NSA was looking to develop a web-based advertising analysis application. The desired application, called iAnalyze, would be part of a suite of web applications and would be used both in-house and by NSA clients to perform geographic analysis in support of newspaper advertising decisions.

NSA had already developed the user requirements for the interface and the functionality that was necessary for the mapping portion of the application. NSA needed to have a consultant work with their existing developers and build a Web-based mapping solution into the application. NSA also required knowledge transfer of ArcIMS and ESRI technology in order for their development team to continue maintenance on iAnalyze and develop other tools and applications.

Great Arc performed development and integration services for NSA’s iAnalyze application. Specifically, Great Arc developed the entire web-GIS interface and GIS-related functionality for the application. The interface was created using ESRI ArcIMS and related technology. Great Arc also integrated the GIS interface with the iAnalyze business application functionality, assisted in the installation and setup of ArcIMS, SQL Server, and SDE, and assisted with the initial data loads.

Great Arc’s principal task was to take charge of the development of a GIS (ArcIMS) interface and the integration of its functionality with the remainder of the iAnalyze application. Functionality developed by Great Arc included:

• The creation of two thematic displays – one color, one hatch. The content of the thematics is selected using pick boxes.
• The ability to zoom to a user-selected mail code.
• The ability to add to the selection (mail codes, newspapers) by capturing all items within a circle drawn on the map or by individual selections. Zip codes are added directly through selections on the map, newspapers are added through additional screens as called through a map selection.
• Control of the data displaying on the map by zoom level, with some user control of these settings.
• The summary display, including total cost, of all mail codes selected by drawing a circle on the map.
• The display of store locations previously defined by the user.
• Turning on/off the display of this data happens elsewhere, with the map display refreshing to display the change.
• The ability to print the current map display, including the coverage keys if used.
• Options for displaying the map data based on circulation type.

Additionally, Great Arc dedicated ample time transferring knowledge to NSA staff. In a classroom-type setting, Great Arc described the various components of ArcIMS and how the components correlated with one another and with ArcIMS. Also discussed were issues such as the use of additional ESRI technology and the integration of this new technology with the iAnalyze application. The remaining transfer of knowledge took place during the course of the development. As Great Arc built and integrated the ArcIMS piece, developers from NSA worked with the Great Arc staff to understand the how and why of the technology.