PrintWelcome to Geography 485. Over the next ten weeks, you'll work through four lessons and a final project dealing with ArcGIS automation in Python. Each lesson will contain readings, examples, and projects. Since the lessons are two weeks long, you should plan between 20 - 30 hours of work to complete them, although this number may vary depending on your prior programming experience. See the Course Schedule section of this syllabus, below, for a schedule of the lessons and course projects.
As with GEOG 483 and GEOG 484, the lessons in this course are project-based with key concepts embedded within. However, because of the nature of computer programming, there is no way this course can follow the step-by-step instructional design of the previous courses. You will probably find the course to be more challenging than our courses on GIS fundamentals. For that reason, it is more important than ever that you stay on schedule and take advantage of the course message boards and private email. It's quite likely that you will get stuck somewhere during the course, so before getting hopelessly frustrated, please seek help from me or your classmates!
I hope that by now that you have reviewed our Orientation and Syllabus for an important course site overview. Before we begin our first project, let me share some important information about the textbook and a related Esri course.
Textbook and Readings
The textbook for this course is Python Scripting for ArcGIS Pro by Paul A. Zandbergen. As you read through Zandbergen's book, you'll see material that closely parallels what is in the Geog 485 lessons. This isn't necessarily a bad thing; when you are learning a subject like programming, it can be helpful to have the same concept explained from two angles.
My advice about the readings is this: Read the material on the Geog 485 lesson pages first. If you feel like you have a good understanding from the lesson pages, you can skim through some of the more lengthy Zandbergen readings. If you struggled with understanding the lesson pages, you should pay close attention to the Zandbergen readings and try some of the related code snippets and exercises. I suggest you plan about 1 - 2 hours per week of reading if you are going to study the chapters in detail.
In all cases, you should get a copy of the textbook because it is a relevant and helpful reference.
Note:
The Zandbergen textbook is up to the 3rd Edition as of Summer 2024. The free copy of the book available through the PSU library is the 2nd Edition. Differences between the two editions are relatively minor and you may assume that the section numbers referenced here in the lessons are applicable to both editions unless otherwise noted.
You may see that in Esri's documentation, shapefiles are also referred to as "feature classes." When you see the term "feature class," consider it to mean a vector dataset that can be used in ArcGIS.
Another type of standalone dataset dating back to the early days of ArcGIS is the ArcInfo coverage. Like the shapefile, the coverage consists of several files that work together. Coverages are definitely an endangered species, but you might encounter them if your organization used ArcInfo Workstation in the past.
Esri Virtual Campus Course Python for Everyone
There is a free Esri Virtual Campus course, Python for Everyone, that introduces a lot of the same things you'll learn this term in Geog 485. Python for Everyone consists of a series of short videos and exercises, some of which might help toward the projects. If you want to get a head start, or you want some reinforcement of what we're learning from a different point of view, it would be worth your time to complete that Virtual Campus course.
All you need in order to access the course is an Esri Global Account, which you can create for free. You do not need to obtain an access code from Penn State.
The course moves through ideas very quickly and covers a range of concepts that we'll spend 10 weeks studying in depth, so don't worry if you don't understand it all immediately or if it seems overwhelming. You might find it helpful to quickly review the course again near the end of Geog 485 to review what you've learned.
Questions?
If you have any questions now or at any point during this week, please feel free to post them to the Lesson 1 Discussion Forum. (To access the forums, return to Canvas via the Canvas link. Once in Canvas, you can navigate to the Modules tab, and then scroll to the Lesson 1 Discussion Forum.) While you are there, feel free to post your own responses if you are able to help a classmate.
Now, let's begin Lesson 1.