The Department of Archaeology, University of the Punjab in collaboration with the The McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research University of Cambridge, UK arranged a 3 Day Online QGIS Training Session organized under Project MAHSA - Mapping of Archaeological Heritage in South Asia in which Faculty, Students and Departmental Staff were engaged by the Training Coordinator Ms Azadeh Vafadari, Jack Tomaney and Piet Gerrits as the main instructors.

The Departmental team was enabled to experience a beginner-level QGIS Introductory Training in archaeology and Heritage work. It included the:
Concepts of QGIS, How to find Geographic Data and Historical Maps leading to their Georeferencing with digitization and tracing of Potential Archaeological sites and features by comparison with today's Satellite Imaging. The overall session was shadowed under the use of different tutorials additionally with the informational presentation sessions for the participants where they were free to talk through and ask questions.
In the meantime, the students learned the use of Vector to identify a feature, Symbology, and Key Cartographic Elements to interpret Geographic data, key types, and file formats used in Quantum GIS.
The software was made easy to use in projections and coordinate systems and most importantly its practical application in Archaeology - capturing, understanding, and managing spatial and archaeological data. The areas of Punjab and Sindh remained of special interest throughout understanding the of landscape archaeology.
Participants were efficiently taught about the old Indian Historic Maps and to see if the same sites were present in today's satellite imagery.
On the fun side, the play of assigning colors to different features or sites played an interesting role.
Technically, the last day of the session was for the official map-making individually with proper scale setting adding labels, tracing coordinates etc.
This fruitful and productive session resulted in an opportunity to make a step forward from traditional methods in Archaeology to more advanced ones.
At the end of the session, Dr. Hameed Chairman Archaeology Department, faculty, staff, and students shared warm gestures while Thanking them wholeheartedly for their excellent coordination, as if erasing the communication barrier, their patience, and enthusiasm in guiding thoroughly. All the participants were equally impressed, and cordially thanked their whole team looking forward to having more interactive opportunities for learning in the future.