Steve Citron-Pousty just posted about a whole new section of the ESRI Developer Network devoted to Java. I think EDN got off to a slow start while everyone got geared up to support it, but now it seems to be flying along with tons of new features (dead link). I have to admit I feel a little left out as this is as close to ESRI Java (dead link) as I have ever gotten (beyond ordering MO Java and EDN for my programmers). If you thought ESRI was ignoring Java for .NET the moves that have happened over the past few weeks prove otherwise.
Author: James
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Chris Tells Me to “Let It Go!”
Chris tells me to move on (dead link) and don’t worry about how ESRI is seen by others.
Moreover, the comment posting and removal scandal happened more than a month ago. That was Before Google Earth (B.G.E.) and I’m surprised that it is still being discussed. What do you think?
Chris is missing my point or at least combining my post with Howard’s in his response. Personally I don’t think ESRI has much to worry about open source, at least in the United States, Canada and Japan and I don’t think too many people are losing sleep over it at ESRI. Chris seems to think that personal opinions are just that and I totally agree, but if you put your company name on your post/blog/email you are bringing your place of work into the discussion. The perception, right or wrong, is that ESRI doesn’t care about open source. I tend to lean toward the thought that they view open source as just another way to get people to use their products and what is wrong with that? The point I was making and I have made here, here and here is that ESRI needs to take advantage of the open dialog that blogging gives them, not delete posts because they feel threatened by other posters.
ESRI has learned much since that incident last month. All the new bloggers are posting some great new information about the User Conference and have even opened up EDN to us bloggers. Talk about a total role reversal. All I’m trying to do is point out what doesn’t work and hopefully they’ll continue the great strides being made blogging. At least to me it seems that they are having a blast doing it.
One point Chris did make that got me thinking is
I don’t see a connection between that scenario of personal opinions posted/retracted and ESRI (The Company) playing the article badly.
I can see how Chris could read it that way and I’m sure many others did too, but perception is a hard thing to figure out and you don’t want to give anyone reasons to doubt your honesty. One thing out of all this I’d like to see is Bryan Baker start up a blog and post. That is the best way to control this conversation.
Love the blog title Chris!
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Dave Bouwman Has Thoughts About How Google Will Make Money With Google Maps
Link – Google Maps Future? Prognostication starts now! (dead link)
Some interesting thoughts Dave. I’m sure those ads will be in there and the big question isn’t if consumers will care about them, its how will the developers feel about them. If you have to pay for using Google Maps without ads, many of them might be more inclined to take a look a more robust ArcWeb Services solution. Then again, if you can make money off of Google AdWords in your maps that might open up a whole new marketplace.
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Google Shoots for the Moon
Talk about good PR, Google has taken their Maps API and applied it to the moon landings that took place July 20, 1969. They have included the locations of the moon landings and some nice information about each in those nice little bubbles. If you zoom in really close you’ll get a great look at the composition of the moon (I always knew it was made of it). No word when gMaps Pedometer will be applied and we’ll get to see where they drove those cool moon buggies.
In related news, ESRI has announced that the Summer ArcUser Online is now online. cough
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Tag Those Photos from the ESRI User Conference
Just a reminder (I’m sure you’ve seen it everywhere) to upload and tag those photos you are taking at the User Conference with the esriuc05 tag. If you just signed up for Flickr it could take a day or two for the pictures to show up, but once you are “approved” they show up that instant. Tag those photos of your trip to San Diego or getting ready for the conference as well at the baseball game, golfing, the fun run or just having a good time in the gaslamp. It is all good, the more photos the more interesting it will be for everyone. Also don’t forget to add the esriuc05 tag feed to your RSS reader so you won’t miss a thing.
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Brian Goldin Posts About EDN Updates
Brian Goldin has some news about updates (dead link) to the ESRI Developer Network on his blog. I’m interested to see how this plays out over the course of the User Conference and I’m hopeful people will take advantage of the new comment features. I like the idea as it is much quicker to get feedback this way than wait for that post UC email survey we all get after the conference. Just login to EDN and post your comments right after each Technical Workshop. Hopefully someone will mention it during the Plenary Session on Monday.
