Last week I was at the courthouse record of deeds office. A teacher (used to be
an engineer) at the local school was there with a dozen kids. Each had an iphone4s
or new ipad. I asked the teacher if the recorder gave him permission to have a
party here. He said he told the recorder that they were on a summer field research
trip. I said OK............ He knew I was a surveyor.
The teacher has a laptop. Each kid was a list of deed books and pages (some use the
term 'call list') I thought-- This looks a little bit over the top. I am sitting
on a stool next to the laptop and all of a sudden pages of deed books begin appearing
on the screen. I ask, "Are those images being saved?" The teacher says, "Yes,
automatically." I say that this looks a little bit commercial. The teacher admits
the copies are being sent automatically to the i-cloud where a pipeline company has
access. "What is the software? I ask. He says, "Screach, an Itune app". I ask, "How many users?" "As many as you want!" is the reply.
I ask, "Could you use the iphones for a topographic survey? He said, "Yes, but it
helps to have GPS capable. Otherwise, you have to go back and tag the points with
coordinates." The teacher said next week they were doing a topo at the local park.
He said, "Bring your data collector." I hesitantly asked, "Your iphone4s talks to
my data collector?" He said, "Yes, of course." He showed a whole bunch of commerical art libraries for utilities, valves, and trees.
What's next??
Sounds Like Exploitation Of Child Labor
Tsk, tsk.
Paul in PA
A ton of homemade mistakes to be fixed, then fewer mistakes, then the ultimate decline of our profession and a dilution into Civil Engineering and GIS. It will take some time, most of us will have fulfilling careers, but expansion and diversity of skills will be essential. Adapt, evolve and survive.
Nothing to worry about...
My kid, who is 28 has his MS in GIS and works for a public utility.
He tells me that surveyors (such as his father and late grandfather) have little to worry about from the GIS front. He thinks it's pretty funny that surveyors are worried about it at all.
The addition of new technology is a great thing.
It is what our clients think that technology is capable of that is important.
I continue to get the questions that tell me that they have been so misinformed about what this new stuff can actually do and they believe it is so because another surveyor has told them that it will.
Some of my competition is exaggerating and drinking the cool-aid at the same time.
It reminds me of when they went out and surveyed three sides of a property and never closed or checked into any other control.
Anyone can pull up Cass County, Texas up on google earth and see that RTK is not going to work very good.
0.02
Nothing to worry about...
I would not recommend going to a seminar by A. R. Vannozzi (Rich). He's working his way up to phd or wherever. He has had the cool-aid.
A couple years ago, we had a convention with ESRI sponsoring a nice day long seminar on GIS. Rich got up and showed us how to create a Plan of Land with the GIS data made available from the state GIS service. Boundaries, images, contours, buildings, all the great stuff. He had a surround: Plan of land by A. R. Vannozzi, PLS.
I asked why someone would not accept this as a legitimate Plan of Land as his name appears with the PLS after it. He replied that anyone who had ever seen one of his plans knew he put more notes on it.
He went on his fear-mongering mission to let us all know that every undergrad student can do exactly the same thing by the middle of their education.
I saw he presented at the Survey Summit last year. I did not attend his session, but I hear he was on the same little fear mongering mission.
I see the writing on the wall.
I wonder if the iPhone app accepts or rejects monuments of record? Maybe the iPhone just freezes up.
Nothing to worry about...
"He had a surround: Plan of land by A. R. Vannozzi, PLS"
A 'surround"? Do you mean a sheet border with a title and name in it?
Check itunes. I am sure it won't cost more than $2.