The user would submit instructions on how the data are to be processed and in return would receive only the results. Young adds that a wide variety of commercial service vendors providing processed GIS data inevitably will produce myriad levels of detail. This mandates intelligent Internet browsers that can sift through the massive technical detail to provide the customer with precise information. Because system and network efficiencies fall short of being able to provide broad-based imagery data base access, Young warrants that Internet users will see a series of arbitrary aggregations of spectral features incorporated into different kinds of product levels. On the technology front, Webster declares that the need for automatic extraction of feature information is holding back GIS progress.
Feature information goes beyond merely identifying a road to include actually defining that road.
This brings back into focus the basic feature extraction requirement, however. He continues that both his company and the government have invested considerable funds on research and development to provide new, more automated methods for extracting information from imagery or existing map sources. Advances in computing power enable fusing different types of imagery to perform enhancements for identifying features. Computers and their software are not sufficiently developed to permit fully automated action, but extensive research continues into automated imagery feature and information extraction, Webster states. Greve adds that high-resolution feature extraction historically has involved panchromatic imagery.