GIS INSTRUCTION IN UNDERGRADUATE EDUCATION LEADS TO A SOFTWARE COMPETITION: ArcGIS VS. GRASS

The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Alfred University offers geospatial instruction in the form of two courses: Introduction to Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and Advanced GIS. Both are offered through the Environmental Studies and Geology Division. Both are focused primarily on GIS as an applied tool, and less on Geographic Information Science. Finally, both are ESRI (ArcGIS)-centric with the core application the focus of the introductory course and select 'toolboxes' - Spatial Analyst, 3D Analyst, Spatial Statistics - the focus of the advanced course.

However, other GIS software programs are available and in limited use at the University: GRASS, Manifold, virtual globe software (e.g. Google Earth), etc. These programs are representative of the software choices now available for GIS instruction, but there are differences between these programs in terms of function, cost and industry use:

- ArcGIS - substantial licensing fees, extensive toolkit, industry standard

- Manifold, IDRISI - lower priced 'alternatives' to ArcGIS

- GRASS, QGIS, MapServer - free, open-source GIS

Each choice has its advocates and yet formal instruction is provided in only one – ArcGIS. Does this ArcGIS-centricity do students a disservice?

With this in mind, we had a competition between GRASS and ArcGIS. Our comparison of the software was limited to geological applications involving three problems devised by a neutral third party. We tracked the 'billable hours' invested in solving the problems and noted any measurable differences between the results obtained. One problem involved data acquisition and re-projection, one involved geoprocessing/spatial analysis, and one involved the visualization of results (making a map). Outcomes of the competition/comparison, including advantages and disadvantages of each software in completing the problems, are the focus of our presentation.