In+ersec+ion for Spatial People

Still catching up my August holidays, here's the recent geospatial open source and open data geonews.

In general news:

• O'Reilly publishes an article named With new maps and apps, the case for open transit gets stronger: "There’s no reason why important civic infrastructure should get bound up in a fight between Apple and Google. And in communities with public GTFS, it won’t."
• Esri published an update on their relation with open source: "Esri has always hosted open code and samples in a variety of ways, but more can be done. Focus and motivation needs to be improved, and Esri is now making it a priority to improve its open source participation. More of Esri’s code should and will be open sourced in the coming days, weeks, months, and years." They are also on Github now, http://github.com/esri and http://github.com/arcgis
• sxdf
• India launched the beta of their open data portal
• MapQuest have a New Geocoding Service and Updated APIs Based on Open Data
• OpenGeo shares an article named Haitidata.org: using open source geospatial for disaster response planning
• FOSS4G software getting adopted, gvSIG 1.11 now official part of the standard software portfolio in the City of Munich and Luxembourg using open source GIS for cadastre
• DM shares a 2-parts article named Designing an Open Source Geospatial Solution to Manage Airport Noise and Operations
• For the curious ones, here's the new OSGeo Board and Charter members refreshed

In software news:

• The OSGeo-Live 6.0 GIS software collection has been released
• A serious OpenLayers competitor, Leaflet 0.4 has been released, actually, they're at version 0.4.3 now
• Believe it or not, MySQL inches closer to PostGIS with support of true spatial relationship functions
• Here's a short entry on Surface Interpolation in GeoServer and there's a new release, v 1.4.3, of GeoServer-Manager
• Nathan is enthusiastic about Five new awesomely awesome QGIS features, here's more on the Latest Style User Interface Improvements
• There's a new winGRASS 7 with R-integration
• Where's MapGuide Open Source? Here's MapGuide state of the union address (or: Results of the user/developer survey)

The GeoServer team is happy to announce the release of GeoServer 2.2-RC3.The release is available for download from:

http://geoserver.org/display/GEOS/GeoServer+2.2-RC3

This release comes with assorted bug fixes and small improvements, and aims to be the latest RC before the final release. Notable changes:

• improvements in the security subsystem upgrade from the 2.1.x series
• bug fixes and improvements in the control-flow module (you won’t be wondering anymore if it’s properly installed, or not)
• avoid deadlocks on some WFS transactions

The entire change logfor the 2.2-RC3 release is available in the issue tracker:

http://jira.codehaus.org/secure/ReleaseNote.jspa?projectId=10311&version=18700

A very special thanks to all those who contributed bug fixes and improvementsto this release.

–The GeoServer Team

You guessed it, that's the last 'batch geonews' entry for the next two weeks. This edition is much shorter than usual. 

From the open source front:

• The open source virtual globe Marble 1.4 has been released for MS Windows
• On scalability, Troubleshooting large GeoServer deployment

From the Google front:

• Nothing less than 130 smaller U.S. cities now with traffic on Google Maps, along with additions and improvements elsewhere
• Expect cities added to the new Google 3D display mode on a regular basis, this time, fly through Seattle and Denver with new 3D imagery on Google Earth for mobile
• Google Map Maker spreading, add your knowledge to the Poland and Ukraine maps (you know me, I am going to tell you you can also add it to OpenStreetMap ;-)
• Kurt shares two short entries on MSL/Curiosity in Google Mars and Gale Crater - Mars Science Laboratory / Curiosity

In the miscellaneous category:

• A demonstration of how things can be easy nowadays, a DM article named Georeferencing on a Budget: Using iPhone and Freeware Apps to Geotag a Mountain of Image Files

Here's the recent open source-related geonews in batch mode.

