The Vector Map (VMAP), also called Vector Smart Map, is a

vector Vector most often refers to: * Euclidean vector, a quantity with a magnitude and a direction * Disease vector, an agent that carries and transmits an infectious pathogen into another living organism Vector may also refer to: Mathematics a ...

-based collection of

geographic information system A geographic information system (GIS) consists of integrated computer hardware and Geographic information system software, software that store, manage, Spatial analysis, analyze, edit, output, and Cartographic design, visualize Geographic data ...

(GIS) data about

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to Planetary habitability, harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all ...

at various levels of detail. Level 0 (low resolution) coverage is global and entirely in the

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no Exclusive exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly Waiver, waived, or may be inapplicable. Because no one holds ...

. Level 1 (global coverage at medium resolution) is only partly in the public domain. There are ongoing discussions about making most of the information available in the public domain.

Description

* Coordinate reference system: Geographic coordinates stored in decimal degrees with southern and western hemispheres using negative values for latitude and longitude, respectively. * Horizontal Datum:

World Geodetic System The World Geodetic System (WGS) is a standard used in cartography, geodesy, and satellite navigation including GPS. The current version, WGS 84, defines an Earth-centered, Earth-fixed coordinate system and a geodetic datum, and also describ ...

1984 (WGS 84). *Vertical Datum:

Mean Sea Level A mean is a quantity representing the "center" of a collection of numbers and is intermediate to the extreme values of the set of numbers. There are several kinds of means (or "measures of central tendency") in mathematics, especially in statist ...

Thematic data layers

Features and data attributes are tagged utilizing the international Feature and Attribute Coding Catalogue (FACC). #major

road A road is a thoroughfare used primarily for movement of traffic. Roads differ from streets, whose primary use is local access. They also differ from stroads, which combine the features of streets and roads. Most modern roads are paved. Th ...

networks #

railroad Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in railway track, tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel railway track, rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of ...

networks #

hydrologic Hydrology () is the scientific study of the movement, distribution, and management of water on Earth and other planets, including the water cycle, water resources, and drainage basin sustainability. A practitioner of hydrology is called a hydro ...

drainage systems #utility networks (cross-country

pipelines A pipeline is a system of pipes for long-distance transportation of a liquid or gas, typically to a market area for consumption. The latest data from 2014 gives a total of slightly less than of pipeline in 120 countries around the world. The Un ...

and communication lines) #major

airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial Aviation, air transport. They usually consist of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surf ...

s #

elevation The elevation of a geographic location (geography), ''location'' is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational equipotenti ...

contours #coastlines # international boundaries #populated places #index of geographical names

Levels of resolution

The vector map product are usually seen as being of three different types: low resolution (level 0), medium resolution (level 1) and high resolution (level 2).

Level Zero (VMAP0)

Level 0 provides worldwide coverage of geo-spatial data and is equivalent to a small scale (1:1,000,000). The data are offered either on CD-ROM or as direct download, as they have been moved to the

. Data are structured following the Vector Product Format (VPF), compliant with standards MIL-V-89039 and MIL-STD 2407.

Data sets

The entire coverage has been divided into four data sets: #

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

(NOAMER
v0noa
#

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

and North

Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...

(EURNASIA
v0eur
#

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

, and

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean (also known as the Antarctic Ocean), it contains the geographic South Pole. ...

(SOAMAFR
v0soa
#South

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

(SASAUS
v0sas

Level One (VMAP1)

Level 1 data are equivalent to a medium scale resolution (1:250,000). Level 1 tiles follow the ''MIL-V-89033'' standard. * Horizontal accuracy: 125–500m * Vertical accuracy: 0.5–2 Contour Interval (for example: if contour interval 50 m, accuracy will be 25 to 100m)

Data sets

VMAP Level 1 is divided in 234 geographical tiles. Only 57 of them are currently (2006) available for download from NGA. Among the available datasets, coverage can be found for parts of

Costa Rica Costa Rica, officially the Republic of Costa Rica, is a country in Central America. It borders Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the northeast, Panama to the southeast, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, as well as Maritime bo ...

Libya Libya, officially the State of Libya, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to Egypt–Libya border, the east, Sudan to Libya–Sudan border, the southeast, Chad to Chad–L ...

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

Iraq Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

Panama Panama, officially the Republic of Panama, is a country in Latin America at the southern end of Central America, bordering South America. It is bordered by Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north, and ...

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

and

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

Level Two (VMAP2)

Level 2 data are equivalent to a large scale resolution. Level 2 tiles follow the ''MIL-V-89032'' standard. * Horizontal accuracy: 50–200m * Vertical accuracy: 0.5–2 Contour Interval (for example: if contour interval 50 m, accuracy will be 25–100m)

Debate about availability of data

The USA Freedom of Information Act and the Electronic Freedom of Information Act guarantee access to virtually all GIS data created by the

US government The Federal Government of the United States of America (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the national government of the United States. The U.S. federal government is composed of three distinct branches: legislative, execut ...

