Interesting links

Text Books For Sale!

Check out my used textbooks and technical references at amazon marketplace

Tools

Useful doo-hickies and bits and bobs.

Jeep Coordinate Converter - Converts DMS to UTM coordinates. Useful for processing GPS data.

Wikipedia - Free online encyclopedia. Nature recently reviewed the site, concluding that it was at least as accurate and complete as commercial alternatives.

Data

Feed those models...

Oregon Climate Service - OCS is the state repository of climate data. The data used in my Predicting Temperature page was sourced through OCS.

Spatial Climate Analysis Service - Home of the PRISM climate prediction model.

GLOVIS - The USGS global visualisation viewer. A searchable catalogue of spatial data products.

GLCF - The University of Maryland global land cover facility. A source of free Earth Observation data; an excellent source for historic Landsat data.

LAADS - NASA's Level 1 and atmosphere archive distribution system. Data retrieval service for MODIS Aqua and Terra satellites. Both calibrated radiances and products are available.

Software

All of the software linked to here is free. Despite the fact that you don't have to pay for any of it, all of the programs are accurate, and well used by geostatisticians.

GSlib - Excellent and advanced software for geostatistical estimation and simulation, developed at Stanford. Not overly user friendly, but massively powerful. Pre-compiled executables and FORTRAN 77 source code are available for free.

GeoR - Extremely well implemented package for the R language. Allows model-based geostatistics (Bayesian computational geostatistics); variogram model fitting by maximum likelihood methods etc. Excellent support network (see below).

R - A fully featured statistical programming language and environment, based on the S language. Essentially the GNU version of S-Plus. A very powerful and easy to use programming language, complete with visualisation. Constantly updated with state of the art techniques and methods directly programmed in the R language. The language is easier to learn than many of the alternatives (eg. C++ or FORTRAN).

Gfort - Open source FORTRAN 77/95 compiler.

S-Gems - Wonderfully easy to use software, with superb 3D visualisation capabilities, based on the Stanford geostatistical template library (GsTL). The most common estimation and simulation algorithms are included, although some of the more advanced non-stationary methods are missing (although are available in the GsTL). However, the C++ code is available and the software can be readily customised with plug-ins.

Variowin - Good software for variogram calculation and modelling. Supports nested models and anisotropic models.

User Groups

Like minded people to help you out of tight spots.

Ai-Geostats - A large and well subscribed user forum for all things GIS and Geostatistics.

Comp. Lang. Fortran - A very good Fortran programmers forum.

CVonline - Edinburghs evolving, distributed, non-proprietary on-line compendium of computer vision

Gslib Support - A mailing list for the WinGSlib and GSlib software. Very helpful group.

R-Sig-Geo - R mailing list specifically for geostatistical enquiries. Follow the mailing list link.

Music

The soundtrack to saving the world.

Fun stuff

Places in the 'burgh and silly things to pass the time.

The Forest Cafe - Edinburgh's finest place to get a cup of something hot and black. Also home to workshops, film screenings and live music.

People and Planet - Edinburgh's People and Planet society, which forms part of the UK network for student action on poverty, human rights and the environment.

Rathergood - Fun and silliness for those stressful moments.