Geospatial Data Quality for Analytical Command and Control Applications

Have you traced a digital representation of a road with so many switchbacks that you questioned the map accuracy? Road switchbacks can result from digitization errors such as kinks and kickbacks. Route planning can be defeated by breaks in the network. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency's (NGA's) current strategy includes substantial data production under contract and a large cooperative effort with other nations under the Multinational Geospatial Co-production Program (MGCP). The development, codification, and enforcement of detailed quality standards are critical to this acquisition strategy. This paper uses the modeling and simulation application area to exemplify problems that can arise when digital feature data is used for command and control purposes such as automated route planning. This paper describes the type of quality standards that are to be applied in production of geospatial feature data and illustrates a process to transform semantic descriptions into specific guidance suitable for software implementation. The process includes experimentation to determine appropriate reasoning strategies that will permit identification of substandard data while minimizing false positive notifications. The paper describes the impact on simulation entities using the digital data to exemplify a typical problem, details the experiment designed to address the problem, and presents the results of conducting the experiment. The paper concludes with observations on the potential impact of these geospatial data developments on computer applications that use the data in various reasoning domains. Presented at AFCEA-GMU C4I Center Symposium: Critical Issues In C4I at George Mason University, Fairfax, VA on 20-21 May 2008. The original document contains color images.