A Discretization-Hierarchization Approach to Information Management -- Implications for Digital Earth

Abstract

The paper addresses ways of supporting the Digital Earth project. Highlighting the merits of discretization and analyzing classification-hierarchization operations as forms of discretization, it analyzes also their weaknesses and shows that their rigidity and inertia stand in contrast to the flexibility required by Digital Earth, and proposes a path towards solutions. Résumé: Aims and scope of the paper. Digital Earth.This paper is not about library science. However, due to the general nature of this investigation, links to library science cannot be excluded. It is not about Google Earth, World Wind, or other geobrowsers either. Its exploration is not confined to geographical information systems. The paper focuses on some critical aspects of a vast knowledgemanaging project, Digital Earth (DE); it identifies discretization and hierarchization as crucial information-handling processes, and explores their implications for DE effectiveness. Discretization and hierarchization, as well as their implementation through classification, are applied in DE in a very wide variety of situations: rather than approaching them in concrete instances and proceeding to generalizations, this study is performed at the conceptual level.