This CD contains refereed and revised papers presented at GEOPRO 2003, the International Workshop on Semantic Processing of Spatial Data, which took place in Mexico City, Mexico, 4-5 November 2003. Semantic processing of spatial data is an emerging area of Geomatics that focuses on representation and use of knowledge to support (semi) automatic Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Due to the growing demand for both interactive and automatic intelligent GIS, the field of semantic processing of spatial data has an exciting and promising future. The GEOPRO workshop is relatively small but unique Geomatics forum that exclusively concerns with this topic in the fields of raster to vector conversion, map generalization, image interpretation, spatial databases, and GIS applications. Excellent keynote speakers are another peculiarity of GEOPRO. We believe that the appearance of such event is extremely timely.

GEOPRO 2003 was the second in series of workshops organized for researchers and practitioners at all levels of experience to share insights into semantic processing of spatial data methods. The workshops welcome strong participation from researchers in both industry and academia. GEOPRO 2003 was sponsored by National Polytechnic Institute (IPN), Centre for Computing Research (CIC), Mexican Petroleum Institute (IMP/PIMAYC), Mexico, and Environmental System Research Institute (ESRI), USA.

The response to the workshop was overwhelming that ensures its promising future (77 submitted papers). Every paper submitted to GEOPRO 2003 was evaluated by at least two reviewers (22 accepted papers). We are grateful to both authors and reviewers for their careful work during this review process. Many of the papers that appear in this CD were thoroughly revised and improved in response to reviewers’ suggestions.

This CD is organized into five sections, reflecting the session topics in the GEOPRO 2003 workshop: Raster-to-vector conversion (4 papers), Map generalization (3 papers), Geo-image interpretation (4 papers), Intelligent GIS tools (8 papers), and GIS applications (1 paper). Each session included a keynote talk and/or tutorial given by recognized specialists. We also included in CD a new with regard to GEOPRO 2002 session: Works in progress (3 papers). The papers of this session expose interesting topics and received in general favorable reviewers’ comments, however they have not been revised and resubmitted.

We are gratefully acknowledge the support provided by the sponsors of GEOPRO: IPN (Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Mexico), CIC (Centro de Investigación en Computación, Mexico), IMP/PIMAYC (Instituto Mexicano del Petroleo/Programa en Matemáticas Aplicadas y Computación, Mexico), CONACYT (Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología, Mexico), ESRI (Environmental System Research Institute, USA), IGN (l’Institut Géographique National, France), Ecole des Mines de Paris, Centre de Morphologie Mathématique, France. Our special thanks to Dr. Juan Luis Díaz de León - Director of CIC, Dr. Rodolfo Suárez - Director of IMP/PIMAYC, and the members of Geoprocessing Laboratory of CIC for their noble support.

See you at GEOPRO 2004!

November 3, 2003

Serguei Levachkine
Miguel Torres