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Exploring commercial catch: creating a responsive Florida fisheries web GIS using ASP.NET, the Esri JavaScript API 4.x, and Calcite Maps

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Exploring commercial catch: creating a responsive Florida fisheries web GIS using ASP.NET, the Esri JavaScript API 4.x, and Calcite Maps

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Exploring Commercial Catch:
Creating a Responsive Florida Fisheries Web GIS Using ASP .NET, the Esri JavaScript API 4.x, and
Calcite Maps

by

Philipp J. Conner

A Thesis Presented to the
Faculty of the USC Graduate School
University of Southern California
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
Master of Science
(Geographic Information Science and Technology)

May 2018

Copyright © 2018 by Philipp J. Conner

To my life long marine science lab partner and wife, Lacie
iv

Table of Contents
List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... vii
List of Tables ................................................................................................................................. ix
Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................... x
List of Abbreviations ..................................................................................................................... xi
Abstract ......................................................................................................................................... xii
Chapter 1 Introduction .................................................................................................................... 1
1.1. The Florida Fishery .............................................................................................................2
1.2. Regulatory Background ......................................................................................................3
1.2.1. Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Management and Conservation Act ............................4
1.2.2. Florida Trip Ticket Program ......................................................................................4
1.3. Motivation ...........................................................................................................................8
1.4. Application Description ......................................................................................................8
1.4.1. Intended User Groups ................................................................................................9
1.4.2. Study Area .................................................................................................................9
1.4.3. Example Use Cases ..................................................................................................10
1.5. Thesis Structure ................................................................................................................11
Chapter 2 Related Work................................................................................................................ 13
2.1. Web GIS............................................................................................................................13
2.2. Fisheries GIS and the Web ...............................................................................................18
2.3. Application Insight............................................................................................................20
2.3.1. Data Patterns ............................................................................................................20
2.3.2. Application Patterns .................................................................................................21
Chapter 3 Requirements ................................................................................................................ 22
3.1. Application Goals .............................................................................................................22
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3.2. User Requirements ............................................................................................................23
3.3. Technological Requirements ............................................................................................23
3.4. Use Cases ..........................................................................................................................24
3.4.1. Fishermen Use Case .................................................................................................24
3.4.2. Fish House / Processor Use Case .............................................................................25
3.4.3. Restaurant Use Case ................................................................................................25
3.5. Hardware and Software Used ...........................................................................................26
Chapter 4 Application Development ............................................................................................ 28
4.1. Application Flow ..............................................................................................................28
4.2. Data Processing .................................................................................................................29
4.3. Web Services ....................................................................................................................30
4.4. Esri JavaScript API 4.X ....................................................................................................31
4.5. Esri Widgets ......................................................................................................................33
4.6. Custom Widget Development ...........................................................................................33
4.6.1. Landings Species Year Widget ................................................................................34
4.6.2. Landings Over Time Widget ...................................................................................34
4.6.3. The Pounds, Trips, Value widget .............................................................................34
4.6.4. Introduction and About Widgets ..............................................................................35
4.7. ASP.NET Development ....................................................................................................35
4.8. Responsive Design ............................................................................................................36
4.8.1. Bootstrap ..................................................................................................................36
4.8.2. Calcite Maps ............................................................................................................37
Chapter 5 Results .......................................................................................................................... 39
5.1. The Menu Bar and Menu Panel ........................................................................................39
5.2. Application Controls .........................................................................................................40
vi

5.2.1. Species Landings by Year ........................................................................................40
5.2.2. Landings Over Time Widget ...................................................................................41
5.2.3. Pounds, Trips, Value Widget ...................................................................................42
5.2.4. Introduction and About Widgets ..............................................................................43
5.3. Use Case Results ...............................................................................................................43
5.4. User Documentation .........................................................................................................46
Chapter 6 Conclusions and Discussion ......................................................................................... 48
6.1. Use Case Results ...............................................................................................................48
6.2. Development Challenges ..................................................................................................49
6.2.1. Bleeding Edge Development ...................................................................................49
6.2.2. Deploying Remotely in a High-Security System .....................................................50
6.2.3. Module Conflicts and Versioning ............................................................................51
6.2.4. Rendering Values Across the Data Set ....................................................................51
6.3. Final Deployment Considerations.....................................................................................52
6.4. Alternate Usage .................................................................................................................53
6.5. Future Development..........................................................................................................53
References ..................................................................................................................................... 55
Bibliography ................................................................................................................................. 57
Appendix A: JavaScript Code ....................................................................................................... 58

vii

List of Figures
Figure 1. Red grouper adult (Epinephelus morio). Photo credit: NOAA ....................................... 1
Figure 2. Longline fishing vessels in Port Orange, FL ................................................................... 3
Figure 3. A Florida Trip Ticket, Image Credit: FWC ..................................................................... 5
Figure 4. The study area: The state of Florida .............................................................................. 10
Figure 5. The US Census Data Mapper ........................................................................................ 14
Figure 6. The Pinellas County GeoProtal ..................................................................................... 17
Figure 7. Essential Fish Habitat Map Application by the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management
Council .............................................................................................................................. 19
Figure 8. IMAS- Fish Application ................................................................................................ 20
Figure 9. Abstracted flow chart .................................................................................................... 29
Figure 10. Web service for the Landings Explorer ....................................................................... 31
Figure 11. JavaScript code sample of a table service join ............................................................ 32
Figure 12. User control logic within the map JavaScript.............................................................. 33
Figure 13. Landings Explorer on a Google Nexus 10 .................................................................. 37
Figure 14. Calcite Maps on a Samsung Galaxy S7 ....................................................................... 38
Figure 15. The Florida Landings Explorer ................................................................................... 39
Figure 16. The main menu, featuring the menu bar and panel ..................................................... 40
Figure 17. Species Landings by Year widget ............................................................................... 41
Figure 18. Landings Over Time widget ........................................................................................ 42
Figure 19. Pounds Trips Value widget ......................................................................................... 42
Figure 20. The introduction widget .............................................................................................. 43
Figure 20. Introduction widget ..................................................................................................... 43
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Figure 21. Average Red Grouper price in Pasco County for 2016 ............................................... 44
Figure 22. Dolphin fish (Mahi Mahi) landings in Duval County for 1995................................... 45
Figure 23. Golden Tilefish trips departing from Miami Dade County for 2014 .......................... 46

ix

List of Tables
Table 1. Sample Trip Ticket summary data .................................................................................... 7

x

Acknowledgements
I would like to acknowledge the outstanding support provided by Dr. Elisabeth Sedano and Dr.
Jennifer Swift while working on this thesis. A large thank you to Geographic Solutions Inc. and
the Seminole Tribe of Florida for working with me while I strived to complete this Thesis. I
would also like to give a special thank you to Dr. Jennifer Gage for not only her help with this
project but also her guidance and support throughout my entire graduate program.

xi

List of Abbreviations
ASP Microsoft Active Server Pages
ASP.NET ASP Application using Microsoft .NET Framework
CSV Comma Separated Value
FIPS Federal Information Processing Standard
FWC Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission
GIS Geographic Information Systems
IDE Integrated Development Environment
IIS Internet Information Services (a Microsoft web server application)
MS Microsoft
MSA Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Conservation and Management Act (1976)
MSSQL Microsoft SQL Server
NMFS National Marine Fisheries Service
NOAA National Oceanic at Atmospheric Administration
RDBMS Relational Database Management System
SDE Spatial Database Engine
SQL Structured Query Language
TFS Team Foundation Server
TTP Florida Marine Fisheries Trip Ticket Program
USCB United States Census Bureau

xii

Abstract
The state of Florida has access to vast marine life resources. The Florida marine commercial
fishery plays a significant part in the state economy. Hundreds of thousands of commercial
fishing trips occur each year totaling hundreds of millions of dollars in dockside value. Because
of the weight of the commercial fishery in the state’s natural resources, sustainable management
is critical. In 1976, the Magnuson-Stevens Marine Fisheries Management and Conservation Act
outlined a federal plan for the management of the United States marine resources. The Gulf of
Mexico Fisheries Management Council worked with Florida to develop the Florida Marine
Fisheries Trip Ticket Program (TTP), to fulfill the mandate to record all licensed commercial
landings in the state. TTP landings summaries are available to the public via a web application
hosted by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. These summaries contain a
wealth of data in tabular format.
This thesis aims to create a web GIS (The Landings Explorer) of the landings summaries
data, to increase accessibility and provide spatial and temporal insight to fishery stakeholders and
the general public. By creating widgets and user controls in the ASP.NET Landings Explorer and
the Esri JS API v4.x, a user is able to select any species and year from the landings summaries
data and render a web map with classes derived from each of the data attributes within these
summaries. The application strives to provide fishermen, seafood processors, restaurateurs, and
other stakeholders with insights about the commercial fishery to aid in economic and
conservatory decision making. By developing the Landings Explorer with the responsive web
frameworks, Calcite Maps and Bootstrap, the application seeks to allow users to access this data
on any internet connected device from dockside to the kitchen.

1

Chapter 1 Introduction
The state of Florida has some of the most beautiful and bountiful marine resources in the United
States, and their management is critical to the economic and ecologic future of Florida. The
Southern Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico are home to many species and specialized ecosystems
that provide a highly diverse fishery. It is because of this unparalleled marine habitat that the
commercial fishery plays a significant part in the state economy. One way Florida records the
productivity of its fisheries is through recording commercial landings, tallying the pounds of fish
caught at time of the vessel offloading. According to the commercial fisheries landing summaries
(the total reported poundage brought to shore), more than 380,000 commercial fishing trips
occurred in 2015, valued at over $244 million (all values in US dollars) (FWC 2016). Individual
catch yields for some species, like Red Grouper (Epinephelus morio; Figure 1) or Pink Shrimp
(Farfantepenaeus duorarum), can easily reach into the millions of pounds annually.