In software updates:

• GeoServer 2.1.4 had been released
• And so was GeoTools 2.7.5 released

• Geopaparazzi 3 has been released too, more here
• And as an indirect user of it, I'm happy that GEOS 3.3.4 was released too
• The OpenGeo Suite 2.5 was released, with updated Linux packages

In other news:

• If you missed it, see this informative comment from the DB4GeO developers, including comparing it to PostGIS 2.0 3D capabilities
• Regarding QGIS, here's fixing invalid geometries with Quantum GIS, another entry named SLD Support and other QGIS 1.8 Style Features
• For GeoServer, Accurate datum shift and full transformation control in GeoServer
• Here,s a summary of the FOSS4G-CEE Conference in Prague

• Here's an entry named GeoWebCache Tweaks Checklist

• And we haven't mentioned OpenStreetMap yet, improving the OpenStreetMap Profile Page for more Social Interaction

Here's the recent geonews in batch mode.

From the open source front:

• Here's a DM summary entry on FOSS4G-NA 2012 that I haven't shared yet, and it's pretty informative
• There's a new video showing us uDig features
• Here's examples of using QGIS in local government, related to QGIS, here's an entry on What's New in QGIS Plugins
• A technical entry on dynamic WMS styling with GeoServer with SLD
• Here's an interesting web browser memory usage experiment for OpenLayers

From the Google front:

• Google announce new StreetView imagery for Israel in an entry named Exploring Jerusalem’s Old City streets with Street View
• There's also an update to the Google Maps API deprecation policy and Terms of Service
• The GEB reminds us the options we have for Sharing your favorite locations in Google Earth

On the Microsoft front:

• You can now Find Venue Maps, Businesses and Buildings Faster on Bing Maps
• Bing Maps is Reducing the Complexity of Rendering Shapes

Discussed over Slashdot:

• A "Big Brother Chip", the Broadcom 4752, that acts as a ubiquitous location chip using everything available: "global navigation satellites, cell phone towers, and Wi-Fi hot spots, coupled with input from gyroscopes, accelerometers, step counters, and altimeters"
• A GPS system that will speed up tsunami warnings
• The Physical Travelling Salesman Challenge
• Using satellite imagery to counting Emperor Penguins from space

Directions Mag articles of note:

• The Top 10 Things You Should Know about GIS Certification, including "In 2012, more than 5,000 people are active GISPs." and "Eight states have recognized and endorsed the GISP"
• A Q&A entry about Is Intergraph’s New GeoMedia Smart Client for You?

In the everything else category:

• The ESA mentions Envisat's mapping of ice shelf disintegration in Antarctic and update on the investigation of Envisat woes, being offline since early April
• @Thierry_G links to interesting impressions on the Where 2012 conference titled From Where 2.0 To Just Where; With Meh 2.0 Somewhere In The Middle, asking where is the geospatial excitement today?
• Via Paul I found this extreme video example of augmented reality
• APB has an entry on TomTom’s New Global Geocoder Targets Power Users
• SS shares a perspective named Have the geospatial technology frontiers changed much in three years?
• SS also shares an interesting summary of a session on capacity building and the expansion of the global geospatial marketplace to a billion plus people

In the maps category:

• O'Reilly shares two visualizations, one on The history of shipping routes and the other on Mapping the Titanic's passengers

​This batch mode edition is unusually long. It covers the past month and a bit more. Yes, that's way too much and I won't try to repeat the experience ;-) Here's what I considered pertinent enough to share with you. Exceptionally, in some cases I haven't gave attribution to the source of the news, thank you for your comprehension.

On the geospatial open source front:

• I just recently became aware of PostGISonline, a site for testing and learning spatial SQL
• You can now create and manipulate SLD (the OGC Styled Layer Descriptor standard) in Python with python-sld
• Via the AGISRS list, I learned about OpenQuake.org, for calculating seismic hazard and risk at any scale, which of course ingest geospatial data and outputs maps
• Here's WherePost.ca, which crowdsources the location of mailboxes and post offices for Canada
• Here's the Switch2OSM website promoting OpenStreetMap, OpenStreetMap might go indoor too
• Still on the OSM topic, V1 shares an entry on the use of OpenStreetMap data in agriculture
• Here's an entry on the future of GeoCouch and CouchDB
• GeoServer gets database-level security
• There's now a plugin to run Python scripts in QGIS
• Here's about improvements to the QGIS rule-based rendering
• On a similar topic, here's a guide to beautiful reliefs in QGIS
• Did you know you can add Google Maps, OSM, and Bing Maps directly in QGIS? You can via the OpenLayers plugin - hey, there's even a Profile plugin
• There's an updated book published by Gary Sherman, now named The Geospatial Desktop , subtitled Open source GIS and mapping
• GEOS 3.3.2 has been released

