I am a developer on the .NET Application Developer Framework at ESRI. Lots of people here at ESRI have blogs and it seemed like the cool thing to do, so I decided to try it out.
Thank’s to Art Haddad for the heads up. Go ahead and add him to your RSS Aggregator.
I’ve updated the title graphic (dead link) in preperation of the ESRI User Conference. The SDCC will be rocking about a week from now.
Link: AJAX (dead link).
Art (dead link) talks a little bit about AJAX implementations and GIS. He’s a little unsure of the performance on Mozilla, but having used the alternative IFRAME “hacks” in the past I’d rather figure out an AJAX solution. Personally it sounds like a great idea for discussion at your special interest group meeting (dead link).
The EDN website has recently been updated to include information on recommended training courses offered by ESRI. This is a great site to find out what instructor lead training is offered for the different products that make up the EDN subscription..
A nice new feature of EDN is now the ability to find out what recommended training courses ESRI think would be beneficial in successfully programming with their different tools. Rob, I don’t see any ArcWeb Services training courses. How cool would it be if there was a free one to get people started?
I was very happy to read on Brian Flood’s blog (dead link) the other day that David Maguire had started up a weblog. If you have ever had a chance to talk, listen or read anything David has been involved with, you know he does a very good job of getting everyone excited about ESRI and GIS in general. I hope he’ll use his blog to focus on what ESRI is doing and has been doing over the course of their existence. Perfect case in point is the latest craze with Google Maps and Google Earth. I pointed out last week to everyone that was excited about Gmaps Pedometer that there was an ArcWeb Services application that was 100 times better and just as free. Gjermund has done a great job with Sportsim and he was kind enough to point out some new features he is working on. But even bigger than that has been the notice that my blog entry has gotten in the blogsphere. C.A.R. Report among others noticed the post (dead link) and featured it in their post on Gmap Pedometer. Without my post, I’m sure it would have gone unnoticed by them. (though they do call me a Google Maps naysayer, but I think I’m more of a Gmap Realist)
I hope David that you’ll be able to do more of this (as well as all ESRI bloggers). Weblogs are a really easy way to educate people to your products and with RSS Aggregators, people get that information as soon as it is posted, not when an email or magazine shows up months down the road. If ESRI can take control of the conversation about GIS, more people will better understand what you are doing and you’ll improve your relationship with your users. Sure, people will still make statements like “ESRI Sucks” but if you can directly answer them (take a look at my post about reading the blogsphere) you’ll be able to most likely change their opinions or at least discount them (the search “ESRI Sucks” is of great benefit). Google is using weblogs to increase their exposure and as I said in my post about ESRI and their PR battle it is something you should look into too.
Lastly David, you should read this article by Bob Lutz (who writes on General Motor’s weblog Fast Lane) which does a great job of explaining why corporate blogging is important and hits on some themes that I outlined above. I think we are all really excited to see some more ESRI bloggers and all of them should take advantage (after you recover for the UC) of weblogs and bring the discussion to the blogsphere.
Link: Google map API transforms the Web – ZDNet.com via PubSub: Google Maps.
“We are getting a great demonstration right now of open source power, as applications using the Google Maps API begin to appear. Mapquest, owned by AOL, has been around for many years, but it’s a proprietary offering. Yahoo Maps has been around for years, but it has been late to this party. It’s Google, using the open source process, that has blown the field apart. The code has only been out a few weeks but already we’re seeing several really great applications.”
Yea, yea Google Maps API is great, but yet another article that doesn’t mention ESRI or their API. It isn’t open source, but they’ve had it much longer than Google has had theirs. But the point they do make at the end of the article is very true.
“And remember, this is just the start. I guarantee that hundreds of programmers are now poring over the Google Map API documentation, thinking about applications that will drive both them, and Google, to new heights.”
I hope we’ll hear an announcement at the ESRI UC that ESRI will release a version of their ArcWeb Services API that these programmers can freely use. If it is features these programmers need and what for their applications, it is ArcWeb Services that can deliver it today, not Google Maps.
Link: Guns, Germs, and Steel and GMaps Census (dead link).
“A quick word on GIS software: ESRI’s ArcGIS is the industry standard, but it can be a challenge to learn and costs way too much. My wife, who does some GIS in her research at the Prevention Research Center in Berkeley, has recently become a big fan of another software called Maptitude. It’s extremely intuitive and an order of magnitude cheaper than ArcGIS.”
I posted about this a couple weeks ago as well as my posts about opening up ArcWeb Services to more users. People want to use ESRI products, but the first word out of their mouths is always it costs too much and in many cases it does. ArcExplorer is about the only free tool that ESRI offers to get into GIS. Compared to products such as Google Earth and the many open source GIS tools, it is very weak and not worth mentioning.
It appears that most users are willing to spend about $500 for a professional GIS system, but their choices are very limited.
Link: Blogging ESRI UC – All Points Blog (dead link).
If you’ve wanted to get move involved in blogging, but haven’t had an opportunity, Directions Magazine is looking for blogger (or wannabe bloggers) to cover the UC. Just email Adena to find out more.
Link: Annotation use cases (dead link).
“The most talked about feature at J1 this year was annotations. It was as if every new API / framework had to have support for annotations or must have something pertaining to it on their radar to gain acceptance or even be considered a contender. I have not yet being able to make my mind if this profileration of @YeahIHaveAnAnnotationToo is a good thing or not. For the time being I am trying to come up with use cases of where annotations make sense. Here are some that I have assimilated from various blogs, J1 sessions and my own brain dumps:”
I’m not a Java programmer, but I love Keyur Shah’s blog (dead link). These kinds of discussions are perfect for users to learn more and respond directly to Keyur. If there are any more ESRI blogger’s getting ready to start up, take a look at Keyur’s blog.
Superb blog Keyur!
Link: ESRI Blog Updates (dead link).
Brian Flood has posted some links to 2 new ESRI bloggers. I like the momentum building before the ESRI UC. I’m hopeful we’ll see some great news by them from the floor of the UC.