As the pace of change increases and new technologies emerge faster than we can assimilate them, we can be forgiven for occasionally feeling left breathless, with new technologies, new skills and new approaches required at regular intervals. In the geographic information industry new ways of collecting data, new data providers and new users entering the industry, different ways of publishing maps and information, greater flexibility and ways of reaching all kinds of new users are all examples where the boundaries have been pushed back more in the last 10 years than in the previous 100. Changes in the mainstream underlying computing technology have enabled and facilitated this so much so more than radical new methods from within the industry. The impact of change on mapping and geographic information is as great as much as any other industry or the change we witness in our own lives from day to day. However, when we stand back and consider what our overall goals are, better management of resources, better education, health and quality of life, greater care in the use of the environment etc.-these are much the same as they always have been. The difference today is that the technology now allows us to really start to address the key issues we have before us. How then do we bring coherence to an apparently disconnected world? How do we prevent diffusion and potential chaos, especially when information integration is a critical success factor? How do we organize ourselves to do that? The paper will describe the concept of the Digital National Framework and how this is now developing to support such an infrastructure and how new technologies e.g. GML are facilitating its development. The paper proposes that we have to start by simplifying the GI infrastructure and recognize the building blocks in developing that infrastructure. We need to incorporate methods that unite and integrate definitive information. This in turn can be used to underpin all kinds of information in a joined-up way. Thereon it will support data sharing, decision making and problem-solving faster and more cost effectively than ever before.
