VISU. Il sistema informativo integrato sulle trasformazioni urbane di Venezia

Abstract

Studying and understanding the phenomena connected with the transformations
of a city means correlating widely different data. Organising the sources
into databases is a way to address the need to create new relationships and interconnections between them. Visualising historic cartography with GIS makes it possible to read the transformations in time and space, thanks to the georeferencing, comparison and subsequent editing of the changes that have occurred.
VISU, the information system used to study the dynamics of the transformations of Venice and its Lagoon, was developed to address these needs.
VISU was perfected using several technologies, including the alphanumeric database created with DB SQL Server, and the geographic one created with Arc-
GIS Desktop. In fact there are two integrated platforms: the browser, where
the sources are accessed and linked to the geographical objects; the GIS, in the
version created by the Default GeoDB, where the transformations are edited
and the time attributes of the shapes are compiled, to be used as filters to load
the DB Geolayer tables. This system makes it possible to link geographical data
(shapefile of a building) with data (texts and images associated with said building), which are in turn linked to the bibliographical or archival sources.