Author: James

Update:

Confirmation by the OGC on the status of the Esri REST API and the OGC process.

Now I’m sorry if I butchered that name, I don’t recall being briefed on what the API Is called these days. (Seems like REST API for ArcGIS Server would be right) It appears that over last weekend Esri announced that they were “giving” their REST API to OGC as a standard. Big news if you ask me given that the OGC has just never been able to get an OGC REST Standard adopted. Plus it might make more sense given that the Esri REST API is pretty damn awesome and you got to think that the OGC would rather have awesome over a committee standard that no one uses.

One curious outcome of this is that we could now have a JSON standard in OGC, in this case, Esri JSON. GeoJSON, despite the fact that almost everyone uses it, is a community standard (And there isn’t anything wrong with that), not an OGC one (like GeoRSS). If the OGC adopts the Esri JSON standard in the REST API, we could finally have a JSON standard for the INSPIRE project (Does anyone else use OGC on purpose, or is it only by law?) Brian Flood thinks it makes sense and I tend to agree with him.

https://twitter.com/bFlood/status/81375894324789248

Bill Dollins isn’t so sure

If this is all going to happen, we’ll see a couple of things come out of this. First, we’ll probably see Geoserver and Mapserver start supporting this standard (Though we’ve seen Esri’s REST API documented for months, no one that I know of has implemented it) which means that Esri Desktop users can add these servers without having to use WMS or WFS. It also may mean that clients such as QGIS, gvSIG, and OpenLayers will have native Esri REST API (And thus Esri ArcGIS for Server) reading.

If OGC was an open organization, we’d probably know more. Heck, something to talk about at the UC next month, right?

Wonder how Esri was able to do this?

So let me get this right out of the way. I for one welcome our new geospatial overlords. I’d like to remind them that as a trusted GIS personality, I could be helpful in rounding up others to toil in their underground geoprocessing caves (see here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xs74VYDNDXE).

I had seen the announcement of Google Earth Builder (GEB) at Where 2.0 and like many of us, I laughed it off as a distraction. Well not anymore as I was lucky enough to take part in a Directions Magazine Webinar today that gave Google an opportunity to show off GEB and I’ve come away impressed. This is a company that has a vision about sharing and visualizing geospatial data and is developing tools to make publishing and visualizing it, much easier. Imagine a combination of Esri, Geocommons, SimpleGeo, Cloudmade, Microsoft and a little Amazon (It doesn’t do everything they do, but crosses all boundaries. Who else by Google could do that?) thrown in for good measure.

You can view the GEB webinar on Directions Magazine by registering. If you get a chance to see it you really should. Basically Google gives you the ability to upload shp, csv, kml, GeoTIFF, JP2 or MrSid with almost no limit in file size. Plus 3D models (COLLADA and probably SketchUp) are also supported. You manage it with a Voyager GIS/MapInfo Manager looking tool and then visualize it using Google’s map styling tools. On the fly rendering of vector data, your vector data (Freaky, right?). On top of it all they give you advanced analytic tools to see who is using your maps. Data sharing? As simple as the data sharing you’ve already seen with Google Docs. Plus tie in OAuth2 for granting access to resources. Bam!

Google is delivering access to this data via the web browser, Google Earth, Mobile (iOS and Android), the Google Maps and Earth APIs, OGC standards and as raw vector features. That means no matter where you are, the data will be available on your platform (Missed references to Microsoft Windows Phone, but that’s got to be around the corner, cough). GEB is built partially on Google Fusion Tables, so if you’ve already gotten familiar with that product, you should be able to get working with GEB. The limits of features goes up million fold vs Fusion Tables and you get that great rich cartography visualization tools I talked about above.

Pricing is still vague, but Google is looking at this as a Page Views vs Storage model. You get changed based on how many map views and disk space you are using, but they aren’t tied together. You could have 10TB of imagery on GEB but accessed by 2 people, or you could have one dinky little KML accessed by millions of users. The licensing scales either way.

