Analytical modelling of positional and thematic uncertainties in the integration of remote sensing and geographical information systems

This paper describes three aspects of uncertainty in geographical information systems (GIS) and remote sensing. First, the positional uncertainty of an area object in a GIS is discussed as a function of positional uncertainties of line segments and boundary line features. Second, the thematic uncertainty of a classified remote sensing image is described using the probability vectors from a maximum likelihood classification. Third, the “S-band” model is used to quantify uncertainties after combining GIS and remote sensing data.