Figure 1. Red grouper adult (Epinephelus morio). Photo credit: NOAA
With millions of dollars and pounds of seafood at stake in Florida fisheries,
understanding the commercial impact can create informed producers and consumers, and
2

increase awareness of sustainable catch. The goal of this project is to create a web GIS
application to display commercial fisheries landings data to a wide range of stakeholders, across
multiple platforms. This chapter provides a background of commercial fishing in Florida, as well
as a brief description of the intended users of this project and the application development
process.
1.1. The Florida Fishery
Florida is not only home to one of the most populous commercial fisheries, but also one
of the most diverse. Small, flat-bottomed, “john boats” will prowl the inland waters for red fish
(Sciaenops ocellatus), while large, steel hull, long liners (Figure 2) steam out of a channel to
track swordfish (Xiphias gladius) in the Gulf Stream. Some vessels use nets (hand-thrown,
seined, or pursed) to catch smaller fish like Shad (Alosa sapidissima), Spot (Leiostomus
xanthurus), or Striped Mullet (Mugil cephalus). Spongers call Tarpon Springs home with a
unique blend of Greco-American maritime traditions. In the fall, stone crab season starts with a
series of festivals along the coast, powered by one of the nation’s only inherently sustainable
fisheries (a single claw is removed, the crab is returned to the water to regrow the lost claw).
Each of these fisheries has an economic impact in the state, and each has real people who depend
on these marine resources for a living.
3

1.2. Regulatory Background
The history of fisheries management is relatively young and can be complex, like most
environmental regulations drafted in the 1970s. With multiple stakeholders, including fishermen,
seafood processors, retailers, and restaurants, regulation is often a point a contention. This is
exacerbated by the fact that both the federal government and state government have a share in
the regulation of marine resources. Aside from commercial fisheries regulation, the recreational
fishery is also closely monitored and regulated. This subsection seeks to provide context for
regulation and management.
Figure 2. Longline fishing vessels in Port Orange, FL
4

1.2.1. Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Management and Conservation Act
Enacted In 1976, the Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Management and Conservation Act
(MSA), outlines a federal framework for the management of US marine resources. The MSA
mandates that regional councils oversee the conservation and regulation of the fisheries with
industry partners and management professionals. This management seeks to maintain sustainable
commercial fishing by developing stock assessments and providing scientifically driven catch
limits (U.S. Congress 1976, 2007). These regional councils are often comprised of multiple
states and coasts. Florida is no exception, with the Gulf and Southern Atlantic Councils working
with Florida to develop the Florida Marine Fisheries Trip Ticket Program (TTP). The Florida
Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) is responsible for collecting TTP records
and creating federal reports for the regional councils and National Marine Fisheries Service
(NMFS) of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). In part, the TTP
was created in order to fulfill the stock assessment mandate. While the TTP summaries provide
the greatest overview of collected fisheries data, other data contributes to the stock assessment.
This additional data includes fisheries biologists doing dock-side sampling, research cruises, and
contracted fishing, to name a few.
1.2.2. Florida Trip Ticket Program
Under the TTP, at the time of offload (landing), commercial fishermen are required to
complete a triplicate paper trip ticket (Figure 3). Traditionally the landing procedure is as
follows. The catch is weighed by individual species and is totaled. The seafood buyer, usually a
seafood processor (“fish house”) or wholesaler, then decides on a price, often informed by the
supply and demand of the species, and the going rate for the species. At the time of transaction,
the fisher and the buyer fill out the triplicate trip ticket in tandem, listing the species poundage,
5

time and gear fished, fishing area, landing location, and other fishing method data. After
completion, one slip is sent to FWC, and the other two to be retained by the captain (or vessel
owner if the captain is hired) and buyer, respectively. However, as more fish houses enter the
high-speed internet age, an electronic solution was added to allow the faster receipt of the
landings information. Currently, a desktop application, VESL, created by Bluefin Data manages
electronic reporting to state and federal agencies.

Figure 3. A Florida Trip Ticket, Image Credit: FWC
FWC offices receive the paper trip tickets monthly in batch alongside the data submitted in the
VESL DB. The trip tickets are tallied, and the data directly informs the population assessment,
which in turn impacts fisheries management through catch limits and moratoriums. Once are
certain poundage is met, the fishery may close completely prohibiting catch, or management
plans may be revisited.
The trip tickets contain the names of the owner and captain, the area fished, the price
paid, and the value of the catch. Due to the sensitive nature of the data, the TTP data set is
confidential. Some fishermen resent the data collection and management, citing it as a violation
of privacy. This is understandable as the trip ticket has financial information and geographic
6

information. While individual trip tickets are not publicly available, the trip ticket summary data
is available to the public and can be downloaded in a CSV via the FWC website (Table 1).

7

Table 1. Sample Trip Ticket summary data
Source: Florida Commercial Fisheries Landing Summaries
Year County Species Name Pounds Trips
Avg. Price
per Pound
(USD)
Est. Total
Value
(USD)
2010 PINELLAS SNAPPER, RED 185,846 526 $3.54 $657,130
2010 PINELLAS SNAPPER, SILK 15,494 38 $3.12 $48,347
2010 PINELLAS SNAPPER,
VERMILION
18,711 248 $1.96 $36,649
2010 PINELLAS SNAPPER,
YELLOWTAIL
212 17 $1.73 $367
2010 PINELLAS SPOT 437 18 $1.21 $531
2010 PINELLAS SWORDFISH 5,252 5 $3.17 $16,667
2010 PINELLAS TILAPIA (NILE
PERCH)
37,664 163 $0.58 $21,980
2010 PINELLAS TILEFISH
(GOLDEN)
12,233 23 $2.05 $25,133
2010 PINELLAS TILEFISH,
BLUELINE
(GRAY)
4,001 9 $0.91 $3,626
2010 PINELLAS TRIGGERFISH 2,393 155 $1.01 $2,427
2010 PINELLAS TUNA,
BLACKFIN
582 12 $0.68 $397
2010 PINELLAS TUNNY, LITTLE
(BONITO)
1,255 30 $0.63 $791
2010 PINELLAS WAHOO 688 15 $1.8 $1,238
2010 PINELLAS CONCH (WHELK,
HELMET)
312 2 $0.15 $47
2010 PINELLAS CRAB, BLUE
(HARD)
307,661 2,131 $1.58 $485,972
2010 PINELLAS CRAB, BLUE
(SOFT)
79 5 $9.14 $718
2010 PINELLAS CRAB, STONE,
JUMBO CLAWS
17,345 663 $12.18 $211,352
2010 PINELLAS CRAB, STONE,
LARGE CLAWS
76,912 1,771 $11.04 $849,341
2010 PINELLAS CRAB, STONE,
MEDIUM CLAWS
75,889 1,805 $6.82 $517,819
8

1.3. Motivation
After spending time with many parties within the commercial fishery in Florida, the
author believes that a way to intuitively display fisheries landings summaries should be
available. Some fishermen are not aware that these summary data exist, despite the very relevant
economic insights the data provides. The same can be said for the other interested parties:
seafood wholesalers and retailers, restaurants, and tourism interests. The federally managed
fisheries are always a hot topic dockside, considering that the economy of the fish itself passes
from the fisherman to the fish house, and then to the public via direct retail, or by restaurant
preparation. Each party has a valid stake in the management of the fishery, not only in its goal of
ecological sustainability but the fisheries’ direct economic impact. A dime less per pound of fish
can be significant when wholesaling thousands of pounds. Changes in the management of a
specific fishery can cause menu mainstay species to become rare, high ticket dishes. The
Landings Explorer web GIS application was created to aid in these kinds of situations.
The FWC website does provide the data, which means the requirement that the public has
access to these data has been fulfilled, but not the same regarding access to the insights within
these data. It is important that we provide a means to consume this data, both for economic and
ecological reasons. With the creation of the Landings Explorer, this project hopes to provide the
tools for enlightened decision making for stakeholders and expand education for the general
public.
1.4. Application Description
The Landings Explorer web GIS application allows users to dive into the complete TTP
landings summary dataset. The user is presented with a responsive ASP.NET (Microsoft Active
Server Pages with the .NET libraries) application. JavaScript user controls via the Esri JavaScript
9

(JS) API allow the user to alter the map in many ways. The user can interact with the map to
look at changes to catch over time, to see how catch has increased or decreased. This can allow
insight into impacts caused by events such as the Deepwater Horizon disaster, or a major
regulatory change. The user can also view the map from each species landed since the start of the
TTP, seeing how catch varies from species to species. There are also the inherent geographic
insights that come with a web GIS. A user can view regional fishery strength or the abundance of
a species with regards to an abiotic factor gradient, for example.
1.4.1. Intended User Groups
The commercial fishery has many different stakeholders that could benefit from the
Landings Explorer. The commercial fisher and wholesalers could both glean valuable economic
data from the application. The fisher could easily see where they could get the best price for their
fish or the wholesalers could find where they best profit could be made by viewing the same
prices. Those within the service and tourism industries can also benefit from the landings data, as
the rarity of specific species and price fluctuations can drive demand, and affect menu pricing.
The seafood consumers are also a targeted user group as they drive consumer demand for
fisheries products. For example, if one wanted to purchase spiny lobster, they may be able to find
it not only fresher but also cheaper in the southern Florida counties as opposed to where it would
need to be shipped to the panhandle. The application can also make certain regional products
easier to find, such as oysters in Apalachicola as opposed to trying to find them in Miami.
1.4.2. Study Area
The study area for this thesis is the state of Florida with its counties as the primary
division (Figure 4). Florida was chosen because of its large marine fishery, and the readily
available commercial landings data. The landings summaries are described by county, therefore
10

county municipal boundaries provided by the US Census Bureau (USCB) are the primary
divisions of the study area. Statewide data is available at monthly time intervals but was not used
because of the lack of area divisions. However, including state data is considered for future
versions.
1.4.3. Example Use Cases
The economics of a trip can be complex, including fuel, ice, bait, gear, provisions, and
other expenses. Most trips begin thousands of dollars in debt before catching a single fish.
Therefore, finding a good price for your catch can be the difference between turning a profit or
Figure 4. The study area: The state of Florida
11

not. Often fishers will call their regular fish house and see what the dock rate is for their catch
that day. If they do not like the price, they can take their catch to another fish house for a better
price. The maps in the Landings Explorer can be used to see how the paid price fluctuates
seasonally or spatially. A captain could quickly identify locations that may be having a shortage
of a certain species and choose to offload there to get the most out of the demand. Inversely, if
the fish house is short of a specific species, they may be able to determine where the bulk of the
catch is and call other fish houses in that area, if not the vessels themselves.
Seafood consumers and the service industry could use the application for different means.
Ecological and sustainability considerations are coming to the fore as understanding about
fisheries management grows. Many restaurants in the Tampa Bay area have had to change
signature dishes due to weak local catches or exorbitant price increases. A common phrase on
seafood menus is “Grouper’s Cousin.” This, often tilapia or other similar species has displaced
groupers in local fare due to rising costs and management impacts. The consumer or chef could
see how ecological or management events drive price over time. Landings Explorer can also help
these people find more sustainable alternatives to fish already being consumed.
1.5. Thesis Structure
The rest of this thesis is constructed from individual sections touching on different
aspects of the application, its conceptualization, and its development. In Chapter 2, relevant
literature is examined with parallels and inspiration being explored. Chapter 3 discusses the
application requirements, going into detail about the design and use cases of the application.
Development of the application is outlined in Chapter 4, with specifics about data sources,
architecture, and coding patterns. Chapter 5 displays the final application and discusses each
12

control in the application. Lastly, Chapter 6 discusses the conclusions of the project as well as
future development, hurdles, and a retrospective on design and development choices.

