Back to Geomatics: Recognizing Who We Are

Recently, geomatics-related data, products, services and applications have proven to significantly support many actions in environmental (land, water, extra-terrestrial) analysis, management and protection, often answering to political instances. A scientific journal, specifically designed to gather contributions about such a strategic discipline, should make clear what it is intended for, with the aim of attracting, and accepting, well-focused works that can improve its recognizability and specificity. MDPI Geomatics has proficiently started this process, and the recently obtained indexing in Scopus demonstrates the significant advancements that have already been made. However, something more can still be done, especially in refining and focusing on the boundaries of what geomatics can be used for, i.e., going back to its inner meaning.

Geomatics is the modern adaptation of traditional surveying and mapping and their related skills; in geomatics, Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and digitization play a focal role. It has been said that geomatics is the discipline which integrates the tasks of gathering, storing, processing, modeling, analyzing, and delivering georeferenced information [1]. To achieve these tasks, adequate skills are required concerning (i) surveying design; (ii) algorithms for data processing, calibration, validation and representation; (iii) technological features of instruments/sensors and (iv) software and ICT. Geomatics produce, validate and represent georeferenced data that help to provide services that meet the needs of the society [1]. Whatever the application, the nodal point that geomatics has to focus on is map production. Maps can function as official, trustworthy and correct 2D, 2.5D or 3D representations of the world, needed to support all human actions. They can relate to different environmental compounds, land, water, atmosphere and, possibly, extra-terrestrial worlds. Geomatics provides georeferenced and validated knowledge for all environment-related disciplines and needs.

With these premises, geomatics should not to be confused with geoinformation [2]. It is not the positional content of a work that makes it a geomatic work, nor the utilization of geographical data. Conversely, it is the method and the associated theoretical background one adopts to generate, or use; is it the positional information that defines the inner geomatic nature of a work [3]. The Geomatics journal is not intended for focusing on case studies but, conversely, is interested in the methodological and theoretical aspects related to error minimization, robustness maximization, the generalization capability of proposed approaches, data/products/services testing and validation, the definition and proposal of guidelines for processing, qualifying, structuring and integrating geographical data, and the evaluation of new software and instruments [4].

To achieve this task, great scientific attention has to be paid to algorithms, software, sensors and surveying instruments, and techniques, always providing benchmarks to compare results with. This is expected to better address the exploitation of geomatic techniques, especially because, currently, we are experiencing a (too) fast technology transfer and geographical data production/supplying.

It is the author’s opinion that the traditional relationship linking scientific research and technology has been presently reverted. Traditionally, technological advancement was driven by research. Research, especially in the geomatic sector, was mainly aimed at proposing solutions to a practical need. The chronology of the process started from the need, continued to the research question, and then to the technology to obtain the solution. Today, especially in geomatics, it is the technological advancement that seems to lead the scientific research, asking researchers for suggestions about the scientific exploitation (tomorrow commercial) of new tools. The geomatics community has to therefore recover a central role, not only proposing applications, but also, once they have been eventually found, defining guidelines and rules for the proper use of data/methods/tools. Especially in those contexts where “derived”, or “secondary”, global products/services obtained by statistically, physically or AI-based modeling are continuously proposed (Earth Observation is the best example), there is an urgent need for validation based on recognized open, global and explicit procedures. Maximally, if these data are distributed by institutional players like, for example, EU Copernicus or NASA USGS, thus assuming officiality, this has to be certified to guarantee robustness and comparability of deductions. This certification is always desirable, but especially needed if deductions from maps have to be probatory within legal concerns (e.g., environmental crimes).

A continued discussion is therefore needed about the qualification of geo-products/services and the definition of guidelines and standards for geographical data production and processing. The geomatics community, and this journal, can be the place where this process can be ignited and, eventually, managed, longing for a “slow science” aimed at slowing down, if not technological advancement, at least its exploitation [5]. Proper time steps, consistent with the definition and application of standards for products/services utilized by final users, have to be defined and respected.

This instance is more true today when we are experiencing two great “revolutions” about geographical data. The first concerns the introduction of GeoAI in geographical data processing and interpretation [6,7]; the second concerns the new roles that citizen science potentially, or actually is playing, in the geographical data production (but not only) framework [8].

In the framework of GeoAI, the geomatics community is called to carefully monitor the process, possibly through a continued comparison of results from AI with more traditional ones, ensuring a strong understanding of this technology. There are some priorities, for example, (i) an alignment between the traditional geomatics terminology (in terms of words and meaning) and the one from the ICT context, where AI comes from, is urgently needed. One example comes from the accuracy metrics of AI-based image classification and those from the more traditional remote sensing approaches (F1 score, Precision, Recall against User’s/Producer’s accuracy, Class commission, etc.). (ii) Considerations about the actual improvements by AI, with respect to ordinary methods, also have to be given. In particular, proper discussions are needed about the opportunity of moving from completely explainable acceptable results (traditional approaches) to unexplainable excellent ones (from AI). (iii) In addition, the preservation of a proper level of domain (geomatics) knowledge, despite AI-based approaches, must be ensured and continued to be transferred to new generations.

In the framework of citizen science, it is worth stressing that spatial data access is undoubtly expanding to new and diverse users’ communities that are shown to be able to play a participating role in data production and exploitation. This puts citizen scientists closest to geomatics, enabling them to collaborate within common scientific programs and studies [9] by supporting spatial data collection, data curation, synthesis, analysis and public engagement. Participating in geography and citizen science can certainly provide potentially positive effects in the geomatics community, but, similarly to GeoAI, a series of research, technological and social challenges still remain. Observational data from citizen science are known to include potential errors and biases and inconsistency of data collection processes that are typical, given the diversity of involved players. Appropriate data sampling and validation protocols, specific methodologies aligned with geomatics technologies, training procedures and best practices are, here as well, urgently needed [8].

MDPI’s Geomatics can play a crucial role in this framework, proposing itself as the place where such instances can be discussed, presented and disseminated, providing the seed for a network of experts that could discuss and fix these new types of needs that the increasing amount of spatially based data strongly require. Whatever the topic falling within the geomatics framework, authors have to consider that submitted works are expected to face scientific problems of surveys (geometric and semantic) and are not intended for presenting local applications. Submitted papers have to present an adequate level of universality about the proposed technique, data or operational instances, with the specific goal of making Geomatics unequivocally recognizable.

We welcome topics concerning geodesy and gravimetry; technical and thematic cartography production; aerial and close range photogrammetry; topographic survey; satellite-based positioning (GNSS) and navigation; SLAM (Simultaneous Localization and Mapping); aerial and terrestrial LiDAR; ground and structures/infrastructures deformation monitoring; hydrography and bathymetry; optical and radar remote sensing techniques, methods and data quality evaluation; odometry, extra-terrestrial geomatics; digital twins; indoor positioning, navigation and mapping; standardization of workflows for acquisition, processing and validation of geographical data and spatial measures; officiality and legal value of spatial information; crowdsourcing/volunteered geographic information; frontiers of geomatics applications like human and animal health, epidemiological modeling, risk analysis and spatially based simulation; and geovisualization.