permaculture

["darren" <darren@permaculture.biz>]

Hi Steven, 

Thanks for your reply. 

Your website has some interesting insights observation into the landscapes
of your area - just like a reading landscape lecture in a way. Sounds like a 
beautiful place to live. The Osage Cuestas sounds like a few landforms in my 
own area - minus the glaciation - last glacial in Australia yielded about 
50km2 only - and that was in the alpine areas. Cool name though - I use it 
from now on. My affinity with the name is also related to my liking for the 
Osage Orange (Maclura pomifera) - especially its wonderful timber - bright 
yellow/orange and amazingly tensile. I have established this one on a few 
clients farms. Near my home town there is a road called Tannery Lane that is 
lined with 120+ yo Osage Oranges as living fences (back when farmers had the 
sense to do so and not the barbed wire). These still exist and are a 
reliable source of both vegetative material and craft wood for local wood 
turners. 

On your question: just today the course I am teaching here in Viet Nam we 
dealt with Low-Tech Survey equipment, techniques etc. We also discussed the 
role of technology and related purchase decisions back to the issues of 
appropriate technology, ease of use, reliability, robustness. 
durability/design life, etc. When we talked about palm-based computers I was 
not exactly complimentary: whilst they can be very useful, their reliability 
in field conditions (at least the "affordable" consumable models) comes into 
serious question - my recommendation was for the purchase selection of 
equipment that met those criteria. So at this stage palm computers don't. 

However so I don't come across as a luddite, which clearly I am not, I see 
the potential value of such devices. They promise much and the linking of 
the gps and palm device is a classic as you have a great little processor 
and flash RAM so they are very capable machines. The screens are great too. 
I checked out the software you mentioned - it looks good - especially if you 
are working in the Natural Resource Mgt field. ArcPad is the industry 
benchmark for this type of palm-based software (as distinct from this easier 
to use free/shareware) and is very capable indeed. The holy grail of the 
handheld device is the combined and durable GPS, CellPhone, Computer, 
Internet Browsable, blee blee blee bla bla bla - the "perfect assistant" - 
this is now a emerging reality so where do we go from here? Which relates 
somewhat to Tim's comments on the changing world of cartography and the 
question of what is next? 

I agree with Tim that its sister products ArcView and ArcInfo are GIS 
benchmarks though my problem with them for use in PC design is their poor 
graphical ability and their relative lack of easy of use compared to 
MapInfo. The ESRI products from my experience are like AutoCAD: you need a 
reasonable amount of training to use them effectively. With MapInfo: a 
couple of hour session is all that I have needed to get people (as most 
recently experienced here in VN) geographically registering a raster (eg 
Aerial Photo, Scanned Topo Map) image, digitising and doing basic design 
work. MapInfo's interface (particularly its graphical commands) is similar 
to many simple graphic's software - even something like MS Paint - which my 
3 year old son can use.... 

You can fall into the trap (speaking from experience) of spending too much 
time on the desktop playing "masters of the universe" with GIS/CAD packages 
- better to spend time trying to sequester carbon, produce some yields and 
get some margin. Do what you need to do then get onto the physical work. 

Tim also discussed the differing surveying devices he uses: I agree 
wholeheartedly with him - though would add that there are plenty of 
second-hand total stations out there for less than $AUD5-8000 - which is 
getting into the ball-park for the full-time professional - that said I 
won't be getting one as for mine it is more time effective to simply hire a 
surveyor and assistant for about AUD$50-$90/hr - especially when they can 
survey most 10-40 ha farms (depending on topography) in about a day or two 
with another few hours at the desktop processing the information. Current 
surveyor I use in Oz charges about $70/hr and he has a superfast one man 
total station that can cover a lot of area in a short space of time. 

I have not personally contracted a photogrammetrist though any time I have 
used a government topo map I have by default used one. From costly 
experience though I am wary: seriously ground truth. Most topo maps are 
still made with this technology - only usually with 3D glasses and a 
computer screen - wild stuff to see - had a sneak in a defence mapping 
facility a few years ago now (before it became top secret) and this stuff is 
pretty wild - pity though that it is used for those purposes and not for the 
job at hand - a great case of "Imagine". The stuff I saw blew me away - 
images (satellite and aerial) that made you feel like you were hovering 
horizontally about a metre from the ground in 3D - pisses me off though that 
its used for merely snooping. 

At today's class here in Dong Xoai we finished using a Transit Level. My 
experience with these great little instruments is quite limited (combined 
with my mild dislexia and poor mental arithmetic) - everyone got a handle of 
them after an hour of class description and then a couple of hours of field 
use. This Japanese model had a very neat tripod and could all fit into a 
school-size back pack - so was extremely portable. 

As an aside we had a couple of well appreciated and hotly contested 
exercises today: both had Bia (beer) as prizes (donated by yours truly) and 
involved groups guessing positions of contours and also nominating the 
relief between two nominated points. Turned an otherwise mundain activity 
into a bit of fun. 

My last contribution relates to the use of video game software in PC. I have 
had a small play and if I was of my kid's generation then I would perhaps be 
better equipped to get into it. Software like World Construction Set is 
truly amazing and is used by the likes of Golf Course designers to do their 
stuff and amazingly represent their concepts and detail plans. Not hard to 
imagine how this type of software could be used in PC design - especially 
since you can do time modelling. If any of you have a look you will see what 
I mean - you can even fly that helicopter through your design that you've 
always dreamed about - but never would as an energy conscious PCist. Again 
the question is? Romantic over analysis and unnecessary time at the desktop 
- my thinking is yes. 

Cheers, 

Yours and Growing, 

Darren Doherty