Technology's heady pace

Lately I have been preparing for the dig in Jordan this summer.  Well into Spring session, I lead a seminar on Monday mornings in which I and 10 students (and Kira) discuss things Jordanian and archaeological.  I am also making necessary purchases and trying out new software and hardware.  What strikes me most is the difference in data collection software and hardware over the last few years.

In 1998 I purchased a TDS data collector for the Total Station survey instrument used in archeological survey and excavation. I used it in 1998, 1999, 2000, twice in 2002, twice in 2003, and finally in 2004. Last year for our survey in Jordan I purchased an 'Archer' data collector with Microsurvey's 'Field Genius' survey software. Even though just 11 years had passed, the difference in technology between the Archer (and software) and TDS is astounding.

The TDS collected five fields of data: point number, northing, easting, elevation, and three letter descriptor for the point. That was it.  All of the spatial and artifact points were collected as discrete, individual points.  That meant that hours upon hours of manipulation of the data was necessary at the end of each day in order to get it ready for GIS (Geographic Information Systems).  All of the spatial points needed to be connected into 'shapes', and all of the artifacts needed to be tagged in a spreadsheet with additional information.  All of this was done by students who had spent the day in the hot sun, and mistakes were inevitable. 

In contrast, the Archer sits on a Windows CE platform, and so all of the wonderful Windows applications become available. The data collection allows one to customize the menus in two broad categories. The first is the collection of artifacts.  For example, a menu might allow the user who has chosen 'ceramics' to fill out a number of screens that correspond to the fields used later in analysis. The user might be asked if the sherd is 'diagnostic', and if so, whether it is a rim, base, handle, lug, or perhaps if it is incised, painted, glazed, coloured, and on and on. The same sorts of menus can be designed for lithics (stone), metals, faunal (animal bones), shells, human bones, coral, jewelry, teeth, etc. The user at the Total Station will simply input this data upon collection rather than passing it along down the data stream to a brain-dead student wishing he or she was somewhere else doing anything other than inputting data into a spread-sheet.   

The other set of menus allows the user to collect 'space'.  Modern archaeology is based on the concept of discrete three dimensional spaces in which artifacts are set in a matrix.  It is important to at least collect the perimeters of the surface and bottom.  The Archer and software allows one to collect a point in space that is then visible on the screen. When the next point is taken, a line is drawn between the two.  When the rim of a pit, for example, is defined by perhaps 10 points, the user then 'closes' the 'polygon'.  This perimeter is now a discrete unit, rather than a series of points that need to be connected later.  Again, menus will prompt the user for the context number, whether this is a surface or bottom perimeter, and what kind of 'space' it is, such as a pit. 

When the day's work is done, two files will be exported.  One will be an artifact 'shape' file, the other a spatial 'shape' file.  These files are then imported directly into GIS. 

Nautiz X-7

This year's data collector goes beyond the Archer.  The Nautiz not only collects artifact and spatial data in the same way, but it allows one to take a picture of the artifact.  The picture is then linked to the artifact by its point number, and both are then easily exported to GIS.  The Nautiz not only has Bluetooth, but also LAN (WiFi) capability, and so one simply connects back and forth from a laptop via a router.  To top it off, the Nautiz has a built-in GPS receiver. 

The next generation of data collectors must surely fry eggs, or perhaps shovel snow in December.