13

Chapter 2 Related Work
Utilizing a web GIS to display data for consumption is a relatively new idea in the lifetime of
GIS. A web GIS uses websites and other technologies to create an internet connected GIS. Often
times this consists of a client server interaction. Some early GIS web apps relied on now
deprecated technologies, while others are still in production today. With legacy technologies
falling out of favor and new technologies being developed constantly, the variety of web GIS
applications continues to grow. Just as web GIS technologies vary, so do their uses. Some focus
on educating a specific user group like drone pilots or school children (Blee 2016; Burrows et al.
2013; Kim et al. 2013), while others aid in decision making (Dowling 2014; Karnatak 2007;
Piarsa et al. 2012). Even a cursory glance at the work in this field shows that there are many
ways to solve many different problems, from leveraging existing enterprise packages to “ground
up” development (Dragićević 2004; Zavala-Romero et al. 2014). This thesis will provide a
broad, but detailed view of the literature related to this web GIS project in three distinct sections:
Web GIS Applications, Fisheries Management, and Application Insights.
2.1. Web GIS
Since the first web GIS was created by the Palo Alto Reach Center (PARC) in 1993, we
have seen an explosion of GIS applications moving to the Web (Kraak 2004; Fu and Sun 2011).
From county GIS portals to the Census Data Mapper (Figure 5), web mapping is quick becoming
ubiquitous in the GIS world. Everyday uses of the web are now featuring some form of GIS.
Shopping for a house (Dowling 2014), booking a hotel room, finding a local restaurant, and even
finding a date for Saturday night utilize the “science of where.” However, making things easy to
14

find or navigating on your vacation are just a couple of examples of the benefits provided by web
GIS.
There are many benefits to creating a GIS on the web. A web GIS application can be
deployed once, reach a broad public outside of the project’s locale, and can even be viewed on a
smart phone (Kraak 2004; Fu 2015). Simultaneous collaboration can be done with users with a
web GIS. Data sources can be kept up to date and can be accessed by disparate software and
languages. A web GIS data service can be written in a specific language on a specific operating
system (C# on Windows for example) and accessed by another application on a different
platform and language (Java on an Android device) (Fu and Sun 2011). A relatively recent use of
web GIS is in volunteer GIS (VGIS) (Fu and Sun 2011). VGIS combined with the web can allow
thousands of users to contribute GIS data freely in ways never before imagined. Professionally,
field surveyors can record data and upload to the home office on the fly via a cellular network
Figure 5. The US Census Data Mapper
15

without having to return home to copy and process their data. As technology moves forward,
new capabilities will continue to be developed and implemented.
Web GIS applications come in many different forms and can utilize many different
technologies. Some rely on large, proprietary software suites, while others choose open source
platform solutions. With many options available for the web developer, finding a web GIS
platform that fits the project needs is also easier than ever. Perhaps one of the most obvious
platforms to the average user is Google Maps.
Not only is Google Maps popular with the average user, but many developers have also
chosen this platform for web development (e.g., Blee 2016). For his Master’s Thesis, Blee
developed a web GIS powered by Google’s API to display drone regulatory areas with a MySQL
backend. Kamel Boulos (2005) used the same API to develop a web GIS that displayed strategic
heath authorities for the web user. In 2011, Kamel Boulos went on to even develop touchless
interfaces for Google Earth, adding even more depth to the Google Platform (Kamel Boulos
2011).
Another popular platform is the Esri ArcGIS API and ArcGIS Server (Berry et al. 2011;
Piarsa et al. 2012; Huang, Du, and He 2013; Norjou and Thomas 2016). The Esri platform
provides a front to back enterprise web solution, paring Microsoft or Oracle database
technologies with an Esri GIS server, managing multiple applications with a web GIS portal.
Berry et al. (2001) developed an Esri powered web GIS that combined government interaction,
VGIS, and 3D technology to drive community engagement in the planning process for wind farm
development. Others opt for open source solutions where licensing is a limiting factor or access
to the native source is required (Zavala-Romero 2014). Web GIS is now even available across
16

many diverse hardware platforms, and as with software, there are many choices with benefits and
shortcoming for each.
Developers can use Java to unify applications, not only across multiple platforms but
multiple hardware configurations. Your car can report traffic or emergency data to a Linux
server hosting Apache Tomcat, to be consumed by a mobile device running iOS. If a large
corporation has the Esri ArcMap suite already in their enterprise application stack, other Esri
software can be paired to streamline the workflow, minimizing effort in bringing data to a
production web environment. A startup with limited funding could go completely open source
and pair a QGIS desktop workflow with the QGIS server or a standalone WMS server to
minimize costs (Fu and Sun 2011; Zavala-Romero 2014). If one does not have the hardware or
infrastructure to host a web GIS oneself, one could always use one of the recent cloud platforms
like AWS (Norjou and Thomas 2016). Cloud solutions allow users to move their entire GIS
workflow to the web, from desktop authoring to python geoprocessing (Fu and Sun 2011; Norjou
and Thomas 2016). Another option is an enterprise GeoPortal. A geoportal is a website that acts
as an interface for web GIS applications, GIS web services, and other forms of GIS data. The
Esri GeoPortal bundled with ArcGIS Enterprise can handle user access, web application
development, interfacing with an ArcGIS server, and more. The one thing all these solutions
have in common is digital cartography on the web. These solutions are not just limited to
commerce and enterprise development, though.
17

Perhaps one of the most useful applications of web GIS is in eGovernment. eGovernment
is the modern movement from traditional paper means of government interactivity to building a
web presence to facilitate interaction (Fu and Sun 2011). This could be from renewing your
driver’s license on a Department of Motor Vehicles website to filing your taxes on line. GIS
powered eGovernment is relatively new, but continuously growing as the government is valuable
a source of information for all its constituents. In Pinellas County, Florida, this is especially true.
With growing concerns about climate change and increasingly intense weather events, The
Pinellas County Geo Portal (Figure 6) provides information about flood zones, hurricane
tracking and evacuation routes, and storm surge modeling.
Beyond environmental concerns, an eGovernment portal provides other vital services to
the taxpayers. The Pinellas portal provides county residents with crime maps, administrative
boundaries, parcel data sets, and aerial imagery; even a means to provide feedback on future
development (Berry, 2011). Developing a government geoportal is of great personal interest to
Figure 6. The Pinellas County GeoProtal
18

the author. Aerials can tell a story and highlight the history of an area. They can also show how a
road construction project is progressing. Parcel data can aid in neighborhood development, and
administrative boundaries can show which police force holds jursidiction where. eGovermnet in
conjuction with GIS portals have great value. However, the value of GIS in eGovernment does
not end here. Incorporating easily consumable fisheries data in an already existing eGovernment
platform is one of the major goals of this project. GIS services continue to be integrated into
eGovernment and will likely be for the foreseeable future.
2.2. Fisheries GIS and the Web
Existing fisheries applications are primarily the domain of regulatory agencies that have a
mandate to provide data services to the public. These applications focus on displaying maps
related to the fisheries, however the author has yet to find one that shares the fisheries landings
themselves. The Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council (GoMFMC) hosts a geoportal.
The GoMFMC geo portal hosts multiple individual mapping applications like the Fish Habitat
Mapper (Figure 7).
19

These applications display ecological data, highlighting areas of sensitivity of different species.
A future goal of this research is to incorporate this application within a similar geoportal or ASP
application, as visualizing multiple datasets on the same map can provide even more insight.
Other fisheries web GIS focus on a system for management professionals to enter, run models
and processes, and retrieve GIS Data. Kavadas et al. developed the IMAS-Fish application
(Figure 8) (Kavardas et al. 2013). The IMAS-Fish application was created for Hellenic Centre
for Marine Research to manage interdisciplinary fisheries data via a relational database
management system (RDBMS) combined with a GIS data portal. A relational database consists
of multiple tables joined together by a related field key. While this application focuses on aiding
the management professional, the Landings Explorer operates at a more modular level.
Figure 7. Essential Fish Habitat Map Application by the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management
Council
20

Figure 8. IMAS- Fish Application
2.3. Application Insight
2.3.1. Data Patterns
There are two main data patterns in modern web GIS. The first is to consume GIS data
inherent in the web application. This is exemplified by developing a web GIS with Google
technologies. The data is stored in Keyhole Markup Language (KML). This eXtensible Markup
Language (XML)-like dataset often exists in a file along site the site itself, though this can also
be consumed as a service. This leads to the second data pattern, consuming data through a
Representational State Transfer (REST) service. This provides the data on a secondary or tertiary
computer system that can act in an inter-operational way, meaning the data is served, decoupling
the data source from the web site host (Fu and Sun, 2011). In the case of ArcGIS server, these
21

REST services can even be supplied through a direct RDBMS query. The data can be hosted in
SQL for example, then queried by ArcGIS server, before offering the service to a browser on a
third client machine. Many RDBMS products are currently available. Some of the most common
options are Microsoft SQL (MSSQL) Server (e.g., Berry et al. 2011 and Dowling 2014), Oracle
(e.g., Kavadas et al. 2013), PostgreSQL, and MySQL. However, some GIS suites are limited to
the type of database that can be used. Esri’s ArcMap has significant support of SQL Server and
Oracle RDBMSs, but limited support for MySQL, for example.
2.3.2. Application Patterns
Application patterns can vary depending on users, use cases, and the data required. Some
web GIS applications require the ability to create new features (Kavadas et al. 2013). Other are
deployed to display data about a specific topic, and the user takes on the role of consumer (Blee
2016; Burrows et al. 2013). The application may not even require a local RDBMS, but rather
relies on consuming external web GIS services (Djamaluddin 2015). An application may be a
VGIS, collecting user-submitted data, and displaying the results as a community service,
meaning that the focus is on layer writability and QA/QC, paired closely with editable features in
a database. Others rely on web-hosted geoprocessors (Dragićević 2003; Huang, Du, and He
2013; Fu 2015).

