When most people think about data, they picture rows and columns. Tables, spreadsheets, and structured formats that help organize information. But there is another dimension to data that changes everything. It adds context, movement, and meaning by telling us where something happened, not just what happened. This is spatial data. And whether you are working […]
How Data Warehouses Power Modern GIS Workflows (And When Not to Use Them)
When most people hear the term “data warehouse,” they think of something built only for data engineers. Endless SQL, massive cloud infrastructure, and dashboards tracking billions of rows. But data warehouses are quietly becoming one of the most important tools in modern GIS. If you need to run spatial joins over millions or billions of […]
GeoParquet Explained: The Cloud-Native Spatial Format Transforming Modern GIS
If you have been working in GIS for a while, you probably know shapefiles and GeoJSON. But there is a new format reshaping how we store, share, and analyze spatial data. It is called GeoParquet, and unlike traditional GIS formats, it was built for the modern data stack rather than desktop mapping workflows. GeoParquet is […]
The Plumbing Layer: Why Most GIS Teams Stall on Modernization
Most GIS teams I work with have already tried to modernize. They have people on Python. Someone is running PostGIS. A few have touched DuckDB or Sedona. And the modernization still stalls. The pattern: tools brought in, then abandoned The pattern is consistent. A new tool gets brought in. Three months later it is abandoned. […]
The Geospatial Index: Why Understanding the Business of GIS Changes Your Career, Your Income, and the Future of Our Industry
The Geospatial Index: Why Understanding the Business of GIS Changes Everything Most GIS professionals spend years mastering tools, workflows, and data. Far fewer understand the business behind the technology we use every day. And almost none look at geospatial as an investable industry with measurable performance, competitive dynamics, and long-term economic signals. But that’s exactly […]
