ArcGIS Cloud is in Your Future
Nobody likes to complain more about software than Adobe Creative Suite users. But then this happened:
Adobe is pointing all of its energy towards Creative Cloud, eliminating the familiar retail box in the process. Like last year, the company is releasing an updated suite of applications this June, newly branded as “CC” apps. This includes: Photoshop CC, InDesign CC, Illustrator CC, Dreamweaver CC and Premiere Pro CC.
The key here is per user, per month. No more stupid buying a new copy of Photoshop every year and complaining about how there is no new value. Now you get the new version no matter what new features are added. Microsoft is trying to do with with Office 365 but most of us realize it is just a awful implementation of SharePoint. That said they realize that people just don’t upgrade anymore and in fact I’d wager they’d rather not anyway.
So Esri has lived on maintenance agreements and the wacky ELA agreements for revenue so they are practically halfway there anyway. I think the ELA tries to capture “per user/per month” but it’s not a 1 to 1 relationship. Adobe is showing the way and I think we GIS folks need to expect that Esri will transition everyone to such a model (at least those not on ELA) in a couple years. Autodesk is probably much closer to this reality so keep an eye on your AutoCAD users down the hall and see how their do when their 100% on Autodesk 360.
Now in the rush to get on the cloud, be careful slipping on those stairs in your Salvatore Ferragamo shoes.
Pete Campbell Fall
WxS Say What Now?
So the requirements doc says the application must support WMS, WFS, WCS and WTS. I hate the first three, but the four one confused me. I was unaware of WTS and Wikipedia is zero help. A phone call into the contracts person (who has no idea what GIS is in the first place) was zero help. She did say that she’d get back to me later today to find out.
UPDATE
WTS means “Web Tile Service”. It’s not WMTS but something they just made up. There is some sort of 900913 awesome in that. I’m just a bit afraid to ask the XYZ order…
WxS Say What Now?
So the requirements doc says the application must support WMS, WFS, WCS and WTS. I hate the first three, but the four one confused me. I was unaware of WTS and Wikipedia is zero help. A phone call into the contracts person (who has no idea what GIS is in the first place) was zero help. She did say that she’d get back to me later today to find out.
UPDATE
WTS means “Web Tile Service”. It’s not WMTS but something they just made up. There is some sort of 900913 awesome in that. I’m just a bit afraid to ask the XYZ order…
What’s a Title?
Someone asked me today what their title should be. Now of course I asked what they did and they said “GIS Manager”. So of course who really cares right? Is GIS Manager a bad thing? I’ve been a GIS Manager in the past and I’m not sure it has affected my ability to get work. Heck I’ve been a “Chief Evangelist” and if that doesn’t kill your job marketability then I’m not sure what does.
So after some back and forth the meat of the argument is do we want to be known as GIS “people”? Is there some negative connotation to GIS that causes us to fear it appearing on our business cards? I look at mine right now and it says “Founder”. Now that should be the death sentence to getting any work. I mean what does a “Founder” do other than talk about being a “Founder”?
My recommendation was just stick to being a GIS Manager, no one really cares and if they do, they probably aren’t a client anyway. Job titles are funny in that we all pretend to not care, but once you see it on your business card, you become self conscious. Does changing GIS into “Geo” or “Spatial” improve your outlook or attractiveness? The real focus on improving your marketability is to make sure your CV/GitHub/Website/Blog is filled with the things that you care about in your career. Maybe it’s Python, JavaScript, .NET, Silverlight (snicker), C++, ObjectiveC, Java, PostGIS, etc. These are all things that will matter to your peers and your clients more than if your title is VP of Awesome or Chief Python scrubber.
Esri Salesman
Even the Esri Salesman seems to realize his title doesn’t matter. “How many ArcGIS Servers can I put you down for?”
What’s a Title?
Someone asked me today what their title should be. Now of course I asked what they did and they said “GIS Manager”. So of course who really cares right? Is GIS Manager a bad thing? I’ve been a GIS Manager in the past and I’m not sure it has affected my ability to get work. Heck I’ve been a “Chief Evangelist” and if that doesn’t kill your job marketability then I’m not sure what does.
So after some back and forth the meat of the argument is do we want to be known as GIS “people”? Is there some negative connotation to GIS that causes us to fear it appearing on our business cards? I look at mine right now and it says “Founder”. Now that should be the death sentence to getting any work. I mean what does a “Founder” do other than talk about being a “Founder”?
My recommendation was just stick to being a GIS Manager, no one really cares and if they do, they probably aren’t a client anyway. Job titles are funny in that we all pretend to not care, but once you see it on your business card, you become self conscious. Does changing GIS into “Geo” or “Spatial” improve your outlook or attractiveness? The real focus on improving your marketability is to make sure your CV/GitHub/Website/Blog is filled with the things that you care about in your career. Maybe it’s Python, JavaScript, .NET, Silverlight (snicker), C++, ObjectiveC, Java, PostGIS, etc. These are all things that will matter to your peers and your clients more than if your title is VP of Awesome or Chief Python scrubber.
Esri Salesman
Even the Esri Salesman seems to realize his title doesn’t matter. “How many ArcGIS Servers can I put you down for?”
Hangouts with James Fee:: GPS is Just a Bunch of Lines
Steve Coast joined me to talk about his Kickstarter project, GPS Art Poster. Selling GPS data as art to the general public can only mean lots of fun for Steve as he tries to convert locations people email him into extent boxes to clip the GPS data. We also caught up on OSM news, the OSM Plus conference in a couple of months, and other interesting projects he is working on. The IRC log is here.