22

Chapter 3 Requirements
This project seeks to provide an engaging, easy-to-use experience for fishery stakeholders to
view data from the Trip Ticket Commercial Fishery Landings Summaries. To ensure that this
overarching goal is met, multiple requirements have been chosen to help drive development and
user experience of the Landings Explorer application. In this chapter, four sections are provided.
The first section describes the overarching goals of the application. The second outlines the user
requirements for the application. User requirements lay out how the user will interact with the
temporal, geographic, and economic information of the data and features. They are enumerated
and tested via use cases. The third section describes the technological requirements. These are
points of determination for design strategies and development methodology, and include specific
coding, architectural, and database system considerations. The fourth section outlines the specific
use cases in the project. Lastly the hardware and software utilized are discussed.
3.1. Application Goals
The primary goal of the application is to allow the fisheries stakeholders to glean insight
from the landings data set in an easy-to-use web GIS, accessible from any internet connected
device regardless of physical platform (device) or operating system. Specifically, the commercial
fishing industry stakeholders are the fishermen, the seafood wholesaler or processor, the retail
seafood establishment owner, the restaurateur, and the seafood consumer. Each of these
shareholders can find value in different information, but economic information is of primacy to
all. It is with this in mind that the following requirements were identified.
A secondary goal of the application is to develop the application in such a way that it if
desired, could be added seamlessly to an Esri Enterprise GIS environment within a Microsoft
ASP.NET application. Many government agencies use an Esri Enterprise environment, with their
23

web pages being developed in ASP.NET. The technological requirements were chosen with this
goal in mind, making the Landings Explorer application modular.
3.2. User Requirements
The first requirement is that the user, regardless of the type of stakeholder, should be able
to control which map is rendered by selecting a species and year combination. The data spans
over 20 years and across more than 120 individual commercially regulated species, and the user
should be able to display any combination of these. Secondly, the user should be able to click on
a feature in the map (a county in this case) and display each field in the landings summary
dataset. The third requirement is that the user should be able select the data attribute within the
landings summaries to be visualized in the map. This means that different color schemes should
be selectable for total pounds caught, landing price per pound, number of trips, and total
estimated value of the catch.
3.3. Technological Requirements
The first technological requirement is that the Landings Explorer application be
developed as a ASP.NET web application, so that it may be modular for potential future
integration with existing server applications. ASP is a Microsoft server application that permits
the execution of server-side code. The .Net part of this technology is often a part of modern ASP
applications due to Microsoft interoperability and greater features. ASP.NET is discussed in
greater depth in Chapter 4. Currently, both the NOAA and the FWCC main websites are
ASP.NET applications. It is because of this that the ASP.NET application was chosen as the
server application.
The second requirement is that the application must consume REST services and that no
data be stored locally. This is to mimic a true web deployment in a high security high isolation
24

production environment. Third, the REST service must host the landings data and the county
layer. The application should utilize a table service from the ArcGIS server that was generated
directly from the SQL deployment. This requirement was chosen as it most closely matches the
data stream in a larger enterprise ASP application. It was also chosen because future
development could utilize direct SQL query services.
Lastly the application must be developed using Responsive design principles. Responsive
design is a way of building web applications that permits the web page to dynamically shift to
meet the dimensions of the screen being displayed. Using CSS classes and a responsive
framework like Bootstrap, the website reads the screen size then adjusts fonts, pop-ups, widgets
and other parts of the page to create a pleasing layout. This save the publisher from having to
develop a separate native mobile application or a separate mobile web page.
3.4. Use Cases
To aid in determining the success of the application, three use cases have been designed
to represent expected uses of the application by fishery stakeholders. These were selected to
provide a variety of users from the fishery stakeholders as well as questions asked and data
sought. The first use case centers around a fisherman trying to find the best price for his fish. The
second use case looks at a fish house looking for a species of fish its boats do not target, and that
they must import. The final case looks at a restaurant owner seeking to add a new species of fish
to the menu, but they would like to find something local that is affordable and also readily
available.
3.4.1. Fishermen Use Case
The first use case involves fisherman trying to determine the best county in which to sell
his catch. For this example, an independent fisherman is used, as contracted or “house”
25

fisherman would likely be obligated to sell at their dock of origin (if the fish house owns the
boat, it will almost always sell to the owning fish house). This fisherman will be searching for a
place to off load a catch typical to the bandit boat fleet of the western Gulf coast of Florida. This
catch typically consists of Red Grouper (Epinephelus morio), Gag Grouper (Mycteroperca
microlepis), and Red Snapper (Lutjanus campechanus). The figures examined will be for the
year 2015, as the fisherman is only interested in the most recent prices paid, and the county must
reside on the west Gulf coast of Florida. The geographic constraint in this example use case is
due to the cost of travel to offload a catch. It makes little economic sense to spend thousands of
dollars on fuel to start a trip in Tampa Bay to then sail all the way to Jacksonville in the northeast
corner of the state to offload the catch.
3.4.2. Fish House / Processor Use Case
This use case while similar to the above use case, could be considered the mirror
opposite. The fish house or processor is looking to secure Dolphin Fish / Mahi Mahi
(Coryphaena hippurus) for a client. As their hypothetical fleet lacks pelagic (open water, or
surface fishing) vessels, they therefore, must find a county where an affordable wholesaler may
be located. For this use case the year 1995 was chosen for variation. The fish house is located in
Panama City Beach in this example and is not limited by distance because this catch will be
transported by truck to their location, and the distance-based cost would be nominal. However,
closer would mean less shipping costs, and will be factored into their decision.
3.4.3. Restaurant Use Case
In the final use case is a restauranteur looking to add a new species of fish to the menu
and would like to see what the price and availability of a few species of fish within the county.
While they know that the prices in the Landings Explorer do not indicate the price they will be
26

paying for fish fillets from a seafood processor, they know that they are relative to the dock
price, meaning, in general, the pricier the fish at the dock, the pricier the fillets. For this use case
the restauranteur is looking at three species of fish: Atlantic Swordfish (Xiphias gladius), Amber
Jack (Seriola dumerili), and Golden Tile (Lopholatilus chamaeleonticeps). For this use case,
Miami-Dade County and the year 2010 were chosen.
3.5. Hardware and Software Used
The base GIS software used in this project is the Esri ArcGIS desktop suite. The project
initially was begun with version 10.3 of the suite, but now employs v10.5. The ArcGIS server
product is at v10.4 at time of writing. The ArcGIS JS API development began at version 4.1 and
is currently at 4.4.x. The data layer foundation of the software utilizes Microsoft SQL server
2012, with interoperability via SDE in ArcMap 10.5. The project IDE (integrated development
environment) and source control are provided by Microsoft Visual Studio Community 2015 and
Visual Studio Online - Team Foundation Server respectively.
To bring the application more in line with intended deployment scenarios, ASP.NET was
chosen to be the server application. Rather than handling functionality in traditional HTML, ASP
is “intelligent” enough to take a user input, process a response on the server itself, and return
dynamic content. ASP allows for functionality like password guarded sections of a site, user
account creation, report generation, and much more. This is the reason many large websites are
developed using ASP. The second half of this technology is the .NET framework. This Microsoft
developed framework allows greater interaction with other aspects of the Windows server
environment. Another useful benefit of an ASP application is that HTML can be dynamically
added.
27

For example, the current ASP application has a drop-down list for the user to select a
species to display on the map. This user control is currently hard coded with over 120 lines of
HTML markup, one for each species. This data could be retrieved from a SQL database tied to a
built-in ASP.NET list user control and populated dynamically, and is slated for future
development.
With the requirements and software described, the next chapter focuses on the
development of the Landings Explorer application. Specific sections are dedicated to widgets
and aspects of the application. Functionality of the application is also described and examples
from the code are used to illustrate the JavaScript patterns. Chapter 4 shows how all the pieces of
the Landings Explorer come together.
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Chapter 4 Application Development
This chapter discusses the development of the application, including design considerations,
technologies, and languages. Section 4.1 examines the high-level flow of the application and
goes into greater detail about the RESTful design pattern. The second section outlines the
specific software, platforms, and enterprise environments used while developing the Landings
Explorer. Section 4.3 is focused on data processing and preparation of the database. Section 4.4
goes into depth about the development of the web services and their consumption within the
application. JavaScript development with the Esri JS API is discussed in Section 4.5. Lastly,
ASP.NET and HTML development are discussed in the final section.
4.1. Application Flow
The application features RESTful design (Figure 9), meaning the application consumes
data through a REST web service. A REST web service is a data-providing endpoint that can be
called within the application to serve up data. In this case, the data served are the landings
summaries and the county layer. The data provided by the web services are formatted in JSON
(JavaScript Object Notation, a standard data transfer format often used by RESTful web
services) which is then used by the ArcGIS JS API to render the map with the attribute data. The
services are first created in the ArcMap desktop and published to the server. The data are
received in a CSV “flat file.” The data are imported into SQL server 2012; then a table is created
in ArcMap by using the SDE connection to the SQL server. The table and county shapefiles are
then published to the ArcGIS Server. This process creates the two distinct services described in
Section 4.4 Web Services. The map view is then created in the ASP.NET application and the
ArcGIS JS API is used to create a MapImageLayer from the joined services. This layer is then
added to the map view and displayed to the user.
29

Figure 9. Abstracted flow chart
4.2. Data Processing
Data processing completed for this project were minimal. For the application, the data
consists of all landings from the start of the TTP in 1984 to the last finalized annual data
committed in 2016 (FWC 2016). The landings data were imported to MSSQL as-is, so the
original data are served through the application. The county shapefile obtained from the USCB
had a single column added to unify the county name formatting between the two data sets to
permit the data table join explained in Section 4.5. On the front end, formatting was applied
using the built-in ArcGIS JS API formatting for specific map elements, in the popup template,
for example.
30

