Ukraine Map
From the last years, the indispensable tool of the cartographer has been the computer. Much of cartography, especially at the data-gathering survey level, has been subsumed by Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The functionality of maps has been greatly advanced by technology simplifying the superimposition of spatially located variables onto existing geographical maps. These are here reduced to the simplest terms by the device of reckoning slopes and dips as gradients. Trigonometrical calculation is thus avoided, the protractor becomes unnecessary, and all questions are solved by the scale alone. Having local information such as rainfall level, distribution of wildlife, or demographic data integrated within the map allows more efficient analysis and better decision making.We can now go on to consider a satellite map, assuming it to have as its basis a topographical map with contour-lines. We shall be concerned mainly with stratified rocks, and in particular with those groups of strata which are separately distinguished on the map by colouring or otherwise, to be called for clearness formations. What the map primarily shows is the distribution of these formations as they appear at their outcrop on the ground-surface. This surface is intersected by the ground-surface in a certain curved line in space, and the projection of this curve on the horizontal plane is the boundary as shown on the map. It is determined, therefore, by two factors: the lie of the bedding and the shape of the ground. Given the shape of the ground and the lie of the bedding at every place, the course of the boundary lines could be inferred. In map-reading it is the converse problem that is presented; given the shape of the ground and the boundary-lines, to make out the lie of the bedding, which may vary from place to place.
Note, however, that on an ordinary map the meridian lines, except the central one, are not parallel to the sides of the rectangular sheet, but (for northern latitudes, converge northward, while the parallels of latitude are curved. The sheets of our Ordnance Survey are not to be regarded as complete maps. The small-scale sheets are parts of a large map of Ukraine drawn to the central meridian of the country. The large-scale sheets are each part of a county map drawn to the central meridian of the county.
Even when GIS is not involved, most cartographers now use a variety of computer graphics programs to generate new maps.