PREFACE
The 3rd ISPRS Workshop on ’’Dynamic and Multi-Dimensional GIS” (DMGIS) is the continuation of
DMGIS’97 in Hong Kong and DMGIS’99 in Beijing. It is unique in that it focuses on themes that would
transform GIS from static modeling of two dimensions to dynamic modeling of multi-dimensions. Since
the last International Workshop on DMGIS, organized by ISPRS Commission IV and held in Beijing in
1999, there have been numerous papers on this exciting topic published in journals and conference
proceedings. The emerging theory and technology of DMGIS and its enormous potentials have
attracted a great deal of attention in academic and industrial communities. We observed that a few new
3D systems have been developed every year and many 3D Cyber City Models have been generated
through the developed techniques. It is the time for us to summarize the achievements so far find out
the current problems, and map out the future development.
Geoinformatics is one of the major international forums for geographic information science and
technology. It serves as the official annual conference for the Association for Chinese Professionals in
Geographic Information Science (CPGIS). Geoinformatics covers a wide range of topics related to the
research, application and education of GIS, remote sensing and GPS. Previous meetings had been
held in Buffalo (1992), Beijing (1993, 1998), Calgary (1994), Hong Kong (1995), West Palm Beach
(1996), Taipei (1997), Ann Arbor (1999), and Monterey (2000).
This joint workshop of Geoinformatics & DMGIS’2001 has provided a successful forum for researchers
and professions over the world to discuss research topics, share their experience, and promote
international collaboration in this field. The workshop has been approved by ISPRS Council and co
organized by six working groups of ISPRS, CPGIS, AIT and LIESMARS. About 80 papers were
presented in the workshop and current front-line research topics were extensively discussed. During the
workshop, ISPRS Council Meeting was also held in AIT and all ISPRS Council members have attended
our workshop. Another joint meeting on “Geoinformatics New Terms” chaired by Prof. Yuying Li and Dr.
Xiaoyong Chen, has also been held in our workshop time. From the workshop, we would like to make a
new record for both the ISPRS DMGIS workshop series and CPGIS annual conferences. We believe
that the volume will provide an excellent up-to-date overview on the theoretical methodologies and
techniques on both Geoinformtics and DMGIS.
On behalf of the organization committee of Geoinformatics & DMGIS’2001, we first would like to thank
all ISPRS Council members for their strong support and their time spent with us. Prof. John Trinder,
President of ISPRS, has kindly accepted our invitation to present a welcome speech on the opening
ceremony. Prof. Ian Dowman, Secretary General of ISPRS, has severed as Chairperson of the
International Steering Committee of our workshop and chaired the opening ceremony. We would like to
thank Prof. Shunji Murai, the former president and honorary member of ISPRS, and Prof. Martien
Molenaar, one of the most outstanding leading researchers on GIS theory, for their successful keynote
speeches. We would also thank Prof.Jean-Louis Armand, President of AIT, Prof. M. T. Tabucanon,
Provost of AIT, Prof. H.N. PHIEN, Dean of SAT of AIT, Dr. Kiyoshi HONDA, Director of ACRoRS, for
their support to host the workshop at AIT. In addition, we would like to thank Prof. Deren Li and Prof.
Songbo Zhang from LIESMARS of China for their support. Finally, we would like to thank our local
secretaries for their hard work for editing the proceedings and CD ROMs, creating and updating our
Web pages and arranging meeting rooms. Special mention goes to Fenwen Bai, Jie Du, Do Minh
Phuong, Teravudh Tipdecho, Jianjun Zhang and Pan Zhu.
Jun CHEN, Xiaoyong CHEN, C. Vincent TAO and Qiming ZHOU
Bangkok, May 2001