GPS Devices Help Prosecutors Win
Be careful before you commit that next crime. Your GPS unit in you car could be the deciding factor to landing you in jail. A news article released by the Associated Press tells of how prosecutors are winning convictions based upon vehicle GPS devices. These GPS devices contain tracking points that can tell others where you have been. Eric Hanson was convicted of murdering four family members based upon his GPS unit in his TrailBlazer. Read Article
On the flip side, the Technology Blog of the DallasNews has an article entitled GPS violates the civil rights of murderers, other criminals. They bring up the point of this evading out privacy. The question is whose privacy is this taking away? The criminal or the average citizen? I do agree with Andrew Smith here in the fact that GPS data should be available to police when needed. But at the same time I do not think that the government should be “following” us like Big Brother (However, I am sure they already are.)
ArcGIS 9.3 Enables More Functionality in Adobe PDF
As GIS users begin migrating to ArcGIS 9.3, they will find more functionality when they export their map as a PDF. I have been using 9.3 for a few months now, and I have found that ESRI has made things a lot better for this export option. Options that I have found include:
1. Ability to enable a viewer to turn on/off layers in PDF
2. Ability to include map georeference information within PDF
3. Ability to embed attribute data in PDF
The coolest of these options is the ability to embed the attribute data. The user looking at the PDF can actually query by pointing and clicking the visual features to get the attribute data returned just like the Identify Tool in ArcMap.
The press release from ESRI discusses the new functionality in ArcGIS 9.3 and Adobe PDF 9.
