The project was started aiming at developing a controlled and structured terminology system related to GIS and remote sensing. The first phase corresponded to the identification of potential sources of terminology, the selection of proper terms, their extraction and the creation of a terminology database.

The sources used to collect the terminology consist of:
    • GIS Dictionary of Association of Geographic Information - AGI
    • CCRS Remote Sensing Glossary of Canada Centre
    • ATIS Telecom glossary 2000

Other sources have been considered:
    • Glossary of Cartographic Terms of Texas University
    • Dictionary of Abbreviations and Acronyms in GIS, Cartography and Remote Sensing of the University of California
    • Glossary of Oceanography, Climatology and the Related Geosciences
    • GIS Glossary of Environmental Systems Research Institute Inc. (ESRI)
    • Glossary of GIS and Metadata terms of Environmental On-Line Services (ERIN)

The terminology was analysed with respect to the degree of semantic relevance in the field of remote sensing and GIS. The terms too generic or that have been considered as non-pertinent were excluded. Groups of terms that could be collected in specific appendixes -for example, terms related to international organisation or institution- were also excluded. Finally, the terms that have been considered as more specifics about GIS, as well as those more details for Remote Sensing, were identified and marked.
Terms have been classified according to the EARTh upper structure. The semantic classification foresees the allocation of each term in a relation tree starting from the more general concept represented by the category. The result is an English-Italian terminology system containing about 3.000 terms.