. Following the trend of the

, much of the VMAP data has been offered to the

. But many countries consider mapping and

cartography Cartography (; from , 'papyrus, sheet of paper, map'; and , 'write') is the study and practice of making and using maps. Combining science, aesthetics and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality (or an imagined reality) can ...

state monopoly In economics, a government monopoly or public monopoly is a form of coercive monopoly in which a government agency or government corporation is the sole provider of a particular good or service and competition is prohibited by law. It is a monopoly ...

; for such countries, the VMAP Level1 data are kept out of the public domain. However, some data may be commercialised by national mapping agencies, sometimes as a consequence of

privatisation Privatization (rendered privatisation in British English) can mean several different things, most commonly referring to moving something from the public sector into the private sector. It is also sometimes used as a synonym for deregulation w ...

. Various public groups are making efforts to have all VMAP1 data moved to the public domain in accordance with FOIA. Further steps have been taken by the ''Free World Maps Foundation'' and others to have the data licensed under the

GNU General Public License The GNU General Public Licenses (GNU GPL or simply GPL) are a series of widely used free software licenses, or ''copyleft'' licenses, that guarantee end users the freedom to run, study, share, or modify the software. The GPL was the first ...

, while remaining copyrighted, as an alternative to the public domain. This is an ongoing debate (as of 2006).

Copyrights

VMAP0

The U.S. government has released the data into public domain, with the following conditions imposed (quotation from VMAP0 Copyright Statement): The VMAP0 download page states: However, all is not quite what it seems. There is a 'readme1.txt' file located in the v0eur, v0sas, and v0soa directories. This file contains information saying that layers: Boundaries Coverage and the Reference Library, are copyrighted to the Environmental Systems Research Institute. If these copyrighted layers are not used there is no violation of any copyrights.

Tools to read and convert VMAP data

*VPFView (V2.1) - developed by NIMA, is available from NGA or

USGS The United States Geological Survey (USGS), founded as the Geological Survey, is an government agency, agency of the United States Department of the Interior, U.S. Department of the Interior whose work spans the disciplines of biology, geograp ...

(as part of the NIMAMUSE package); this tool can render simple plots and export GIS data to other

GIS file formats A GIS file format or geospatial file format is a standard for encoding geographical information into a computer file. It is a specialized type of file format for use in geographic information systems (GIS), remote sensing image processing tools, a ...

* " OGR with OGDI driver": this

free software Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribut ...

tool can convert VMAP format to standard

such as

SHAPE A shape is a graphics, graphical representation of an object's form or its external boundary, outline, or external Surface (mathematics), surface. It is distinct from other object properties, such as color, Surface texture, texture, or material ...

PostGIS PostGIS ( ) is an open source software program that adds support for geographic objects to the PostgreSQL object-relational database. PostGIS follows the Simple Features for SQL specification from the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC). PostGIS is ...

etc.

History

*1991–1993: The ''National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA)'' develops the Digital Chart of the World (DCW)Digital Chart of the World
- DCW data access site for the US Defense Mapping Agency (DMA) with themes including Political/Ocean Populated Places, Railroads, Roads, Utilities, Drainage, Hypsography, Land Cover, Ocean Features, Physiography, Aeronautical, Cultural Landmarks, Transportation Structure and Vegetation. One of the sources for the data was the ''Operational Navigation Chart'' that compiles military mapping from Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, and the United States. VMAP (level 0) is a slightly more detailed reiteration of the DCW.
VMAP (level 1) has much higher resolution data. *2004 The ''National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA)'' is renamed to

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) is a combat support agency within the United States Department of Defense whose primary mission is collecting, analyzing, and distributing geospatial intelligence (GEOINT) to support national se ...

which will include other mapping agencies such as the ''Defense Mapping Agency (DMA)'', the ''Central Imagery Office (CIO)'' and the ''Defense Dissemination Program Office (DDPO)''. All VMAP data will subsequently be distributed through the NGA.

References

* Processing of VMAP0 data with free GIS software: ''SRTM and VMAP0 data in OGR and GRASS''
GRASS Newsletter
3:2-6, 2005 (M. Neteler) {{refend

External links

at National Geospatial Intelligence Agency
free java viewerfast java viewer from Idevio
in ESRI shapefile format, ready to download

in ESRI shapefile format, ready to download

Geographic information systems

Description

Thematic data layers

Levels of resolution

Level Zero (VMAP0)

Data sets

Level One (VMAP1)

Data sets

Level Two (VMAP2)

Debate about availability of data

Copyrights

VMAP0

Tools to read and convert VMAP data

History

See also

References

External links