US-RSE'24 Pre-Conference Tutorial: Overview of GIS Open Source Software Ecosystem and Theory

Researchers are finding spatial-analysis as a valuable tool to answer new research questions that were not considered before. This is made possible because many of the open source spatial analysis tools (GIS Software) are getting easier to use and often provide tools to visualize the data in exciting interactive mapping environments. As a Research Software Engineer, providing support and troubleshooting errors associated with these GIS tools is not always easy. When using a search engine to find a solution, one will encounter GIS terminology in documentation and community forums. This terminology will refer to some fundamental aspects of GIS theory or components of GIS libraries/software that is common knowledge among the GIS community. This tutorial aims to provide a stepping stone to acquiring this fundamental GIS knowledge.