In a normal GIS enterprise environment, the attribute data would be stored within the
feature classes organized into feature datasets. With the Landings Explorer, the attribute data is
decoupled from the spatial data. Storing years of attribute data within a county polygon feature
class is an inefficient data storage methodology. The fact that the landings data is most likely
stored in a separate database within the FWCC system architecture supports this decision. This
data may not even be stored on the same server. Because of this reason, the application was
developed with decoupled attribute and spatial data. However, a web service could be published
with the relationship added between the landings attribute tables and the spatial county layer.
With fisheries data being constantly created, the RDBMS data source could provide
dynamic queries to provide the most up-to-date data as possible. If this application were to be
incorporated into a larger enterprise application, no underlying data structure changes would be
required. Rather a single updated query could populate the table service, or a direct query service
could be used to bypass the entire table service.
4.3. Web Services
The core of the application utilizes two distinct web services (Figure 10). First, by using
the Publish Web Service dialog, the USCB county boundaries were published via ArcMap. A
feature service was published for the county layer. Because they are a federal standard, the
included FIPS codes were retained.. Next, a table service of the landing summaries was
published with the entirety of the summaries being published together. To provide the attribute
data by county, the table service was then joined to the county service. More information about
the join will be provided in the following section.
31

4.4. Esri JavaScript API 4.X
The JavaScript API is at the heart of this application. The API consumes the web service
and renders the map, and offers functionality that may be utilized in future enhancements to this
project. Future uses of the API will be discussed in the results, Section 7.4 Future Development.
The application joins the landings data to the county shapefile by creating a MapImageLayer
with a dynamic data layer (Figure 11). A left join is done on county name, creating a one-to-
many relationship.
Figure 10. Web service for the Landings Explorer
32

Figure 11. JavaScript code sample of a table service join
A definition expression was applied to reduce the landings data set to a specific year
species combination, bringing the relationship one to one. Red Grouper and 2016 were selected
to be the default selection. The layer is only joined once and then updated as the user interacts
with the map and changes the species or year. The JavaScript waits for the layer to finish loading
then acts upon it (Figure 12). Future development may utilize jQuery for asynchronous handling,
but initial development was done without.
33

Figure 12. User control logic within the map JavaScript
4.5. Esri Widgets
There are a trio of built-in Esri widgets that were deployed in the project as-is. These are
the legend widget, the layers widget, and the print widget. These were included in the JavaScript
file by calling the module alongside the application’s other modules. These widgets worked out
of the box, with Calcite Maps / Bootstrap providing native support for styling. Calcite maps are
the respsonsive design frameworks used in the Landings Explorer and will be discussed more in
sections 4.8.1 and 4.8.2. The only manual coding required was defining the layer and legend
DIVs within the HTML and ASP pages. Calcite Maps handled styling by managing the CSS
classes. This allowed the proper theming, responsive behavior, and other functionality without
any additional coding on behalf of the developer.
4.6. Custom Widget Development
Aside from the built-in widgets described above, the remaining widgets were developed
as custom controls. The JavaScript event listeners and functional code were included in the map
JavaScript file. These widgets were created because the functionality desired had not been
developed for the newer version of the JavaScript API or were informational, and a widget was
34

needed to inform the users. The former reason led to the development of the Landings Species
Year widget, Landings Over Time widget, and time slider widgets. The introduction and about
widgets were developed for the latter reason.
4.6.1. Landings Species Year Widget
Perhaps the most important widget in the application is the Landings Species and Year
widget. This widget was the first developed. It is controlled by an event listener on the “query”
button. When the button is pressed, the species and year and pulled from the drop-down lists and
the definition query is updated. A JS function then refreshes the map with the new definition
expression is applied. The where clause of the query is static with only the new year and species
being dynamic.
4.6.2. Landings Over Time Widget
This widget was also developed as a simple JS event listener that would read the year
value of the selected year chosen on the slider and updated the definition query like the query
widget. The code used for both is almost identical, though instead of reading the year from the
drop-down control in the query widget, the slider widget year is read instead for updating the
definition.
4.6.3. The Pounds, Trips, Value widget
The Pounds, Trips, Value widget allows the user to change the visible renderer. Four
renderers were created, one for each of the data attributes in the landings table, except for
average price per pound (see Section 6.1.4 for more information). Each renderer was manually
created in the map JS file, by defining the class breaks for the data and the color values
associated with each. The pounds per trip renderer had field normalization applied, making it the
35

only custom attribute renderer, rather than a renderer from a native attribute from within the
table. The control was developed as a simple on off toggle. A series of If/Then statements checks
the currently selected rendered when the drop-down list is changed. The previous renderer is
removed from the map, then the selected renderer is added.
4.6.4. Introduction and About Widgets
The Introduction and About widgets are mostly informational. The Introduction widget
uses a generic widget template copied from existing widgets. As there is no interacting
functionality with the map there was not code hooks into map controls. However, there was the
need to handle opening and closing of other widgets. The widget required JavaScript code to
manage the opening and closing of the panels via button in each section. Since these are all
DOM objects with bootstrap classes, normal HTML link buttons could not be used.
Incorporating the JavaScript in the map file helped in minimizing control code in the front-end
HTML. The controls are event listeners that add and remove the collapse and open panel classes
tying directly into the built-in Calcite / Bootstrap functionality. The About widget is built in the
same fashion. Basic HTML tags were used in conjunction with the custom widget template to
create a list of items. Only the unordered list, bold, div, and paragraph tags were used. This is the
least sophisticated of the widgets in the Landings Explorer, requiring no JS at all.

4.7. ASP.NET Development
The application uses .NET framework version 4.0 and ASP.NET version 4.5. The map
view is a named HTML division (div) tag, where the division tag occupies all the screen space,
except the Calcite Maps menu bar and its related div tags. It is embedded within an ASP.NET
page as a standalone page, meaning the map view is the entirety of the APS page. Currently, no
36

ASP.NET user controls are used in the application as the JS code, and the built-in map widgets
handle all existing functionality, however greater ASP.NET integration is scheduled for future
development to allow the application to respond to changes in the dataset easily. The ASP
application works perfectly when run locally (on the author’s desktop), however also due to
security concerns, the application is not running on the USC Microsoft Internet Information
Services (IIS) server.
4.8. Responsive Design
Initially, a native Android application was considered for the Landings Explorer. Time
constraints and maintenance considerations led to a responsive solution to mobile development.
The proposed Android application would have been platform specific (Apple users would be
excluded from the mobile client) therefor responsive design would bring the application to all
platforms able to browse the web on a mobile device. Since the development of the native
android application would still consume the web services, no functionality was lost by moving to
browser-based clients. When Calcite Maps was found, the decision to develop a responsive
application was reinforced.
4.8.1. Bootstrap
Bootstrap frees the developer from managing CSS classes, some basic JS functionality,
and creating a specific theme for the application. This allows the user to focus on developing
map functionality without having to manage responsive media levels for example. In Figure 13
below, the Landings Explorer renders on a tablet with minimal issue out of the box. Normally the
developer would need to specify at what screen size the application would need to change layout
and format to better fit a smaller screen. The styling of the application was greatly enhanced by
the use of Bootstrap.
37

Bootstrap provides base classes for styling buttons and glyphicons as seen in the menu.
When creating a new panel, the developer does not need to worry about managing styling
through manual CSS, the panel classes can be added to a new panel DIV, and the panel now
inherits the panel styling. These classes control the background color, text color, font, heading
styles, and more automatically. From a development standpoint, it reduces CSS mark up in each
element as it exists in a separate stylesheet.
4.8.2. Calcite Maps
Calcite Maps is an Esri module that combines existing Dojo and Bootstrap functionality
in a single package. Calcite Map pairs responsive design with pre-styled templates for an out-of-
the-box web mapping solution (Figure 14). Classes are included for most currently supported
Esri widgets. A menu bar with a click out menu panel is also available. A simple 2D template
was chosen, as the design matched closely with the pre-development design. This also sped up
development by prepackaging this functionality, styling, and responsive design. It is estimated
that another six to eight months of development would have been required to incorporate the
Figure 13. Landings Explorer on a Google Nexus 10
38

functionality of Calcite Maps. However, Calcite Maps is very young in development, and
documentation can be difficult to find. Answers to questions can be found by contacting the
developers on GitHub or through Esri’s GeoNet.

Figure 14. Calcite Maps on a Samsung Galaxy S7
39

Chapter 5 Results
The application (Figure 15) has surpassed performance expectations, despite some setbacks,
which are outlined in Section 6.1. All of the requirements were met (Section 5.3), and at the time
of publication, the application remains functional, and not in danger of losing stability with the
next round of JS API updates provided by Esri. Multiple controls were developed to provide
functionality to the user. Each user widget / user control is discussed in the following sections
(Sections 5.2.1 through 5.2.4) touching functionality, code, and results of user interaction. Each
section highlights a part of the application, with the final two sections showing the results of the
use cases and user documentation, respectively.
Figure 15. The Florida Landings Explorer
5.1. The Menu Bar and Menu Panel
At the top of the application is the menu bar (Figure 16). This stretches across the top of
the application in both large screens and small screens. It houses the menu button, the application
40

title, and subtitle. This menu bar can be hidden by selecting the Full-Screen menu item, but it is
most often used to open the menu panel. The menu panel features a menu item for each widget
including the print widget. If the user closes a widget completely, they can be reopened from this
menu.

Figure 16. The main menu, featuring the menu bar and panel
5.2. Application Controls
The Landings Explorer consists of multiple widgets as stated previously, most with
custom development. These widgets combine custom controls and built-in Esri functionality to
create a web application that can display fisheries landings data in a meaningful way. Each
section below discusses the individual user controls within the Landings Explorer. These can all
be accessed through the Introduction widget or by the Main Menu.
5.2.1. Species Landings by Year
The Species Landings by Year widget allows the user to select a species and year from
the data set. The species and year are then “set” in the definition expression. While this works
41

well, there are cases where no data will display due to missing data for that species and year.
Results of using this widget can be found in use cases one and two (Figure 21, Figure 22
respectively). Additional development could allow this widget to gracefully handle the missing
data by displaying a popup modal or basic JS alert to the user, stating that there is no data for the
selected time and species. The data could be missing due to closure or a change in protection
status. However, data pertaining to management status is not included in the landings summaries.
5.2.2. Landings Over Time Widget
The Landings Over Time widget was also custom developed as no Esri time slider widget
had been developed at the time (Figure 18). By clicking and dragging the slider control in the
widget, the user and change the landings year in real time. This allows the use to quickly see how
the catch of a specific species has changed over time. This widget can also be susceptible to the
no data issue as mentioned in the previous section. The results of using this widget can be found
in the discussion of use case three (Figure 23).

