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December 1998 - Number 36 EARSeL Newsletter CONTENTS ISSN 0257-0521 1 EDITORIAL 3 Bulletin of the 2 NEWS FROM THE ASSOCIATION European Association of Remote Sensing Laboratories 2.1 ECO BP'98 and the Bureau Meeting 4 Http://www-earsel.cma.fr 2.2 Retirement Gottfried Konecny 4 December 1998 - Number 36 2.3 Outcomes Data Fusion SIG Workshop 5 3 REPORT ON IS SIG WORKSHOP EARSeL Newsletter Editor 3.1 Intro 7 Dr. Ir. L.L.F. Janssen 3.2 Summary 7 Associate Professor Remote Sensing & Photogrammetry 3.3 Events 13 ITC 3.4 Conclusions and Outlook 15 P.O.Box 6, 7500 AA Enschede,The Netherlands 3.5 Acknowledgements 15 Tel: +31 53 4874414 3.6 Internet Adresses 15 Fax: +31 53 4874335 E-mail: [email protected] 4 NEWS FROM THE EC, ESA AND THE CEO 4.1 News update from the CEO programme 16 Editorial Assistant 5 RS DATA, PRODUCTS AND PROJECTS Mme. M. Godefroy 5.1 Observations 16 EARSeL Secretariat 5.2 ISPRS Jobs Directory 22 2 avenue Rapp, 75340 PARIS Cedex 07, France 5.3 ILWIS 2.2 for Windows 22 Tel: +33 1 45567360 5.4 New Environmental Observatory 23 Fax: +33 1 45567361 E-mail: [email protected] 6 REVIEWS, PUBLICATIONS AND REPORTS 6.1 Window on the World 23 Published by: EARSeL Secretariat 6.2 Information from Space 25 Desk Top Publishing by: ITC DTP, Enschede, 6.3 RSS'98 Congress 26 The Netherlands 6.4 PIERS Workshop 27 Printing by: Giethoorn Ten Brink, 6.5 ABDMAP Workshop in Crete 28 Meppel,The Netherlands 6.6 US-European Collaboration in Space Science 28 Nr of copies printed: 650 6.7 ISPRS Commission VII Symposium 29 Subscription rates 1998 7 FORTHCOMING MEETINGS AND EVENTS 32 Members receive the Newsletter as part of the annual membership fee. For non-members rates are as follows: (4 issues) within Europe 450 FRF. including airmail postage outside Europe 500 FRF. personal subscription from EARSeL member laboratories’ staff 200 FRF. EARSeL membership fees 1998 Individual observer 1700 FRF. Laboratory/company member or observer having up to 10 researchers 1700 FRF. Laboratory/company member or observer having 11 or more researchers 2700 FRF. Laboratory from Eastern Europe (for first two years membership) 850 FRF. The Newsletter is a forum for the exchange of news and views among our members and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the editor or the EARSeL Bureau. Articles published in the EARSeL Newsletter may be reproduced but the relevant credit should be given. 1 EARSeL Newsletter December 1998 - Number 36 EARSeL CHAIRMAN Representatives of the Sponsoring Dr. Robin Vaughan Organisations Bureau A.P.E.M.E. University of Dundee EUROPEAN SPACE AGENCY Dundee DD1 4HN, United Kingdom Mr. G. Duchossois Tel: +44 1382 344557 European Space Agency Fax: +44 1382 345415 8-10, rue Mario Nikis Email: [email protected] 75738 Paris Cedex 15, France Tel: +33 1 5369 7285 VICE-CHAIRMAN Fax: +33 1 5369 7674 Prof. Dr. Eberhard Parlow Email: [email protected] MCR Laboratory University of Basel COMMISSION OF EUROPEAN Spalenring 145 COMMUNITIES CH-4055 Basel, Switzerland Dr. J. Mégier Tel: +41 61 2726480 Space Applications Institute Fax: +41 61 2726923 Joint Research Centre of the EC Email: [email protected] I-21020 Ispra (VA), Italy Tel: +39 332 785 579 SECRETARY-GENERAL Fax: +39 332 789 469 Dr. Lucien Wald Email : [email protected] Groupe Télédétection et Modélisation Ecole des Mines de Paris COUNCIL OF EUROPE B.P. 207 Mr. J. P. Massué F-06904 Sophia Antipolis Cedex, France EUR-OPA Major Hazards Agreement Tel: +33 4 93 95 7449 B.P. 431 R-6 Fax: +33 4 93 95 7535 67075 Strasbourg Cedex, France Email: [email protected] Tel: +33 3 88 41 26 15 Fax: +33 3 88 41 27 87 TREASURER Email: [email protected] Dr. Peter Winkler FÖMI Remote Sensing Centre Bosnyak tér 5 1149 Budapest, Hungary Tel: +36 1 363 6669 Fax: +36 1 252 8282 Email: [email protected] EAST-WEST RELATIONS Dr.Tomas Benes Lesprojekt Forest Management Institute Nabrezni 1326 250 44 Brandys-nad-Labem, Czech Republic Tel: +420 202 800 192 Fax: +420 202 803 371 Email: [email protected] 2 EARSeL Newsletter December 1998 - Number 36 1 EDITORIAL Recently I have been involved in a pro- Now, let us see what we have in this ject dealing with Internet-based solu- December issue of the Newsletter. First tions for the distribution of Earth of all I would like to thank guest editor Observation data. Using an interactive Michael Schaepman who has produced approach that enables definition of the (with his co-authors) a report on the ‘region and time series of interest’, hid- Imaging Spectroscopy SIG workshop den