ArcView, produced by ESRI (Environmental Systems Research Institute), is an easy-touse GIS (Geographic Information System) package for map display and database management. Arc View allows the user to link and query database tables and to quickly display the results. This can be extremely helpful to seismologists with large and often cumbersome datasets. In this study, Arcview's seismic data manipulation and mapping abilities are investigated. Eight months of data (January - October 1998) from the Anza Seismic Network is used as a test set. This data is available through the Geological Sciences Department at San Diego State University as well as UCSD, SCEC (Southern California Earthquake Center), Stephan Birch Aquarium at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography, or the IRIS DMC. Data arrives in textfiles formatted according to the CSS 3.0 Database Schema. UNIX scripts are used to convert these tables into a form readable by ArcView. Different forms of information about single events and detections are stored in separate tables within the CSS 3 .0 Database Schema. Arcview can link these tables together through common field names. This allows the user to create and customize multiple displays of information on sets of seismic events. Each generated map (or "display") has a uniquely associated attribute file from which the user can query information and display the results on the same map view. This GIS-approach may facilitate and/or initiate new alternatives for seismic data visualization.