Figure 17. Species Landings by Year widget
42

5.2.3. Pounds, Trips, Value Widget
The Pounds, Trips, Value widget provides a control to manage the map renders within the
application (Figure 19). By changing the drop down, the renderer will change in the map.
Renders for pounds average price per pound, number of trips, and total estimated value can be
selected. Each renderer features a unique color allowing the user to quickly identify the
difference between the renderers. By default, the first attribute in the table, Total Pounds Landed,
is selected. The application will show this upon initial load. The results of using this widget to
change the renderer can be found in section 5.3, use case three (Figure 23).

Figure 19. Pounds Trips Value widget
Figure 18. Landings Over Time widget
43

5.2.4. Introduction and About Widgets
The Introduction widget is a custom-made information panel designed to provide the user
with usage information upon first load. This widget has multiple sections describing each map
control in the application. A link is provided for each section that will bring the user right to the
selected widget. The About widget was built from the same template as the Introduction widget
however it was much simpler as it only contained text data and some headings. There are
sections introducing the author, this thesis project, the Florida fishery, contact information, and
data refences.

5.3. Use Case Results
In our first use case, a fisherman is looking for the best county to sell his Red Grouper,
Gag Grouper, and Red Snapper in the year 2015. For this use case, it was assumed that he was
Figure 20. The introduction widget
44

leaving out of Tampa Bay. By setting the species to Red Grouper and the year to 2015 and
clicking the search button in the Species Landings by Year widget, the map renders
appropriately; the user finds that Pinellas County is notorious for landing Red Grouper.
However, Pasco County, the next county North offered an average of $0.14 per pound more than
Pinellas (Figure 21). For Black grouper, this difference was $0.27. Lastly, Red Snapper was
$0.46 higher. Perhaps this trip the user will consider checking the prices in Pasco County.

Figure 22. Average Red Grouper price in Pasco County for 2016
45

In the next use case, a fish house in Panama City Beach was looking to source a few
thousand pounds of Mahi Mahi to be freighted in by truck. Using the Species Landings by Year
widget again, the fish house manager set the species to Dolphin (Mahi Mahi), and the year to
1995. The user was able to quickly identify that a lot of Mahi was being caught last year in
Duval County. Not only did Duval have a much larger portion of the Mahi Mahi catch then his
hometown in Bay County, it was on average more than forty cents cheaper.

The last use case centered around a restaurant owner looking to see the availability and
price of Swordfish, Golden Tile, and Amber Jacks. First looking at the Swordfish, they noticed
that there was not much catch coming to shore in Miami Dade. However, Broward County to the
North is consistently a high producer, dominating the landings almost every year. They also not
that swordfish can be a bit expensive. Next, they looked at Tilefish by once again setting the year
Figure 23. Dolphin fish (Mahi Mahi) landings in Duval County for 1995
46

and species. They then opened the Landings over Time widget, and found that Miami Dade has
very little catch, and by switching to the Trips render, they can see it is because there are few
trips for Tilefish leaving the county (Figure 22). Lastly looking at the Amberjack, the user notes
that while Miami-Dade sees few pounds crossing the docs, the poundage is greater than that of
the Tilefish, with a much lower price. With this knowledge, the restauranteur now has the
information they need to make the right decision for their financial and availability needs, though
all three of these would make a fine addition to any menu.

Figure 24. Golden Tilefish trips departing from Miami Dade County for 2014
5.4. User Documentation
The application handles the user documentation in the form of the Introduction widget.
Since there is no part of the application that can be customized by the users, standalone
documentation was deemed unnecessary. The Introduction widget handles the documentation of
the Landings Explorer application. Each widget in the application receives a section and an a
description of house to use it. Embedded within the documentation is a button titled “Take me
47

there.” This will open each widget when the user is done reading the instructions. The
instructions tell the user how to open the widget by means of the menu as well as the “Take me
there” button.

48

Chapter 6 Conclusions and Discussion
The application is successful in meeting all of the requirements outlined in Chapter 3. However,
this was not without significant challenges.
This chapter discusses successes, pitfalls and hurdles encountered during the
development process, as well as how to use the Landings Explorer as a module, other uses, and
continuing development. The first section discusses the substantial development problems
encountered. This section is broken down into subsections to provide finer detail about specific
development challenges. The second major section of this chapter discusses procedures for
deploying the landings explorer within in a larger enterprise application and system. Section 6.3
discusses other potential uses for the application which are not related to the commercial fishery.
Lastly, Section 6.4 outlines potential future development and a road map for achieving the next
version of the Landings Explorer application.
6.1. Use Case Results
The first use case was successful in that the fisherman was able to locate a better price for
his catch. The second and third use cases were also successful in that they were able to find an
affordable source of seafood for whole sale and restaurant. The application was responsive as
displayed in the web and mobile clients without a significant change in user experience. Multiple
renderers were included in the application, allowing the user to change the colors and the
attribute displayed on the map. While not currently deployed, the application is working in
ASP.NET, meeting the architectural requirements.
49

6.2. Development Challenges
As with almost all development projects, many challenges were encountered. Some were
caused by data limitations, some by the in-development technology used in the project. The
following section is divided into four sub sections each relating to a specific challenge
encountered while developing the Landings Explorer. The first section discusses the challenges
of being an early adopter and working with software which is still currently in development. The
second section discusses the challenges of working with a remote deployment situation. While
more often than not, sites are deployed remotely, the developer has the option to go physically
interact with the host machine if need be and had administrator privileges when working with the
remote system. Section 6.1.3 discusses software module conflicts and problems arising when one
module requires a specific version of a library while another requires a different version with
varying levels of module support. The final development challenges section discusses working
with broad data sets and programmatically representing those values.
6.2.1. Bleeding Edge Development
While staying at the fore of GIS technology can bring incredible functionality to an
application, there are some caveats. Often times the code is released to the public with features
incomplete or there is less support for specific functionality that was included in previous
versions. This was the case when working with the new Esri JS API v4.x. Some modules that
were released under the 3.x version of the API had not been developed for the 4.x version. One
specific example of this is the time slider.
A time slider widget module can be easily imported for time-enabled data sets in the 3.x
version. This has yet to see development in the most recent version of the API. It is likely that
development will occur in the near future, but at the time of deployment of the Landings
50

Explorer application, it has not been released. This required that a custom JavaScript solution is
used for time slider functionality. This came with some visual bugs in specific browsers like
Internet Explorer. While it does work the solution is not ideal, and future development will
include a redesign of the time slider widget.
6.2.2. Deploying Remotely in a High-Security System
Remote deployment of a project never seems to be without it’s downfalls. Licensing,
administrator privileges, and not being on premises all add to the difficulty of these types of
projects. The project was initially meant to utilize the now ArcGIS Enterprise SDE. This would
require secure account creation, so that database connections from the GIS server to the SQL
server would only have read permissions on the specific project database. This application was
developed utilizing the authors own account, which had much greater read and write permissions
within the project server. Utilizing the primary development account would have introduced
potential security flaws within the USC GIST network. SQL server account creation was not the
only roadblock in the Landings Explorer development.
Administrative access to the greater Windows environment through Active Directory
permissions was problematic. On the author’s local development machine, direct administrative
permissions are granted to run and configure IIS and the application. Lacking those permissions
on the remote server, the configuring IIS is not possible. The deployment workflow for this
project was: configure and test locally, deploy to IIS folder via FTP, load the site and debug.
When ASP errors were encountered, it was found that an IIS misconfiguration was the cause.
However, without administrative access IIS could not be properly configured. Other issues such
as ensuring the proper version of .NET, SSL, and other application configurations could also not
be remedied.
51

Local releases of the application work in ASP.NET without issue. However, due to the
aforementioned security issues, an HTML version of the application was created for final
deployment to the USC servers. Since there was no extra Esri SQL integration at the time of
development, the site can stand alone in an HTML page without issue. If greater ASP SQL
integration was required (for populating front end text, for example), SQL permissions and
connections would need to be developed in ASP natively.
6.2.3. Module Conflicts and Versioning
Perhaps one of the largest setbacks in unifying front end design in a satisfying and
pleasing way is version conflicts of required dependencies. Calcite maps require an in-house
custom version of Bootstrap to work. It comes packaged with Calcite maps and works well out
of the box with basic Bootstrap functionality. However, some functionality is missing from this
deployment version. While developing the Introduction widget, using a Bootstrap popup modal
was considered. However, the popup modal functionality does not exist within the Esri packaged
Dojo-Bootstrap. When trying to import a full version of Bootstrap, the modules and functionality
overwrite the custom Dojo version, breaking the built-in Calcite maps widgets, preventing the
opening and closing of the widgets. It was for this reason that the intro widget was required. The
information is not a nicely as displayed as possible, but it does work with the Dojo version of
Bootstrap.
6.2.4. Rendering Values Across the Data Set
With such a large dataset, dynamic renderers become relevant. If a single or a few
individual maps were published, then using the custom visualization and symbology are
perfectly fine. Each individual map can easily be symbolized to fit the range of the dataset. If one
was to inspect a Mullet data set, they would find the price range is very small, fifty cents to a
52

dollar in times of scarcity. Red grouper on the other hand routinely fetches a dock price of 3
dollars. On the far end of the scale, extra-large stone crab claws can reach fifty dollars a pound.
Since the entire data set ranges from cents to fifty dollars and up, we must stretch the class bins
($0 - $5.00, $5.01-$15.00, etcetera). This means subtle price variation within a single species
becomes unreadable, as most counties will fall within the same bin, despite the renderer spanning
the entire data set.
One way to handle these cases is to incorporate a third-party library to manage renderer
ranges. The data set could be parsed in JSON, and the minimum and maximum values are found
for the individual year and species. This could be taken a step further by adding classification
schemes like Jenks Natural Breaks. The limitation with the 4.x API is that the MapImageLayer
normalization does not exist. In the 3.x API, the user can use these normalization methods to
show quartile, natural Jenks, and more. IT is for this reason that the average price per pound
render was removed. The user can still click on the map and return the average price per pound
in the popup. Enhancing application handling of visualization is a high priority for future
application development.
6.3. Final Deployment Considerations
Final deployment into an enterprise solution would be simple. The web services could be
copied directly to a local installation of ArcGIS server. The data would be transferred within a
GeoDB via the service definition file. These self-contained definition files could then be
published to the destination ArcGIS Enterprise environment. If direct SQL access is preferred, it
would be at this time that the SDE connections would need to be created for the source
databases, then published as a query service alongside the rest of the application services.
Enterprise administrator permissions would be required, but tasks such as this should be easily
53

accomplished by the GIS Administrator. Deployment to an already existing ASP.NET
application would also relatively simple.
Incorporating the application in an already existing ASP.NET would be simple as the
map DIV can be added as a stand-alone page, making the application “plug and play” from a
front-end view. Embedding the DIV is also simple, through the additional HTML and includes
would need to be migrated from the Landings Explorer page to the intended parent page. Paths
for local files would need to be altered to point at the new location of the resources.
6.4. Alternate Usage
Other data could be used in the Landings Explorer with a time series. Ideally, this would
be through an Enterprise SDE environment. Data such as distribution of sales of a specific item
over time or almost any demographic data could easily fit into the application. Changes to
service pointing, layer creation, and renderer class breaks configuration could be made to match
the application to the data. Any flat, time series data source could be used. Demographic or
Census information could be displayed, though high geographic data resolution, such as census
tracts, might require a data architecture to properly implement with acceptable response times.
6.5. Future Development
The Landings Explorer is a living application, at least for the foreseeable future. Since
there are no real production requirements at the time of publishing, development can continue
without a deployment schedule or deadlines to meet. With most living applications, development
will continue to improve on existing functionality, while incorporating new features as they
become available (from the JS API 4.x for example). There are some notable future development
considerations.
54

