Ernest Blair Experiment

Last weekend, I met with John Wightman to discuss the transition from the Nova Scotia Land Survey Institute (NSLSI) to the College of Geographic Sciences (COGS).

John reflected on the structure of the programs, and the need to fill the new building in Lawrencetown.

In 1980, there were three departments: Planning and Cartography, Computer Programming, and Survey Engineering.

John’s objective was to create a technical institute, similar to ITC in Enschede. By adding new technology and faculty, he hoped to develop a relationship with one of the universities in the region.

From a computer technology perspective, this led to programs in Scientific Computer Programming, Business Computer Programming, Computer Graphics, Geographic Information Systems, Remote Sensing, and Business Geographics. Planning and Cartography remained similar with new technology. Likewise, Survey Engineering added Marine Geomatics Engineering to Geomatics Engineering Technology.

On the weekend I met with Bruce Gillis, Lawyer. He was interested in sharing with me the Annapolis County Atlas, produced by the Annapolis County Planning Department in 1984. This proves to be a remarkable document in light of the state of county planning today, 2024 (forty years later).

Both of these meetings shed light on the trajectory of COGS over the last fifty years, and the opportunity to apply both GIS and Remote Sensing technology. Evidently, John had close ties with both the Canadian Centre for Remote Sensing (CCRS) as well as the GIS community through Roger Tomlinson.

Postscript

We went to Hampton Beach. There were a couple of local volunteers cleaning up the old rope and plastic. Apparently, there is a group from Halifax that has taken on this mission. Concern for our marine environment.

Acknowledgements

To John Wightman and Bruce Gillis for their memories of both NSLSI and COGS. Edward added the graphics.

References

Annapolis County Atlas, October 1984, Published by the Annapolis County Planning Department.

Esri visited COGS to recruit new employees. Their head office is in Redlands, California.

The three members of the recruiting team were from Halifax and Connecticut. I attended the opening session in the AV room, because of my interest in GIS education.

I worked in Redlands in 1989, after a year in Indonesia and before moving to Ontario, to design and deliver GIS training for staff at the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (OMNR).

Here are a couple of items that caught my attention.

1. Esri remains the world-leading GIS software company. They have 5,000 employees world-wide. They have eighteen R&D centres, one of which is in Ottawa. Esri purchased SpotOn in 2011. Both Derek Weatherbe and Jeff Sutherland work remotely for SpotOn.
2. Jeff gave a technical presentation on Data Pipelines. This included a video on Generative AI Assistants (HERE is the link).

In the evening, Jeannie Shoveller offered us a drive to Annapolis Royal to see Freud ‘s Last Session

— a conversation between Sigmund Freud (Anthony Hopkins) and C.S. Lewis (Matthew Goode) set in London during the Second World War. C.S. Lewis is best known for The Chronicles of Narnia, and the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

It was an evening of contrasts. Jeannie used to babysit our children when we lived in Clarence. I am not sure if C.S. Lewis was on the reading list.

It was unsettling to watch a movie set in WWII, in a small community with its own theatre, at a time when the world is in a state of turmoil, given the war between Ukraine and Russia.

Postscript

In today’s Bridgetown Reader, I noticed a call for memories of Ride the Lobster. A uni-cycle relay race around Nova Scotia in 2008.

(Members of the Singapore and Nova Scotia teams are shown in this photo taken by Edward).

The brainchild of Edward Wedler. Doug Dockrill is preparing a book on the event.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Derek Weatherbe for the invitation to the ESRI Technical presentation. Thanks to Jeannie for the invitation to Kings Theatre. Edward added the graphics and the links.

References

Esri Generative AI Assistants video.

Today (Sunday), we took another micro-adventure to Annapolis Royal. The first stop was the French Basin trail; snow-covered but passable (see the video at Walking Paths). Afterward, we stopped at the Sissiboo cafe.

There, I found a copy of Matthew Rouse’s book ‘Will AI take my job?’ Apparently, Rouse wrote the book at the cafe.

This thought intersects with my research into the future of GIS (Geographic Information Systems) and RS (Remote Sensing) at COGS (Centre of Geographic Sciences). What will be the impact of AI (Artificial Intelligence) on that world?

With the availability of new sensors, drones, etc., how will we manage the deluge of geographic information? I can envisage a day when we may need to return to a new digital photogrammetry.

In the meantime, this week Esri will be at COGS recruiting new talent for their expanding business. I plan to attend, to see what skills are in demand from the 2024 graduates, aside from AI and digital photogrammetry.

After Annapolis Royal, we ventured down to Lower Granville. We arrived home in time to take a sunset photograph.

Reference

Matthew Rouse, 2023, Will AI take my job?

Acknowledgments

Heather hiked the trail with me. Edward added the graphics. I expect to see Derek Weatherbe and the Esri team on Wednesday morning.

This June 10-13, 2024, Halifax is hosting the 45th Canadian Society for Remote Sensing (CSRS) annual conference. I have been invited to present a keynote talk. Below, I have a call for contributors to my keynote address.

Currently, I am preparing an abstract and undertaking background research.

I have divided the topic into three parts:
a) the history from my perspective;
b) current programs and projects at COGS;
c) speculation on future technology and their application.

I have had the opportunity to discuss history with John Wightman. For the current programs, I am able to meet with faculty responsible for GIS, RS and data analytics. For future directions, I will connect with my network of contacts in the education community, industry and applied research.

Within this context, I consider the conversations by John Wightman with researchers at CCRS, as well as input from Roger Tomlinson and Ray Boyle to have happened between 1974 and1980. In 1980, I moved to Nova Scotia, with Heather and a young family, to teach in the Scientific Computer Programming (SCP) program. My relationship with COGS continued until 2011. There were several breaks, in Indonesia, California, England, Ontario and British Columbia, I retired as Senior Research Scientist at the Applied Geomatics Research Group (AGRG) in Middleton, at the Annapolis Valley campus of the NSCC.

Since my retirement, I have maintained my life-long interests in Geography and Geographic Information Science. This includes a blog, under the title ernestblairexperiment.wordpress.com, with over 550 posts to date.

Over the next few months, I will appreciate any feedback through my blog —
in particular, the trends in teaching and research, both from a Remote Sensing and GIS perspective.

My plan is to provide Amy Mui at CSRS with an abstract, later this month.

Postscript

I should be remiss if I did not mention that my colleague and blog partner, Edward Wedler. He was a Remote Sensing instructor at COGS in the ‘80’s.

Micro-adventure: West Inglisville

Heather and I snowshoed up through our property to the West Inglisville road on South Mountain. We returned back down to Paradise on Hwy #201 and home. These were excellent conditions for snow-shoeing — fresh snow on a hard crust.