Guidance

Geospatial Glossary

This glossary is intended for anyone using geospatial data and is particularly valuable to users who are new to the geospatial world.

From:
Cabinet Office and Geospatial Commission
Published
9 June 2020
Last updated
11 March 2021 — See all updates

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Geospatial Glossary

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The Geospatial Commission and its Partner Bodies have produced the geospatial glossary to define the common terms used in the geospatial industry. The main purpose for the glossary is to help those new to geospatial data understand the terms used, as well as to provide anyone involved in the industry with a set of common definitions in one place.

If you have any feedback or comments about this glossary, please email us at geospatialcommission@cabinetoffice.gov.uk

Notes on Sources:

  • Where possible, links are provided to websites from which the definitions were sourced or derived. Some definitions have been modified to suit the purpose of this glossary, for example, using less specialist or technical terms to suit a wider audience.
  • In some cases, definitions have been derived from internal glossaries used by the Geo6 organisations, in which case a link to the organisation’s external website has been provided.

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Updates to this page

Published 9 June 2020
Last updated 11 March 2021 + show all updates

  1. 45 links to specific source pages were updated and one definition (spatial) changed.

  2. 76 links to specific source pages were updated.

  3. We have taken on board feedback from users and made the following changes to the glossary: New terms and definitions: Registers of Scotland Scottish Assessors Retired terms: Boundary Shapefile Updated definitions: Discrete Global Grid System (DGGS) Gazetteer Geography Markup Language (GML) Global Positioning System (GPS) National mapping agencies Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Ordnance Survey (OS) Register (The) Unique Resource Identifier (URI) Unregistered land Web Coverage Service (WCS) Web Feature Service (WFS) Web Map Service (WMS) Web Map Tile Service (WMTS)

  4. Source for GeoJSON changed from Ordnance Survey to GeoJSON

  5. edited National mapping agencies entry - Changed UK's Ordanance Survey to Great Britain's Ordnance Survey

  6. First published.

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