Open Data on AWS benefits

Hopefully, this chapter has provided you with some tangible examples of how Open Data on AWS can enrich your GIS ecosphere. Store once, use many is a pattern that works well in the cloud and results in dramatic reductions in cost and wait times for large geoprocessing workflows.

Using Amazon Workspaces, you can launch a virtual desktop in the same AWS Region as your data for a low-latency geospatial workstation. The chatty network nature of many popular GIS desktop tools is latency-sensitive and performs best when the software is close to the data. Less time watching screen refreshes means more time drawing insights out of your geospatial data.

You can run those massive compute transformations during small windows, knowing that the scale and elasticity of AWS will ensure your process completes. Replications to other Regions can be added where global latency constraints arise. The scale and functionality of the AWS global infrastructure grows as does...