Methodology

The main framework for the development of the map can be viewed in two steps: i) gathering of data such as hospital information and GPS location ii) programming and development of the required files to integrate the data with Google Earth/Maps.

Data Gathering

This will be achieved by research students through and project leaders to obtain images of the hospital and to conduct surveys to find out the capabilities of the health centres. The surveys will extract data such as: type of hospital, number of beds, doctors, nurses, hospital care/treatment. The research team have industry links to many hospitals in urban Phnom Penh which will assist in the process. The images will be integrated with a GPS unit to map out the region of interest with the data collected. The scope of this project is to cover the entire Phnom Penh region. Continual work in this project will go beyond the scope of this project and eventually will map out the health centres throughout the country itself.

Software Development

The data collected from the surveys will be stored into an SQL database and called up from results of a search/criteria. An image will display the map accompanied by data related to the health centre . Research students will extend their programming skills to incorporate the KML mark-up language. The integration of GPS data, MySQL, PHP/Ajax/Java and KML languages will allow a dynamic website to deploy the Google Maps and .kmz files into Google Earth through a website. Software tools such as the WAMP5 server, phpMyAdmin, Dreamweaver, Photoshop, and Flash will be used as the main tools for the development. In addition the AJAX/PHP/SQL database will allow the data to be more dynamic in terms of updating.