Brian also points out that EDN also has a survey on blogging (dead link). I’m going to go fill it out right now and hopefully everyone who has a blog that talks about GIS/ESRI/Programming will do so too. Also don’t forget to comment on the lack of RSS feeds at EDN. I’m sure Brian would love to hear about that.
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ESRI Posts Answers to Preconference Q&A
I’m sure you’ll see this in your email inbox, but just in case you didn’t here is the link to ESRI’s answers to our questions.
ESRI International User Conference 2005 – Preconference Survey Q & A (dead link)
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Howard Butler Wonders if ESRI Understands gPhenomenon
Link – The Google Phenomenon and ESRI’s Dilemma – Hobu, Inc.
In the GIS world, Google (er, Keyhole with Google’s resources rather) has changed the game. If you’re a long-time GIS’er though, you might not think so. In this post I describe stuff that any Open Source developer has experienced – mindshare, hackability, and momentum – and why these are important to both ESRI and Google in the race to be the dominant developer platform for GIS in the near future.
OK, I made up gPhenomenon, but we all know what Howard is talking about. The new server side GIS is now expected to be “hackable” because of Google Maps and their API. I suspect as Howard does that ESRI will open up some sort of ArcWeb Services tools at the User Conference, but the question is how will they be received by the programming community. Howard thinks that the same programmers that are drawn to Google Maps API will be turned off of the “complex GIS” backend of ArcWeb Services and he might be right. I think it is a shame that ESRI will wait until the User Conference to announce such a move, but it shows that they are still in the “old world” mentality of magazines, email newsletters and press releases. The time between the release of Google Maps API and an open ArcWeb Services might be too great to catch up. The example I before was the gMap Workout Tracker and how far it has come in just about two weeks. Another two weeks and who knows what they will accomplish (not to mention who wants to change a backend that late in the game)?
Howard then takes ESRI to task for not understanding the open source community. I’m not really involved (yet) with it, but I’m not sure that it really is that important to their business model (beyond interoperability and perception). Google sure doesn’t really care about open source as most of their tools are not, but business reality forces them to work with the community and the perception is that they do it very well. Howard uses the Directions Magazine open source article from a about a month ago to illustrate his point of ESRI not understanding their users or community. I don’t think ESRI could have played that article any worse as the first response was poorly thought out and then to retract it only made it worse. I’ve talked at great lengths on this blog about how blogging can help companies talk better with their users and it would appear that ESRI needs to take that to heart. ESRI doesn’t have to fear open source anymore than Microsoft fears Open Office. ESRI employees are going to make “bad posts” in the future for sure, but removing them will only draw attention to them. The best thing about putting your foot in your mouth is that you can easily remove it. Better yet, blog about it.
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Keyur Shah Talks about ArcGIS Server 9.2 and Java
Keyur Shah teases us with some great information (dead link) about ArcGIS Server 9.2. I was already planning to go to the Technical Workshop ArcGIS Road Ahead: What’s Coming for GIS Developers at 9.2 and it sounds like it will be very compelling.
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One Quick Thought for New Bloggers
Jumping into the blogger world can seem like fun at first, but as with anything there are plenty of jerks who will want to criticise you for your views (you know the ones who post their comments anonymously). The big thing to keep in mind is to be honest and open to suggestions. Don’t let these “trolls” (didn’t think there was a huge article on that did you?) keep you from posting about your passion. Personally I’ve always been outspoken (what others might call quick with the mouth, slow with the brain), but I’m always listening to what others think about my views. That is what blogging is all about, learning from others.
The best way you can participate is to write about what moves you (I’m guessing GIS?) and in turn others will better understand your position. Read something on someones blog that is critical of your software? Don’t just write a quick response in their comments but create a post on your blog. They’ll get the message by looking at their referrer logs. I’ve got nothing against comments, but they should only really be used for quick answers/statements. If you want to dissect their post, it is best to be done on your own weblog where you have time to think about what you want to say (and have search engines crawl your posts so users can find it (dead link) when they search).
So go ahead, post about how much you love GIS, programming or even Java. Tell people about how your software makes their lives easier. Give people reasons to talk about your software on the blogosphere and you’ll be surprised about the results. Passion attracts passion (positive and negative) so go ahead and post and have fun.