Today, few texts offer a comprehensive overview of geographic information systems (GIS). The literature common in academic circles is highly technical and pays little attention to the role GIS plays as a tool in the planning and shaping of society and the world around us. The contributors to this book feel strongly about the potential inherent in the concepts and methodologies that make up a GIS. Similarly, the contributors are aware of the limitations of the uniformly technical and structural approach that dominates discussions about GIS in many professional circles. This book is a guide and an educational, easy-to-understand journey that introduces the concepts and methodologies that lie behind today's GIS. It makes GIS both more familiar and more relevant to a far broader section of the professional circles which plan, organize, and shape our surroundings.