ABSTRACT
This chapter intends to provoke discussions and reactions on a number of items relevant to GIS data visualization at multiple levels of scale. Some mapping agencies and commercial firms are now investing resources to implement automated or semi-automated generalization facilities. Issues relevant to graphical representations are well known to conventional cartographers. In geographical circles, people usually think of generalization as part of cartographic compilation whose purpose is to resolve legibility problems. The difference between the model view and the cartographic view of generalization is the possibility for database manipulation in the former case, independent of cartographic representation. The tools currently available for automated cartographic generalization resemble those of manual generalization. In this sense, efforts in the automatic domain are oriented towards the manual domain. The difficulties of providing a batch solution and the disappointment over the progress of the formalization of generalization knowledge have led some researchers to put their efforts towards the exploitation of interactive techniques.
