Digitizing landscapes in Slovakia

The Geodetic and Cartographic Institute of Bratislava (GKU) is a budgetary organization established by the Geodesy, Cartography and Cadastre Authority of the Slovak Republic to fulfill the tasks of state administration for geodesy, cartography and real estate cadastre.

Today, the institute implements, manages, and develops the information system of geodesy, cartography, and cadastres.

Since the time of the cadastre of real estate was established in the 17th century, and up to the present day, a large amount of map series have been made. Maps are an important form of information, whether ancient, modern or future. GKU map fund consists of sheets created in various periods of time, in various scales, and in different technical quality.

Because archival holdings, especially maps, are also used in many other scientific disciplines, the Institute (with its archive) was incorporated into the network of state archives of special importance. In order to preserve the content, the office is now undergoing a digitisation process where they aim to preserve historical data for the future.

To preserve the content of historical maps, the conversion from analogue to digital form is necessary, and the process of digitization is underway. The digital outputs are ready for further postprocessing, and each digital file is enriched with metadata. The Institute was looking for a solid and safe solution for long-term data storage, and Piql technology best met their requirements.

„In Today’s era of digitisation, the success of digital transformation comes from a well-planned collaboration. The most important [part] for us was to safeguard our historical data, in a format that will last forever. And I have no doubt, Piql met all our needs.” Ing. Juraj Celler, deputy director of GKU

The goal of GKÚ Bratislava is complete digitization of cadastral maps and the description of raster data by means of metadata. The files have been converted to preservation format in digital form to ensure its readability in the future and stored to piqlFilm.