Recent developments in geographic information systems across different application domains: a review.

The recent advancements in geospatial technologies together with the availability of geographic information system (GIS) software and tools with enhanced capabilities in the recent decades have shifted the use of this technology from an early adoption phase to a more mature phase. The application of GIS technology has found new avenues in solving complex socio-economic engineering problems from disaster management and mitigation planning to environmental modelling for sustainable development of cities. In order to reveal the recent developments in use of this technology in different scientific disciplines, a new methodology is developed by considering the semantics to formalize the engineering knowledge in GIS applications. This formalized knowledge is then used to reveal emerging macrotrends, challenges and directions of future research in two different semantic aspects, the "the application" aspect and "the domain" aspect. The review of "the application" aspect shows that a significant change is seen in the applications of GIS, a shift towards complexity in analyses for engineering and building systems for management and decision-making. Further, a systematic keyword analysis on "the domain" aspect is used to develop sub-domains ontologies and a review of literature on each of these sub-domains details the core developments in GIS and some emerging domains of application. Semantic inferences are drawn based on domain-specific requirements, problems and challenges, and outcomes to improve the domain knowledge. The GIS domain knowledge can further be used in developing computational methods using ontologies, formalization of logic and engineering the future GIS systems. The review interestingly finds a growing trend in using GIS as a Decision Support System (DSS), to model domain-specific contexts, semantically integrate data and develop expert intelligence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]