An OO Methodology Based on the Unified Process for GIS Application Development

Abstract

This chapter introduces an object-oriented methodology for Geographical Information Systems (GIS) development. It argues that a COTS-based development methodology combined with the UML, can be extended to support the spatiotemporal peculiarities that characterize GIS applications. The author hopes that by typifying both enterprises and developments, and, with a thorough knowledge of the software component granularity in the GIS domain, it will be possible to extend and adapt the proposed COTS-based methodologies to cover the full lifecycle. Moreover, some recommendations are outlined to translate the methodology to the commercial iCASE Rational Suite Enterprise and its relationships with tool kits proposed by some GIS COTS vendors.