pre-processing (basic data are raw that was held in Zürich just a few weeks data) and value adding (all processing ago. I think the Newsletter is to serve done by remote servers) in this project, the Special Interest Groups in their ac- the objective was to find some ways for tivities as much as possible. enlarging the market potential for EO Included with this issue you will find a data. From the technical point of view I CD-ROM "Window on the World" that think the project was a success; it is pos- has been produced by BNSC and RSS sible to deliver specific portions of in- (Great Britain) which was circulated to formation to the end user either by via all readers of the Sunday Times. Before the Internet or by direct communication putting this into your PC please read links. However, two of the problems the separate sheet of instructions that still stood out by the end of the pro- "Travel the World" and the review pro- ject should be mentioned. Today’s data vided by Nick Kew on page 23. and pricing policies do not have ‘rules’ Wim Bakker provides us with some for EO data covering small areas, and, new 'observations' on what is happen- how to price ‘value-adding’? The other ing in the space related EO activities; problem is related to the ‘quality’ of the reading his contribution four times a information retrieved - what informa- year will keep you up-to-date on what tion is given on the accuracy and by you should know (plus some extras). what organisation ? When, for example, some Internet-derived land cover map I want to remind you that EARSeL now might be used for planning purposes of has its own web entry (www-ear- my province I would be the first one to sel.cma.fr), including the member's di- object against using such a map which rectory, possibilities for tendering and could be quite inaccurate. These days, SIG related sites. There has been discus- any person that can push buttons can sion with some members on the way the produce 'information'. Newsletter is published on the web site. When it comes to enlarging the market At this moment we only publish the for applications of EO data, technology Table of Contents and the chapter on is the first thing that can be solved by Association News. We think that if peo- hard labour. Data policies and accepted ple and organisations are interested standards and/or procedures for qual- they should at least pay the subscrip- ity definition of (value-added) products tion rate for the Newsletter (better still take more. Some of us see a correspon- to become a member of course). I would dence between selling cans of soup and be interested in hearing strong opinions EO data to anonymous customers. In in favour or against this policy - please this marketing context during one dis- react to my address and we will come cussion one of my colleagues said back to this issue in the March 1999 “under those conditions this person will EARSeL Newsletter. become a real potential customer”. From that remark I concluded that there Just a few weeks to go before the holi- is a long way to go before we are facing days. On behalf the EARSeL Bureau I a market of cash paying customers. In would like to wish everybody a Merry fact, because of the complexity of inter- Christmas and a Happy New Year ! preting EO data it is my opinion that the largest share of value-added prod- The editor ucts can only be generated in close com- munication with specific customers. 3 EARSeL Newsletter December 1998 - Number 36 2 NEWS FROM THE ASSOCIATION AND ITS MEMBERS 2.1 ECO BP'98 and EARSeL Among topics discussed were arrange- Bureau meeting ments for the meeting on "Space Tech- niques for Natural Disaster Monitoring The organisers of the ISPRS Commis- and Management", to be held 6-8 April sion VII mid-term Conference EOC 2000. Discussions are under way that BP'98 held from 1-4 September 1998, the organisation Perspective 2100 invited EARSeL to organise a session to should look after the practical organisa- present some of the work being carried tion with EARSeL/UNESCO being out by our Special Interest Groups. The responsible for the scientific content. session was well attended and much appreciated according to the reports we The dates of the EARSeL General have received. After an introduction Assembly and Symposium were decid- describing the aims and activities of the ed. These are Monday 22nd May - Association, given by our Chairman, Wednesday 24th May with Bureau and Robin Vaughan, the following presenta- Council meetings on 21st May and the tions were made : General Assembly on 23rd.