1.3 The thematic sections
To enable practitioners to target the individual sections most
relevant to the particular task at hand, the aims of each section
are summarised here:
- Section 2 provides a brief introduction to the role of GIS
within archaeology, containing many pointers to important core
references and fundamental texts. The aim of this section is to
provide a contextual background to GIS in archaeology.
- The aim of Section 3
is to discuss the principle types of
primary spatial and attribute data, common sources of these data, and the processes by
which they can be integrated within a GIS environment.
- In Section 4 the procedures and considerations involved in
the effective structuring, organisation and maintenance of an
active GIS database are discussed. In addition, suggestions for working with derived
data are introduced.
- The aim of Section 5
is to discuss the importance of careful documentation. In effect what to record and when,
in order to facilitate the convenient discovery and re-use of
both active and archival GIS-based data resources. The concepts
of documentation and metadata will be explored and discussed together
with a working introduction to the Dublin Core, the metadata standard
for resource discovery adopted by the ADS.
- Section 6 contains a practical discussion on how to deposit
and catalogue with the ADS. This will include a detailed introduction
to the creation of metadata records.
- In Section 7.1 a carefully selected set of bibliographic references
is provided to enable individuals to study topics in more detail.
In addition an internal glossary is presented in Section 7.2.
