Got GEOINT? Try Multi-INT Fusion With MarkLogic & Esri

At the Esri Federal GIS Conference, MarkLogic demonstrated the interoperability between Esri’s ArcGIS and an Object Based Production (OBP) data model, utilizing MarkLogic’s Enterprise NoSQL database platform. The integration allows GIS users to fuse and correlate geospatial features with multi-INT data objects including imagery, full motion video, finished intelligence reports, open source intelligence, and other unstructured data. The MarkLogic OBP data model enables geospatial intelligence organizations to move into the next generation of activity based intelligence, structured observation management, and human geography analytics.

This is not a little deal. Several people told us they were struggling with how to ingest and search across multiple types of content (text, office docs, XML, social media, etc.) and how to integrate that with their existing GIS systems. Something that relational just can’t do.

The MarkLogic OBP data model can receive any kind of data from anywhere, and organizes it in a “one object, one time” (O3T) scheme. Objects can contain multiple values and multiple geometries, and metadata can be attached at the value level. For example, a specific lighthouse can have 3 different values for its height. For each height, a metadata field could contain the source of that value, the classification, temporal encoding to describe the valid dates at this height, other user comments, and contextual relationships to another object(s). Metadata fields can evolve dynamically with a mission’s needs and are not limited to a rigid and static data model. The framework also provides flexible mechanisms to create, navigate and manage relationships between objects and their various attributes. Semantic technology is used to define relationships, proving the ability to capture the complexity and richness of world events.

The MarkLogic OBP solution places intelligence in context by answering Who? When? What? and Where? It provides tradecraft tools and a data model required to store, enhance, and disseminate trends and analysis products. A GEOINT Specialist told us “it was very impressive to see objects generated from features coming from different data sources without the constraints of the different GIS layers.”

One of our local government customers also showed my colleague Kim Kok a new app from his mobile phone. The app allows citizens to enter an address and view all 911 Services incidents (break-ins, criminal mischief, etc.) within the user selected range and date. That application searches in real-time from over 2M+ documents, with sub-second response time. This customer has already deployed a number of applications on the MarkLogic platform, and this one will be rolled out to the public in the next couple of months.