Geography 353 Cartography and Visualization

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Geog 353 Lab 10: Final Project Evaluation
Update: 11/10/19
100 points
ASSIGNED: Wednesday November 13
DUE: Google Doc (let me know when shared) or PDF or Word Doc to Krygier by end of scheduled final exam period.

Presentation of your web pages with all the animations and updates: Monday, Dec3mber 2


Lab exercise 10 is the final evaluation of your lab project, and builds upon the beloved Mid-semester Evaluation (Lab 6).

In this final evaluation is for you to assess your course project in general, from beginning to end, and, specifically, to evaluate issues we have covered since the mid-project evaluation, from Week 9 onward on the course schedule. In addition, you will create a helpful hint for solving problems encountered during the completion of your project that will be incorporated in the WWW lab exercises for future (grateful!) generations of Geography 353 students.

Lab 10 Goal: Complete your evaluation of the course project.

Please email me a PDF or Word Document of your final. You may also submit a shared Google Doc. Make sure you get confirmation (email) from me that I got your document.



The Details:

Note: The suggested amount that you write on each of the questions below is assuming double spaced pages.

Please copy and paste the first part of the questions from this page into your word processor document, so I know which question you are answering.

In the Mid-Semester Evaluation of your course project, you evaluated your project in terms of the Map Making Process.

You completed some of this work in the last evaluation, and will continue (and finish it) in this one.

You don't have to include your answers to the questions you answered in the last evaluation in this final evaluation.


1. Making Maps is Hard (already answered in Mid-Project Evaluation)

2. Summary of Course Project (already answered in Mid-Project Evaluation)

3. Why are you Making Your Map? (already answered in Mid-Project Evaluation)

4. Collect Appropriate Data (already answered in Mid-Project Evaluation)





5. Constructing the Map

5a. to 5c (already answered in Mid-Project evaluation)

5d. 1 Page Review chapter 6 in Making Maps (3rd ed.) and discuss one additional modification to your project based on the information in the chapter.

5e. 1 Page: Review chapter 7 in Making Maps (3rd ed.) and the ideas of Figure-Ground and Visual Hierarchy. Please construct a list of all visual elements on your WWW pages (including the background color!) and on your map from most important (high on the intellectual hierarchy) to least important (low on the intellectual hierarchy). How have you graphically symbolized these elements? Does the visual hierarchy in your current WWW pages and map match the intellectual hierarchy? Are some elements higher or lower in the visual hierarchy than they should be? Suggest two significant changes to your web pages and map based on the idea of intellectual and visual hierarchies.

5f. 1 Page: There are many choices for classifying your data (number of classes, and classification schemes) as discussed in chapter 8 of Making Maps (3rd ed.) and the Data Classification lecture. Detail how you have gone about classifying your data for your population change maps. How do the classification schemes (natural breaks, quantiles, equal intervals, etc.) offered by ArcGIS relate to the specific classification scheme you have devised for your map? What are some of the significant issues you have encountered in your attempt to classify your data? How did you solve them? Discuss how your classification choices affect the patterns you see on you maps. Why might it be important, for people viewing and using your WWW site, to be able to see several animated maps on your final WWW pages, each classified differently? Also discuss the two-class map of counties with losses vs gains I asked you to create as part of Lab 9. Is such a two-class map worthwhile or useful for your intended audience, now that you see it? Is it best in tandem with your other map (with more classes), or could it stand alone?

5g. Map design issues: In the previous evaluation, you related several general map design issues from the lectures and readings to your project. Additional map design issues concerning color and type have been discussed since the last evaluation:


5h. Lab 8: ArcGIS Layouts and Graphic File Export and Lab 9: Cartographic Animation consisted of a series of steps to get your maps out of ArcGIS and into a format appropriate for animation on the WWW.


5i. Lab 9: Cartographic Animation provided background on map animation as well as leading you to a series of animated PNGs (APNG) of your mapped Census data.



6. Evaluation

6a. (already answered in Mid-Project evaluation)

6b. Once again, update your project documentation on your class blog. Make sure there is a blog entry for each lab. Make sure all links work (not long URLs pasted into the blog entry) and that all relevant information (such as questions I asked you to answer in each lab) are on the blog.

6c. (already answered in Mid-Project evaluation)

6d. (already answered in Mid-Project evaluation)

6e. (already answered in Mid-Project evaluation)

6f. (already answered in Mid-Project evaluation)

6g. General Evaluation questions: Three to Four Pages: Think back over the entire project process you have engaged in over the semester - including locating data and processing it, learning HTML, learning basic GIS and mapping functions, graphic file exchange, and PNG animation.



7. Helpful Hint

1/2 page of HTML code: All of you have encountered problems throughout the course of your project. Some are technical (ArcGIS functions), some more conceptual (eg., choosing an appropriate classification). You solved these problems, and it is important to pass your knowledge of problem solving on to future generations of Geography 353 students. Please create a "helpful hint," based on your experiences this semester, which can be incorporated into revised versions of the WWW lab materials for this course.

Look at Lab 5: Data Processing, Part 2 for an example of how I incorporated some "helpful hints" (from students in previous semesters) to deal with common problems that arose in completing a particular exercise. You should generate a similar hint for any of the exercises (excluding the two evaluations). The hints should be succinct, tangible, and specifically describe how to solve the problem in a step by step manner. They should not be hints or instructions that are already included in course lab exercises. They should be problems that are not too obscure or generic (eg., "save your project, because I didn't and ArcGIS crashed and I lost my data"). They may also be cool things you figured out how to do in ArcGIS or with HTML or whatever. You can include links to other sites. Think about hints you would have liked to have while you were doing the various exercises!

Please script your hint in HTML. Include it in this evaluation, but also send me the code (in an email or as an attached html file). I can then just cut and paste the hint into the course materials.



8. Course Grade

Please suggest the letter grade you think you deserve for this course. Be realistic. Consider the amount of effort you put into the course, how much you learned, your attendance, your ability to get exercises completed on time, the quality of your evaluations (Labs 7 and 10) and the quality of your final project. Do consider yourself in relation to other students in the class. Use these criteria to justify the grade you think you deserve. I do reserve the right to adjust this grade (up or down, or even sideways).



E-mail: jbkrygier@owu.edu

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