GDAL/OGR 1.7.0 Released
Good news from the gdal-announce email list:
The GDAL/OGR Project is pleased to announce the release of GDAL/OGR 1.7.0.
Yep, you can stop there and get your GDAL/OGR on. Or maybe you want to know what is new, copied directly from Frank’s email:
- New Raster Drivers: BAG, EPSILON, Northwood/VerticalMapper, R, Rasterlite, SAGA GIS Binary, SRP (USRP/ASRP), EarthWatch .TIL, WKT Raster
- GDAL PCIDSK driver using the new PCIDSK SDK by default
- New Vector drivers : DXF, GeoRSS, GTM, PCIDSK and VFK
- New utilities: gdaldem, gdalbuildvrt now compiled by default
- Add support for Python 3.X. Compatibility with Python 2.X preserved
- Remove old-generation Python bindings.
- Significantly improved raster drivers: GeoRaster, GeoTIFF, HFA, JPEG2000 JasPer, JPEG2000 Kakadu, NITF
- Significantly improved vector drivers: CSV, KML, SQLite/SpataiLite, VRT
I did a little highlighting up there to list what I think is noteworthy at least for me. You can either build it yourself or keep an eye out for an update of FWTools.
Rolling Your Mapping Apps on the iPad (or the iPhone)
One thing that has become crystal clear is the preferred method of having a mapping application on the iPhone and by extension the new iPad is to create a native iPhone/iPad app. That said, the noise sometimes causes people to miss some great web mapping app (as native web apps). I’ve looked into using SVG and even OpenLayers in the past for mapping in the iPhone, but who is rolling their own web apps out there to accomplish what until 2 years ago required a browser on a laptop or desktop? I know there will most likely be a session at the ESRI DevSummit using OpenLayers, but is there a framework people are working with?
Can anyone find me some mobile web mapping applications to love?
Rolling Your Mapping Apps on the iPad (or the iPhone)
One thing that has become crystal clear is the preferred method of having a mapping application on the iPhone and by extension the new iPad is to create a native iPhone/iPad app. That said, the noise sometimes causes people to miss some great web mapping app (as native web apps). I’ve looked into using SVG and even OpenLayers in the past for mapping in the iPhone, but who is rolling their own web apps out there to accomplish what until 2 years ago required a browser on a laptop or desktop? I know there will most likely be a session at the ESRI DevSummit using OpenLayers, but is there a framework people are working with?
Can anyone find me some mobile web mapping applications to love?
Government Open Data Updates
Despite some speed humps, many cities and governments are going full speed ahead with opening their data. One of the biggest is the City of Vancouver’s Open Data Catalogue (note the copy and paste spelling of catalog, those wacky Canadians). Well they’ve launched a new update that simplifies the process of navigating the data. Every time I stop by I see more and more data available in more formats. I think the city should be commended for their embracing open data sharing with citizens.
The other open data update is the data.gov.uk website. The search is less than useful as you can’t perform advanced searches. Sean Gorman did a quick look and didn’t find any specific geo datasets, but I’m sure we’ll start seeing them. One thing that didn’t surprise me was the presence of SPARQL. Why data.gov.uk would put such an annoying query language front and center is beyond me. But with Sir Tim Berners-Lee as and advisor I can only imagine that he pushed hard for its placement. (note I’m not a big fan of RDF so take that as you will). Still it is good to see the UK start working hard at sharing public data with everyone.
I wasn’t in Britain for the announcement of data.gov.uk, but I can only imagine it went something like this….
Government Open Data Updates
Despite some speed humps, many cities and governments are going full speed ahead with opening their data. One of the biggest is the City of Vancouver’s Open Data Catalogue (note the copy and paste spelling of catalog, those wacky Canadians). Well they’ve launched a new update that simplifies the process of navigating the data. Every time I stop by I see more and more data available in more formats. I think the city should be commended for their embracing open data sharing with citizens.
The other open data update is the data.gov.uk website. The search is less than useful as you can’t perform advanced searches. Sean Gorman did a quick look and didn’t find any specific geo datasets, but I’m sure we’ll start seeing them. One thing that didn’t surprise me was the presence of SPARQL. Why data.gov.uk would put such an annoying query language front and center is beyond me. But with Sir Tim Berners-Lee as and advisor I can only imagine that he pushed hard for its placement. (note I’m not a big fan of RDF so take that as you will). Still it is good to see the UK start working hard at sharing public data with everyone.
I wasn’t in Britain for the announcement of data.gov.uk, but I can only imagine it went something like this….
Voting is Open for the 2010 DevSummit User Presentations
One big change from the 2009 ESRI DevSummit is that users will now vote on which presentations they wish to see at the 2010 DevSummit. Go here to pick which ones you think would be valuable to the community. Normally I wouldn’t promote a talk myself (and I’m not giving one this year), but I think “Ruby-fu: Using ArcGIS Server with Rails” by Dave Bouwman is something people should be voting for. Ruby is here to stay and there are many of us working on projects that use Rails at the backend. ESRI of course already has a wonderful API to use with Rails so there is no excuse not to look at a quicker, more robust framework.
Oh, Ruby!