GIS and Spatial Sciences

at USC Libraries

Andy Rutkowski

arutkows@usc.edu

 

bit.ly/sscislides

Contact me for a research consultation:

 

arutkows@usc.edu


email for an appointment

 

Research flows and data life cycle 

1. research question / proposal

2. review of literature / data

3. offer an answer (report, essay, map etc.)

Life Cycle models:
DataOne - https://www.dataone.org/data-life-cycle 

 

discover

analyze

clean

visualize

share

refine

Primary vs Secondary vs Teriatry sources

RESEARCH GUIDE:

http://libguides.usc.edu/primarysources/home

Primary

direct, first-hand, closeness to an event or thing

Secondary

interpretation or analysis of a primary or secondary source. good way of getting back to a primary source.

Tertiary

overview, summary, encyclopedia, wikipedia, textbooks, etc. 

Primary: 
Census data extracted from cenus website
Secondary:
Article or book that discusses and uses that census data
Tertiary: Wikepedia entry for the US Census

Literature

https://libraries.usc.edu/

 

filters

filters

filters

 

Use advanced search to narrow / broaden your results

Click on full text

and get the article from a database.

 

Depending on which one you choose your article may or may not contain diagrams and images. Important for spatial research!

sharing options!

Sign in and save!

Google Scholar

change settings in order to link to USC Libraries  

  • click on library links
  • search for university of southern california
  • check off University of Southern California - Find it @ USC
  • save

 

if you selected USC you will see the Find it @ USC link for available articles

Data

Thoughts on Finding Data

  • Topic of interest?

  • Ideal dataset(s)?

  • Source of dataset(s)?

  • Spatial Scale?

  • Temporal Scale?

  • Primary or Secondary data?

  • Raster or Vector data model?

  • Analytic procedures?

Access to USC subscription databases and other data sources

https://libguides.usc.edu/spatial

Social Explorer
PolicyMap
SimplyAnalytics
DataPlanet
Statista

Los Angeles Open Data

LA County GIS Data Portal

County of Los Angeles Open Data

Los Angeles Geohub
 

Courses - access core geospatial datasets online

your data is only as good as the metadata

  • where did you get it
  • how it was collected
  • dates
  • coverage
  • etc

Practice good metadata

  • describe the data that you download in a text document
  • write out any relevant information about it
  • if you change your data say what you did
  • name your data files something meaningful
  • with each change update filenames and offer description

Citation

 

https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/

Ask a Librarian 

https://libraries.usc.edu/ask-a-librarian

Made with Slides.com