API integration for GIS and asset management | 360GEO

API integration for GIS, asset management and your own applications

However good a viewer is, the real work often happens in another system: an asset management package, an inspection application, a GIS environment or a dashboard. GEORIZON is therefore built API first. Everything you see in the viewer can also be requested through an open REST API returning JSON, from the capture stations along a route to the measurements and the objects extracted from the data. GEORIZON stays the source of the geodata while your staff carry on working in the environment they know.

An open REST API returning JSON, usable from any system or script
Request capture stations, measurements and detections by area or project
Authentication with tokens and permissions per project or user
No copy of the data required: you always query the current dataset

From a coordinate to imagery, measurement and object

The question most often put to the API is a simple one: what can be seen here. You pass a coordinate or an area and receive the capture stations nearby, with their position, capture date and a reference to the imagery. From an asset management package this lets you place a button on every object that opens the nearest capture at the right viewpoint, so staff do not have to search. The same route works for measurements and for the objects extracted from imagery and point cloud, so you can retrieve every detected traffic sign within a district, for instance, and compare it against your own records.

Integrating without creating a second set of records

The pitfall with integrations is that a copy appears which no longer matches reality a few months later. Because the API queries your tenant directly, you always work with the current dataset: process a new survey round and the same call returns the new imagery tomorrow, with the earlier capture still available as history. Permissions and access are arranged per project and per user, with tokens rather than open URLs, and through single sign-on or an on-premises deployment where the setup demands it. For bulk work, populating a register once for example, a download in common formats is often more practical; that route remains available alongside the API.

Alongside viewer, WMTS and download

The API is meant for system to system traffic and is strong at that, but not every question is an integration question. For assessing a situation the viewer works better, and for showing a map layer in QGIS or ArcGIS the WMTS service is the shortest path. Anyone wanting to process the source data themselves downloads a selection in formats such as LAZ or E57. Every route points at the same dataset in the same tenant, so no argument arises about which version is the right one. Organisations including ProRail (SpoorInBeeld), the municipality of Nijmegen and Kempkes Landmeten work with their geodata this way.