The commercial version (I’m assuming this is a reference to the federal government already using it) is due out this fall. Google will have tools available for migrating ArcGIS Server for Server implementations which they didn’t get into details so we’ll have to hear about their plans for Esri users. Quite a bit they talked about migrating Esri products and data formats to GEB so it is clear who they are going after.

So as I’m sitting there, all I could think of was how many different ways WeoGeo can work with GEB. We’re looking forward to working with the GEB APIs for delivery of WeoGeo Market and Library data and hope to talk more about it over the summer. Very exciting times!

Larry Page is gunning for you. Look at those pecs!

When I wrote about the Esri ArcGIS new naming convention yesterday, you’ll notice there was one thing I didn’t mention. Basic, Standard, Advanced are the new View, Editor, Info. And you know what? It makes perfect sense to me, I’ve been telling Esri to fix this problem for years and finally they’ve had to guts to do so. ArcView has been devalued in the Esri stack for years. It can’t edit SDE Geodatabases, it can’t edit advanced cartography and it sure as heck can’t handle advanced analysis. Editor is the standard authoring tool in the Esri world and if that bothers you, take your money elsewhere. There are lots of other tools out there that duplicate or exceed ArcGIS for Desktop Basic that are either a fraction of the cost or free.

ArcView users are nothing but a drain on Esri resources. They don’t want to pay for the features Esri wants to sell, clutter the support forum with questions about NAD83/WGS84 conversions and want VBA to continue as a scripting engine in ArcGIS for Desktop. Getting emotional about a product that didn’t change what it was (ArcView has the same features it did last week) and is now more aptly named given its purpose is a distraction to the reality you live in. Finally I can look at Esri’s desktop lineup and understand the purpose of each application. View/Editor/Info are confusing arbitrary terms that mean nothing to anyone but a small niche of users.

The cold hard facts of the matter is that if you wish to play in Esri’s silo, you need to have ArcGIS for Desktop Standard. Otherwise, what’s the point?

So the classic thinking is Esri can’t figure out what to name anything. You either put the Prefix “Arc” in front of something, use the company name Esri (though you’d be better at using ESRI for the classic touch), or put the phrase ArcGIS in front of any simple word. Those days of wacky are over apparently as there is now a guide to the new naming convention for Esri products.

Thus the keyword is now ArcGIS and it may or may not be “for” something else. Because as Esri points out, “The reason for these modifications is to reinforce the fact that, regardless of where and how ArcGIS is used, it is the same system.” Natch! My favorite which isn’t listed here is the new ArcGIS for the Internet which was previously known as ArcGIS.com.

Who is ArcGIS?

The FOSS4G 2011 Local Organizing Committee has been hard at work (I know because somehow I volunteered) at preparing for the best geospatial conference in the world. By now, those presenters who submitted talks should know if they were accepted or not. You, being lazy of course, who did not submit can see the schedule now online.

Remember, the early bird registration ends at the end of this month (June 30th) so go ahead and get registered. Tyler Mitchell blogged about the hotel rooms at the conference (Who wants to walk home after beers anyway?) so make sure you book a room at the Sheraton as well.

FOSS4G 2011 will be a huge Rocky Mountain High my friends. Don’t miss out on epic awesomeness.

Last week I was lucky enough to spend time at the M Resort in Las Vegas, NV for the 2011 PBBI Insights Conference. I had a wonderful time seeing everyone again (many who I hadn’t seen since the last Insights Conference in Miami last year). There was a ton going on given the new focus from Pitney Bowes on their location intelligence division. Here are some highlights:

• MapInfo 11 – Should be out by the end of the month (if not sooner). I liked that there were no “goes to 11” jokes (at least none that I noticed) given that stopped being funny at least 20 years ago. One new features in MiPro that should be of interest to folks is that it will now be available as a 64-bit application (Grapevine got that wrong) to run under a 64-bit operating system and take advantage of 4GB of memory. Desktop GIS should take advantage of the great new hardware we’ve had for years and not be limited to what was expected in 1999, right? also noticed that OpenStreetMap will be available as a basemap (joining the Bing Aerial, Hybrid and Road layers). Also the biggest frustration with me and MiPro has been fixed; working with tabular data is finally workable and could actually stop me from exporting data into other databases to work with it.
• MapInfo Manager – This is a relatively new product at attempts to help you manage your spatial data. The session was very well attended so it appears this is a huge want from the PBBI community. Being browser based, MapInfo Manager seems to be a better choice for organizations to use than a traditional desktop application. It also is INSPIRE compliant offering up CSW feeds to clients to use (including MiPro 10.5 or later).
• MapInfo Spatial Server – I didn’t get as much time to spend on these sessions, but APB has a detailed rundown. This will replace most of the legacy MapInfo server technology with a modern spatial server. It is still very early in its implementation so we’ll need to keep an eye out on functionality as PBBI releases some demos and use cases. Definitely something to watch.
• Geosk – While this was released last year, 2011 will be a big year (disclaimer: PBBI is using WeoGeo technology on it). PBBI is in the process of loading up their latest data to Geosk and has signed up Mentum as a Geosk Library customer and you’ll see their data on Geosk (as well as WeoGeo Market) very soon. For data vendors, DaaS is critical for them to scale up. Those who persist in sending out DVDs via snail mail will wither and die (Fair warning folks).
• From MapInfo to Pitney Bowes – The new President of PBBI, John O’Hara, was definitely on message with MapInfo and Group1 being integrated into the greater Pitney Bowes strategy. While I don’t think this means that PBBI is going to abandon the “traditional” geo market (You know the one where nobody has any money?), but they are going to focus on Fortune 100 companies who want to to integrate spatial data into their business decisions. PBBI was on message as being part of Pitney Bowes. I liked the focus!

As with most conferences, I didn’t get a chance to sit in on every session and PBBI unlike many other geospatial companies does do a traditional plenary where they roll down each product in front of everyone. Looking forward to seeing what happens in the next year with the new MapInfo Spatial Server and of course Geosk!

Bruce Joffe puts it plainly:

Many GIS professionals, users of public agency GIS databases, and advocates for transparency in government through accessible data records are concerned that this decision, if it stands, would enable many more counties to charge restrictive prices for their GIS databases.

This is my warning to all those who think they are smarter than they really are. The tides are a-changing how people are using data, eventually, you’ll drown if you don’t ride with them. That is all…

If I worked for Orange County, I’d kill myself…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7stpw4UfAs

I’m kind of thinking that has become the case after reading this from a MapInfo user:

The worst part about the rule based rendering [in QGIS] is that I have gotten so used to their power that I feel crippled when I go back to MapInfo and try to do styling 🙂
Yea, cartography has been the one area people still say ArcGIS is king. Times, they be a changing though…

He’s looking at it from a MacInfo user perspective, but you could look at it as a proprietary GIS perspective.

Is ArcView use about to fall off the ledge?

The minute I saw this I knew it was going to be awesome:

A few months ago an experimental service to automatically find roads and other features in aerial imagery was launched. Today we’re adding to that a service to help improve local search results.
The frontdoor app allows anyone on the web to help improve our address location results. The site allows you to drag a pin from where we think an address currently is to the front door of the property.

It works on a similar concept to Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. Only here the output is freely available OpenStreetMap (Or will be soon) address data. I’ve been working through Magicshop Frontdoor quite a bit this week so I know this is easy enough. Can’t be that many addresses in the USA, can there? The great thing about helping Microsoft here over lets say Google is that your efforts are helping the community at large. I wish other mapping companies would embrace this concept as Microsoft has (Wait, did I just call Microsoft a mapping company?).

While I was in Sweden at the Sweco developer conference, a really awesome video was shown that was done in house (clearly) by the Sweco team. Anyone who’s done any consulting will get an absolute kick out of it. Glad to see it was finally available on YouTube. Enjoy!