November 2003

Thanks to the radar satellite data and some good software like Oziexplorer and Arcmap, it is easy to build at home the complex and sophisticated geographic database necessary to develop custom maps of the most remote and difficult to access region of the World. With Oziexplorer the digitization of a geographic element from a calibrated map or satellite image is a straightforward process. This programs allows the export of points and polylines as ESRI shapefile, a format accepted by almost every GIS software. Modern GIS software allows to create map in a fly, according to any possible existent datum or projection. In addition, GIS data (roads, populated place, cultural landmarks, etc...) are easy to found on the internet as freely downloadable data from a large variety of sources. Contours can be computed from the radar data by using a contour program allowing the export of vector data in the shapefile format (like the contour tool contained in Globalmapper) or by using the Mymap space-tools
In the 1934 the Captain Oreste Marchesi and his team of topographers from the Istituto Geografico Militare worked 8 months to compile a expedite map of the Jebel Uweinat (Gebel Auenat)massif at the 100.000 scale. The IGM team experienced extreme conditions; mapping in the deep heart of the Sahara with the technologies and methods of the year '30 is something that now is beyond imagination.  Notwithstanding the hard work and the skill of the Italian military topographers, the Oreste Marchesi's map is far from representing the real complexity of the Jebel Uweinat morphology as it is shown by the satellite images. It is clear that a lot of time are required to enter and explore every corner of this incredibly rough massif. Nowadays with a good PC and an Internet connection plus some good pieces of software, it is quite easy to build in a few minutes a very good map up to the 1:50.000 scale comfortably sitting on a chair at home.