INTERGEO is billed as the biggest specialist event in geodesy, geoinformation, and land management. From a logistical standpoint, that claim is certainly hard to dispute. It’s held in the world’s largest convention center, the Deutsche Messe exhibition complex in Hannover, Germany. The Messe is spread over nearly 250 acres, with futuristic-looking buildings. The Messe exhibition...

Ever since I first started working with GIS, a lot of the most valuable data came from CAD users. At first there was a chasm between the CAD and GIS worlds—different approaches, different tools, different ways of representing things in the real world, different ideas about accuracy. Gradually users on both sides started reaching out....

Editor’s Note: Spiral curves have been used in engineering design for centuries, most prominently for railroads coincident with the worldwide boom in railway construction in the late 1800s. Many who have had to lay out or retrace spiral curves (especially any offsets) might have secretly cursed whoever chose to add them to the design and...