A redesign of the time slider widget is of high priority. The goal of this development
would be to either incorporate a new widget or to add data result handling to alert the user in the
case of no data. Unification of styling across all browsers would also be done. 3D development is
also considered. The calcite maps theme already supports incorporating the menu into a 2D/3D
switchable application. However, 3D maps do not currently work on the mobile browsers. The
MapImageLayer is also not supported in 3D maps at the time of publication.

55

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Kamel Boulos, Maged N. 2005. “Editorial: Web GIS in Practice III: Creating a Simple
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57

Bibliography
Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWCC). Commercial Fisheries Landings
1984 - 2015, 2016. https://public.myfwc.com/FWRI/PFDM/ReportCreator.aspx, Last
retrieved 06/02/2017.

94
th
U.S. Congress. 1976 “Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act
(MSA).”, Public Law 94-256, 109-479 (Reauthorized 2007)

U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census (USCB). Cartographic Boundary
Shapefiles, 2015.
http://www2.census.gov/geo/tiger/GENZ2015/shp/cb_2015_us_county_500k.zip,
Last retrieved 11/28/2016.

58

Appendix A: JavaScript Code
//##########################
// File Name: landingsMap.js
// Purpose: This is the main javascript file for the Landings Explorer //
application.
// Author: Philipp Conner
// Last Edited: 12/16/2017
// Contact Email: pjconner@usc.edu
// Based on original code
//##########################

require([
"esri/Map",
"esri/views/MapView",
"esri/widgets/Search",
"esri/widgets/Popup",
"dojo/query",
"esri/layers/MapImageLayer",
"esri/layers/FeatureLayer",
"esri/layers/TileLayer",
"esri/renderers/SimpleRenderer",
"esri/renderers/ClassBreaksRenderer",
"esri/symbols/SimpleFillSymbol",
"esri/widgets/Legend",
"esri/widgets/LayerList",
"esri/widgets/Print",
"esri/widgets/ScaleBar",
"dojo/dom",
"dojo/on",
"dojo/number",

// Bootstrap
"bootstrap/Collapse",
"bootstrap/Dropdown",

// Calcite Maps
"calcite-maps/calcitemaps-v0.3",

"dojo/domReady!"
], function (Map, MapView, Search, Popup, query, MapImageLayer, FeatureLayer,
TileLayer, SimpleRenderer, ClassBreaksRenderer, SimpleFillSymbol, Legend,
LayerList, Print, ScaleBar, dom, on, number) {

// helper function to create a symbol
function createSymbol(color) {
return new SimpleFillSymbol({
color: color,
outline: {
width: 0.5,
color: [255, 255, 255, 0.4]
},
style: "solid"
59

})
}

var defaultSym = new SimpleFillSymbol({
outline: {
color: "darkgray",
width: "0.5"
}
})

/******************************************************************
*
* Create the map, view and widgets
*
******************************************************************/
// Map
var map = new Map({
basemap: "dark-gray",
});

// View
var mapView = new MapView({
container: "mapViewDiv",

map: map,
center: [-82, 28],
zoom: 7,
padding: {
top: 50,
bottom: 0
},
breakpoints: {
xsmall: 768,
small: 769,
medium: 992,
large: 1200
},
constraints: {
rotationEnabled: false
}
});

// Search - add to navbar
var searchWidget = new Search({
view: mapView
}, "searchWidgetDiv");

// Change basemaps with panel
query("#selectBasemapPanel").on("change", function(e) {
mapView.map.basemap = e.target.value;
});

/******************************************************************
*
60

* Create Layers
*
******************************************************************/

function createCountiesLayer() {

var countiesfl = new FeatureLayer({
url: "https://gis-server-
02.usc.edu:6443/arcgis/rest/services/pjconner/fisheriesLandings/MapServer/33"
,
title: "County Boundaries"
});
return countiesfl;
}

function createTerritorialSeaLayer() {

var territorialSeafl = new FeatureLayer({
url:
"https://maritimeboundaries.noaa.gov/arcgis/rest/services/MaritimeBoundaries/
US_Maritime_Limits_Boundaries/MapServer/1",
title: "12 NM Territorial Sea",
visible: false
});
return territorialSeafl;
}

function createEEZLayer() {

var eEZfl = new FeatureLayer({
url:
"https://maritimeboundaries.noaa.gov/arcgis/rest/services/MaritimeBoundaries/
US_Maritime_Limits_Boundaries/MapServer/3",
title: "200NM EEZ and Maritime Boundaries",
visible: false
});
return eEZfl;
}

function createLandingsLayer() {
var landingsLayer = new MapImageLayer({
title: "TTP Landings 1984-2016",
url: "https://gis-server-
02.usc.edu:6443/arcgis/rest/services/pjconner/fl_landings_annual/MapServer",
sublayers: [{
title: "Total Pounds Landed",
visible: true,
renderer: createPoundsRenderer(),
outfields: ["*"],
id: 0,
opacity: 0.75,
source: {
type: "data-layer",
dataSource: {
type: "join-table",
leftTableSource: {
type: "map-layer",
61

mapLayerId: 0
},
rightTableSource: {
type: "data-layer",
dataSource: {
type: "table",
workspaceId: "landingsGDB",
dataSourceName: "annual_landings",
oidFields: "OBJECTID"
}
},
leftTableKey: "NAME",
rightTableKey: "County",
joinType: "left-outer-join"
}
},

popupTemplate: {
title: "{annual_landings.County}, County",
content: [{
type: "fields",
fieldInfos: [
{
fieldName: "annual_landings.Year",
label: "Landing Year",
visible: true,
format: {
digitSeparator: false,
places: 0
}
}, {
fieldName: "annual_landings.Species",
label: "Species",
visible: true,
}, {
fieldName: "annual_landings.County",
label: "County Landed",
visible: true,
}, {
fieldName: "annual_landings.Pounds",
label: "Total Pounds Landed",
visible: true,
format: {
digitSeparator: true,
places: 0
}
}, {
fieldName: "annual_landings.Trips",
label: "No. of Trips",
visible: true,
format: {
digitSeparator: false,
places: 0
}
}, {
fieldName: "annual_landings.Avg_Price",
label: "Average Dock Price (USD)",
62

visible: true,
format: {
digitSeparator: true,
places: 2
}
}, {
fieldName: "annual_landings.Est_Value",
label: "Estimated Value (USD)",
visible: true,
format: {
digitSeparator: true,
places: 0
}
}]

}]
}
}]
});
return landingsLayer;
}

/*****************************************************************
* Create renderers for each attribute: pounds, trips, avgprice,
totalval
*****************************************************************/
//Pounds Renderer
function createPoundsRenderer() {
var poundsRenderer = new ClassBreaksRenderer({
title: "Percentage of total Annual Catch for
{annual_landings.Species}",
field: "annual_landings.Pounds",
legendOptions: {
title: "Total Pounds Landed of {annual_landings.Species}"
},
classBreakInfos: [{
minValue: 0,
maxValue: 2500,
symbol: createSymbol("#0080E1"),
label: "0 - 2,500 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 2501,
maxValue: 10000,
symbol: createSymbol("#336CB4"),
label: "2,501-10,000 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 10001,
maxValue: 50000,
symbol: createSymbol("#665987"),
label: "10,001 - 50,000 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 50001,
maxValue: 100000,
symbol: createSymbol("#99465A"),
label: "50,001 - 100,000 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 100001,
63

maxValue: 500000,
symbol: createSymbol("#CC332D"),
label: "100,000 - 500,000 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 500001,
maxValue: 5000000,
symbol: createSymbol("#FF2000"),
label: "500,001 - 5,000,000 lbs"
}]
});
return poundsRenderer;
}
//Pounds per Trip Renderer
function createPPTRenderer() {
var pptRenderer = new ClassBreaksRenderer({
field: "annual_landings.Pounds",
normalizationField: "annual_landings.Trips",
normalizationType: "field",
legendOptions: {
title: "Average Pounds Landed per Trip"
},
classBreakInfos: [{
minValue: 0,
maxValue: 250,
symbol: createSymbol("#0080E1"),
label: "0 - 250 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 251,
maxValue: 500,
symbol: createSymbol("#336CB4"),
label: "251-500 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 501,
maxValue: 1000,
symbol: createSymbol("#665987"),
label: "501 - 1000 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 1001,
maxValue: 2500,
symbol: createSymbol("#99465A"),
label: "1001 - 2500 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 2501,
maxValue: 5000,
symbol: createSymbol("#CC332D"),
label: "2501 - 5000 lbs"
}, {
minValue: 5000,
maxValue: 20000,
symbol: createSymbol("#FF2000"),
label: "> 5000 lbs"
}]
});
return pptRenderer;
}

