ABSTRACT
Sharing spatial information across agencies, regions and scales is governed by the interaction of behavioural and technical 'catalysts' and 'inhibitors': widearea networks and communications standards, incomplete data directories and semantic incompatibilities, as well as bureaucratic, institutional and legal forces. Information sharing is an active research topic not only in environmental science and geographic information systems, but also in organizational analysis, library science, computer hardware and software, and database management systems. Many findings from these fields are applicable to the sharing of spatial and environmental information among government agencies. The author evaluates existing software tools that address technical and organizational issues in concert (network browsers, data repositories and composite information systems), and recommends developing advanced network tools for sharing spatial information, creating a dynamic human and technical infrastructure, and collaborating with specialists in database management and computer-aided software engineering.
