GIS Services

What Application Should I Use?

After determining that there is a spatial aspect to your research question, you will want to know what kind of application is best suited to your needs.  Applications like ArcMap, QGIS and Maptitude can be very time-intensive, especially in the data capture and analysis phases.  If you want a simple visualization without too much analysis you can use applications like Excel to generate very basic maps like the one shown below:

          One of the draw backs of a program like Excel is that is works only with a limited range of spatial data like counties, states and countries.  

          For more detailed visualizations and any type of analysis you can move forward with using a more robust GIS application listed below.

Proprietary

• ArcGIS -  Arguably the most widely used, proprietary GIS software suite, includes extensive technical and tutorial support.  ArcGIS can be integrated with a  broad range of data sources.  Limit access at Morgan.
• Maptitude -  Maptitude has the advantage of easy to use interfaces and expansive built-in data that facilitates streamlined visualizations and analyses.  Limited access at Morgan.

Open Source

• ESRI Story Maps  - An exceptional platform for  journalists that enables compelling story-telling with maps, images and text.
• QGIS -  Likely the world's most popular GIS software suite.  QGIS is a free, fully-functional GIS software with extensive capabilities.  A large user-base generates a lot of tutorial resources and technical support.
• GRASS The Geographic Resources Analysis Support System is an open source GIS providing powerful raster, vector and geospatial processing capabilities. It can be used either as a stand-alone application or as backend for other software packages such as QGIS and R or in the cloud. 
• Google Maps - Google provides limited GIS capabilities mostly in data capture and visualization.  Data captured in Google Maps can be further integrated into other GIS software platforms like ArcGIS and QGIS.
• GeoDa - GeoDa is a free and open source, user-friendly software program that developed to help researchers and analysts translate data into insights. The program is designed for location-specific data such as buildings, firms or disease incidents at the address level or aggregated to areas such as neighborhoods, districts or health areas. What differentiates GeoDa from other data analysis tools is its focus on explicitly spatial methods for these spatial data.