//Number of Trips Renderer
64

function createTripsRenderer() {
var tripsRenderer = new ClassBreaksRenderer({
field: "annual_landings.Trips",
legendOptions: {
title: "Number of Trips Annually"
},
classBreakInfos: [{
minValue: 0,
maxValue: 10,
symbol: createSymbol("#CAF2FE"),
label: "0 - 10 Trips"
}, {
minValue: 10,
maxValue: 25,
symbol: createSymbol("#A1E9FE"),
label: "10-25 Trips"
}, {
minValue: 26,
maxValue: 100,
symbol: createSymbol("#79E0FE"),
label: "26 - 100 Trips"
}, {
minValue: 101,
maxValue: 250,
symbol: createSymbol("#50D8FE"),
label: "101 - 250 Trips"
}, {
minValue: 251,
maxValue: 500,
symbol: createSymbol("#28CFFE"),
label: "251 - 500 Trips"
}, {
minValue: 501,
maxValue: 2000,
symbol: createSymbol("#00C7FF"),
label: "501 - 2000 Trips"
}]
});
return tripsRenderer;
}

//Average Price Renderer
function createPriceRenderer() {
var priceRenderer = new ClassBreaksRenderer({
field: "annual_landings.Avg_Price",
legendOptions: {
title: "Average Price Per Pound"
},
classBreakInfos: [{
minValue: 0,
maxValue: 1.00,
symbol: createSymbol("#F4ED01"),
label: "0 - $1.00"
}, {
minValue: 1.01,
maxValue: 2.50,
symbol: createSymbol("#F6F025"),
65

label: "$1.01 - $2.50"
}, {
minValue: 2.51,
maxValue: 5.00,
symbol: createSymbol("#F8F349"),
label: "$2.51 - $5.00"
}, {
minValue: 5.01,
maxValue: 10.00,
symbol: createSymbol("#FAF66D"),
label: "$5.01 - $10.00"
}, {
minValue: 10.01,
maxValue: 20.00,
symbol: createSymbol("#FCF991"),
label: "$10.01 - $20.00"
}, {
minValue: 20.01,
maxValue: 50.00,
symbol: createSymbol("#FFFCB5"),
label: "$20.01 - $50.00"
}]
});
return priceRenderer;
}

//Estimated Value Renderer
function createValueRenderer() {
var valueRenderer = new ClassBreaksRenderer({
field: "annual_landings.Est_Value",
legendOptions: {
title: "Total Catch Est. Value (USD)"
},

classBreakInfos: [{
minValue: 0,
maxValue: 2500,
symbol: createSymbol("#FFFCB5"),

label: "$0 - $2,500"
}, {
minValue: 2501,
maxValue: 10000,
symbol: createSymbol("#FCF991"),

label: "$2,501-$10,000"
}, {
minValue: 10001,
maxValue: 50000,
symbol: createSymbol("#FAF66D"),
label: "$10,001 - $50,000"
}, {
minValue: 50001,
maxValue: 100000,
symbol: createSymbol("#F8F349"),
label: "$50,001 - $100,000"
}, {
66

minValue: 100001,
maxValue: 500000,
symbol: createSymbol("#F6F025"),
label: "$100,000 - $500,000"
}, {
minValue: 500001,
maxValue: 10000000,
symbol: createSymbol("#F4ED01"),
label: "$500,001 - $5,000,000 "
}]
});
return valueRenderer;
}

//###############################################################
//
// Exec Layer Creates and add to map with initial definitions
//
//###############################################################
var landingsLayer = createLandingsLayer()

var landingSublayer = landingsLayer.sublayers.find(function (sublayer) {
return sublayer.id === 0 ;
});

landingSublayer.definitionExpression = "Year = 2016 AND Species =
'GROUPER, RED'"

landingSublayer.renderer = createPoundsRenderer();

mapView.map.add(landingsLayer);
mapView.map.add(createCountiesLayer());
mapView.map.add(createTerritorialSeaLayer());
mapView.map.add(createEEZLayer());

//Timeslider Listener
landingsLayer.then(function () {
var slider = document.querySelector(".timeslider");
var year = document.querySelector(".year");
on(slider, "change", function () {
var species = document.getElementById("selectQuerySpecies");
landingSublayer.definitionExpression = "Year = " + slider.value + "
AND Species = '" +species.options[species.selectedIndex].value + "'";
});
on(slider, "input", function() {
year.innerText = number.format(parseInt(slider.value), { pattern:
"0000" });
});
});

//Renderer Listener
landingsLayer.then(function () {
var rendererSel = document.getElementById("selectRenderer");

on(rendererSel, "change", function () {
67

var rendererVal =
rendererSel.options[rendererSel.selectedIndex].value;
landingSublayer.renderer = null;
var newRenderer;
switch (rendererVal) {
case "poundsRenderer":
newRenderer = createPoundsRenderer();
break;
case "pptRenderer":
newRenderer = createPPTRenderer();
break;
case "tripsRenderer":
newRenderer = createTripsRenderer();
break;
case "valueRenderer":
newRenderer = createValueRenderer();
break;
}

landingSublayer.renderer = newRenderer;
});
});

//Query Handling
document.getElementById("queryButton").addEventListener("click", function
() {
updateQuery();
});

function updateQuery() {

var species = document.getElementById("selectQuerySpecies");
var speciesVal = species.options[species.selectedIndex].value;

var year = document.getElementById("selectQueryYear");
var yearVal = year.options[year.selectedIndex].value

landingSublayer.definitionExpression = "Year = " + yearVal + " AND
Species = '" + speciesVal + "'";
};

//Introduction Help buttons
document.getElementById("queryHelpButton").addEventListener("click",
function () {
helpButton("#panelQuery", "#collapseQuery")
});

document.getElementById("renderHelpButton").addEventListener("click",
function () {
helpButton("#panelRenderer", "#collapseRenderer")
});

document.getElementById("timeHelpButton").addEventListener("click",
function () {
helpButton("#panelTimeSlider", "#collapseTimeSlider")
});

68

document.getElementById("layerHelpButton").addEventListener("click",
function () {
helpButton("#panelLayers", "#collapseLayers")
});

document.getElementById("legendHelpButton").addEventListener("click",
function () {
helpButton("#panelLegend", "#collapseLegend")
});

document.getElementById("basemapHelpButton").addEventListener("click",
function () {
helpButton("#panelBasemaps", "#collapseBasemaps")
});

document.getElementById("aboutHelpButton").addEventListener("click",
function () {
helpButton("#panelAbout", "#collapseAbout")
});

function helpButton(targetPanel, collapsePanel) {

//Toggle the info panel as well as the collapbable div
query("#panelInfo").collapse("toggle");
query("#collapseInfo").collapse("toggle");

// Toggle target panel to show and expand
query(targetPanel).collapse("toggle");
query(collapsePanel).collapse("toggle");

};

//###############################################################
// End Time Slider Playback
//###############################################################

// Legend
var legendWidget = new Legend({
container: "legendWidgetDiv",
view: mapView
});

var legend = new Legend({
view: mapView
});
mapView.ui.add(legend, "bottom-left")

// LayerList
var layerWidget = new LayerList({
container: "layersDiv",
view: mapView
});

// Print
var printWidget = new Print({
container: "printDiv",
69

view: mapView,
printServiceUrl:
"https://utility.arcgisonline.com/arcgis/rest/services/Utilities/PrintingTool
s/GPServer/Export%20Web%20Map%20Task"
});

// Scalebar
var scaleBar = new ScaleBar({
view: mapView,

});

mapView.ui.add(scaleBar, {
style: "ruler",
position: "bottom-left"
});

/******************************************************************
*
* Synchronize popup and Bootstrap panels
* Code modified from Calcite Maps – 2017
*
******************************************************************/

// Popup - dock top-right desktop, bottom for mobile
mapView.watch("widthBreakpoint", function(breakPoint){
if (breakPoint === "medium" || breakPoint === "large" || breakPoint ===
"xlarge") {
mapView.popup.dockOptions.position = "top-right";
} else {
mapView.popup.dockOptions.position = "bottom-center";
}
});

// Popup - show/hide panels when popup is docked
mapView.popup.watch(["visible", "currentDockPosition"], function(){
var docked = mapView.popup.visible &&
mapView.popup.currentDockPosition;
if (docked) {
query(".calcite-panels").addClass("invisible");
} else {
query(".calcite-panels").removeClass("invisible");
}
});

// Panels - undock popup when panel shows
query(".calcite-panels .panel").on("show.bs.collapse", function(e) {
if (mapView.popup.currentDockPosition) {
mapView.popup.dockEnabled = false;
}
});

});

Abstract (if available)

Abstract The state of Florida has access to vast marine life resources. The Florida marine commercial fishery plays a significant part in the state economy. Hundreds of thousands of commercial fishing trips occur each year totaling hundreds of millions of dollars in dockside value. Because of the weight of the commercial fishery in the state’s natural resources, sustainable management is critical. In 1976, the Magnuson-Stevens Marine Fisheries Management and Conservation Act outlined a federal plan for the management of the United States marine resources. The Gulf of Mexico Fisheries Management Council worked with Florida to develop the Florida Marine Fisheries Trip Ticket Program (TTP), to fulfill the mandate to record all licensed commercial landings in the state. TTP landings summaries are available to the public via a web application hosted by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. These summaries contain a wealth of data in tabular format. ❧ This thesis aims to create a web GIS (The Landings Explorer) of the landings summaries data, to increase accessibility and provide spatial and temporal insight to fishery stakeholders and the general public. By creating widgets and user controls in the ASP.NET Landings Explorer and the Esri JS API v4.x, a user is able to select any species and year from the landings summaries data and render a web map with classes derived from each of the data attributes within these summaries. The application strives to provide fishermen, seafood processors, restaurateurs, and other stakeholders with insights about the commercial fishery to aid in economic and conservatory decision making. By developing the Landings Explorer with the responsive web frameworks, Calcite Maps and Bootstrap, the application seeks to allow users to access this data on any internet connected device from dockside to the kitchen.

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Asset Metadata

Creator Conner, Philipp Joseph (author)

Core Title Exploring commercial catch: creating a responsive Florida fisheries web GIS using ASP.NET, the Esri JavaScript API 4.x, and Calcite Maps

School College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

Degree Master of Science

Degree Program Geographic Information Science and Technology

Publication Date 02/23/2018

Defense Date 12/11/2017

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag Esri,fisheries,GIS,Javascript,OAI-PMH Harvest,responsive design,WebGIS

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Sedano, Elisabeth (committee chair), Swift, Jennifer (committee member), Wu, An-Min (committee member)

Creator Email philippconner@gmail.com,pjconner@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c40-478175

Unique identifier UC11266875

Identifier etd-ConnerPhil-6058.pdf (filename),usctheses-c40-478175 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-ConnerPhil-6058.pdf

Dmrecord 478175

Document Type Thesis

Rights Conner, Philipp Joseph

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA