Spatially Adjusted

Tag: esri

  • David Maguire Announces ESRI Image Server

    Link – Image Server

    On Monday during the Plenary we will introduce a new type of Image Server. It takes a different approach to serving up large (TB) quantities of Images. The data is held in the raw file format (no need to pre-process, or load into a DBMS). The Server builds an index so that the files can be treated as a continuous image map. Services can be authored to process the images on the fly as they are served up to desktop or web clients.

    My first reaction is cool, but I don’t see how this would replace me loading rasters into my ArcSDE as I do now. I’m guessing it costs less than ArcSDE and a DBMS, but how much less?

    Damn, I guess I’ll just have to wait until Monday.

    [update] OK, I’ve thought about this a little bit. How are they doing this without a DBMS? I’m guessing they are reading in the cell information from the rasters and then storing it somewhere (xml?). I guess Image Server processes the requests from clients, but how does Image Server know what to return?

    I’m guessing this is an outgrowth of abandoning the Personal Geodatabase MDB format as we all have learned it pretty much doesn’t work as well as shapefiles (let alone Coverages, GRIDs and Tins). I’m actually excited about a new data format, but I’d like to know more about how we’ll be able to “interchange” the datasets. I assume it will be back to the venerable e00? 😉

  • Steve Announces New Java Section on EDN

    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.

  • Stefan Reacts to David Maguire’s Blog Entry

    Link – It’s social software

    Stefan Geens read David’s post and has an interesting take on it. Stefan doesn’t know much about GIS and even admits it, so his viewpoint is from an “ESRI outsider”.

    Maguire implies that Google Earth and its ilk are a fad, a bubble, and rhetorically wonders why people have written about it. He can think of six reasons: It’s Google, it’s free, it’s easy, it’s detailed, it’s fast and it’s different, (but read the post yourself).

    That’s sort of stunning, because to me, the most important reason why Google Earth and Maps are a runaway success is not on his list: It’s social software. Google Earth is an extremely compelling canvas that people are using to link their experiences in the real world to the web.

    That is an interesting thought. I’ve always thought of GIS software as social, but it appears some programs are more than others. ESRI always preaches GIS for the people and it seems that message is not getting out very far beyond Redlands. I can’t wait to see what Jack (Dangermond – Founder and President of ESRI for those who don’t know) and David have in store for us at the UC.

  • David Maguire Talks About Google Earth

    Geographic Exploration – The New Fad?

    David Maguire has written another blog post and he gives us his thoughts on Google Earth, MSN, Yahoo! and others who have entered the GIS arena. Personally I’m glad to see he gets why the others have been successful (ease of use, global data, branding) and he lets us know what concerns he has for the future of these system. I tend to agree with him that once you get past the hype, these are very basic programs or APIs, but we need to keep in mind that most of these are either beta or version 1.0 of their releases. ESRI needs to move the bar forward so that there is a gap between the hype and their products. Sounds like David or Jack will make an announcement at ESRI about their plans. Hopefully the ArcWeb Services team will be on stage at that point or even a new product.

    Good to see a strategic blog post by David. Do you disagree with him? Just blog about it because I’m sure he’d love to see feedback from the users.

  • 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.

  • 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!

  • Thinking about the 2005 ESRI User Conference

    Esri UC 2005 Logo

    Well by this time next week, most of us will be enjoying yet another ESRI User Conference. I believe this is my 10th and 5th in a row. My focus on the UC has changed over the years, but I still enjoy going. I’m just amazed at how big it has become since moving to San Diego from Palm Springs. There are a couple things I’m looking forward to and I thought I’d list them here in no real order.

    • ArcSDE on PostgreSQL – I’ve got no problem with Oracle, just that many of our clients just can’t afford it. PostgreSQL would fit that bill perfectly. I’m not too high on MySQL so I don’t care too much about support of the RDBMS, but PostgreSQL would be super.
    • Open ArcWeb Services – Given the press that Google Maps has gotten, I’d love to see Jack announce that they will open up a reduced functionality version of ArcWeb Services for free. Then all ESRI has to do is convince people to start using it (blog about it!).
    • Meeting everyone at the blogger meet up – I’m looking forward to meeting many of you.
    • ArcGIS 9.2 – I’ve seen some peaks at what might be announced with 9.2 and I’m quite interested. I’m going to try and go to as many Technical Workshops as I can.
    • ArcGIS .NET Developer Special Interest Group Meeting (dead link) – Art Haddad has posted some interesting thoughts on his blog over the past week. I’d like to see more of what he’s talking about.
    • Jithen Singh on ArcGIS Server Implementation – I’m always interesting in “real” implementations of ESRI software. We usually have tight deadlines and it sounds like Jithen did too.
    • ESRI Developer Network – We’ve got one subscription and getting ready to order another. I want to make sure we get the most out of EDN so I’ll try and spend some time with folks over at the EDN Island (can I assume you’ll have an island?).

    Oh I’m sure they’ll be more that will creep up during this week as we learn more about what will be announced. I’d also like to stop at the Thales Navigation booth and take a look at the MobileMapper CE GPS unit. We are getting ready to replace our old one and I like what I’ve seen from Thales.

  • 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.

  • 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)

  • 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.