) A simple answer to the simple question is that achieving technology's promise requires skilled humans. And this explains why so many organizations using ArcGIS software have embraced Esri learning plans. The learning plan concept is simple too. For us, it started with listening to our customers to understand how they use our products (for what workflows? to support what business objectives?). Then drive collaboration between product and educational experts to define the skills and knowledge needed to efficiently perform those workflows. Build training content that provides context and guidance through the best practices to perform the workflows and produce valid results. Here's the really simple part. Take multiple pieces of content, in various formats, all related to the same focused topic, all contributing toward defined learning goals, group them into a learning plan, and make the plan easily available from the web. This is the essence of what we're doing in Esri Training, but there's more. Learning plans are a tool for individuals to build skills and advance their professional goals, and they are also a tool for organizations to build geospatial capabilities and manage workforce development. We've built tools that allow managers to create learning plans tailored to their specific workforce training needs, assign learning plans to one or many individuals (and set due dates if desired), track progress through learning plans, and easily see when learning plans are completed. Esri learning plans and the tools to manage them are completely free to anyone. Some plans may include instructor-led courses (which have a cost), but many contain only e-Learning options. All customers with a current maintenance subscription enjoy unlimited access to all e-Learning on the Training site. With hundreds of e-Learning options, all developed by Esri experts, this is an amazing benefit we want all customers to take advantage of. When organizations encourage a culture of learning and align GIS skills acquisition with GIS-enabled business objectives, technology delivers big time. Esri learning plans are here to help.   Want More on This Topic? Read Learning Plans 101 for details on how to create and manage Esri learning plans. ... View more

If your organization uses ArcGIS to support field operations, be sure to join our free live training seminar next week. ArcGIS QuickCapture is the newest app for rapid field data collection and dissemination. QuickCapture has a simple interface that makes it fast and easy to capture data from a moving vehicle (on the ground or in the air) —especially useful when decision makers need data quickly after a natural disaster or in remote locations with rough terrain.   Esri presenters Danielle Hopkins and Ismael Chivite will give an overview of app features and use cases, and show how to create and manage QuickCapture projects within an ArcGIS organization.   Three, one-hour sessions will be broadcast live, and each includes Q&A with the presenters. View more details and get a calendar reminder at the link below.   What: Get Started with ArcGIS QuickCapture When: Thursday, November 14, 2019 9:00 a.m., 11:00 a.m., and 3:00 p.m. Pacific Where: Online at the Esri Training website ... View more

October 25 Update: The seminar was recorded and is available for viewing here.    Interested in AI, machine learning, or deep learning? If so, be sure to join our next free live training seminar on October 24. ArcGIS Deep Learning Tools for Imagery is a one-hour seminar that will take you through the latest capabilities and workflows to create an object-detection deep learning model and extract features from large imagery files. Esri presenters Vinay Viswambharan and David Yu will show an end-to-end workflow to create a land-cover map from imagery using ArcGIS Notebooks and ArcGIS API for Python.   Three sessions will be broadcast live, and each includes Q&A with the presenters. View more details and get a calendar reminder at the link below.   What: ArcGIS Deep Learning Tools for Imagery When: Thursday, October 24, 2019. 9:00 a.m., 11:00 a.m., and 3:00 p.m. Pacific Where: Online at the Esri Training website ... View more

Up next in our live training seminar series is Engage Your Community with ArcGIS Hub. Join this one-hour seminar to learn how cities, nonprofits, and other organizations are using ArcGIS Hub to share data, engage stakeholders and the public, and tackle issues that matter. The presenters will show how to design a hub site, provide access to the site to community members, and share authoritative resources that support initiatives. Three sessions will be broadcast live, and each includes Q&A with the presenters.   What: Engage Your Community with ArcGIS Hub When: Thursday, September 26, 2019 Where: Online at the Esri Training website ... View more