On the Esri front:

• Mandown shares how to convert GPX files to Features using ArcGIS 10
• From the same source, Learn The Basics Of Working With The ArcGIS Runtime SDK For Android
• There were updates to ArcGIS for SharePoint, ArcGIS Mobile and to the ArcGIS API for Windows Phone
• James and SS talks about ArcGIS Online as the Esri Content Management System

On the Microsoft front:

• Microsoft announced a few new Bing Maps features, such as traffic incidents and find near route
• They announced the Bing Maps Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) Control v1
• There's new Bing Maps V7 modules too along with a new routing engine
• James Fee shares an interesting entry named Bing Maps gets Nokia Brand and Possibly the Boot

On the remote sensing front:

• This is pretty interesting to many: SS shares an entry named USGS Now Offers OrbView-3 High-Resolution Images for Free, 180,000 scenes at 1m spatial resolution available
• China launched their first high-resolution remote sensing satellite, Ziyuan I-02C
• Slashdot discussed the newly released version of Blue Marble high definition (and beautiful) satellite image of the Earth from the Suomi NPP satellite
• Slashdot is running a story named Who's Flying Those Drones? FAA Won't Say and related, O'Reilly mentions OpenPilot, open source UAV with cameras
• And another named Launch Your Own Nanosatellite Into Space

On the GNSS / GPS front:

• It's coming, car makers are preparing for augmented reality driving
• Not exactly GPS but via radio-tagging, see the nice and short video of whale 3D paths in the ocean
• Slashdot is also discussing a story named New Mexico Is Stretching, GPS Reveals
• MapQuest launched an html5 app-like site for Android and iPhone for using MapQuest

In the miscellaneous category:

• The 7 geo predictions for 2012 of Cédric are interesting 
• Microsoft's Flight Simulator, renamed Flight, will be available for free next Spring, with paid extra content
• We never mentioned it before, but now Indiemapper is free, it "helps you make static, thematic maps from geographic data by bringing the best of traditional cartographic design to internet map-making."
• SS mentions the new alliance between Autodesk and Pitney Bowes, APB also discuss this new relationship
• SS also shares an entry named Safe Software’s Expanded Role as a Conduit Between Sensors and Systems
• The U.S. EPA in their Locations Challenge introduced a crowdsourcing project of georeferenced photos of environmental problems
• Slashdot ran a discussion on assembling your own 3D printer
• The OGC shared a summary of the Eye on Earth Summit held in December
• Another OGC entry was named Status of the OGC's Water Resource Activities
• DM shares an article named GIS Adoption and Use on College Campuses: An End-of-Year Review and Look Ahead to 2012
• The GEB mentions a new 3D San Francisco website
• I found interesting the possibility of a .data TLD
• A new free iPad app: GeoViewer from LizardTech, supports MrSID format and more
• It's been a while since we mentioned them, GISCorps were recently in 7 countries, including Libya

In the maps category:

• APB summarizes this: Comparing Maps of Obesity and Car Travel
• Here's an entry on cleanly using symbols on maps
• Here's U.S. routes as a subway map and the U.S. National Wind Energy Map
• Fox News shared a map with missing or wrongly placed countries
• TMR shares an obligatory animated map of rising global temperatures since 1880

PRESS RELEASE

Publishing Open Data using Open Standards

GeoCat - The Government Geographic Data Publishing Company introduces GeoCat Bridge™ v1.1 

Bennekom, 10 January 2012 - GeoCat Bridge™ is designed to publish geospatial data and metadata on the Internet with a click of a button. GeoCat Bridge is an Esri® ArcGIS® Desktop extension. Publishing is done through Open Standards on a proven Free and Open Software (FOSS) server platform. Numerous government agencies, universities and privately held companies are satisfied users of Bridge version 1.0

Open Data - Open Standards!

Using a high performance server solution with unparalleled support for OGC services, data providers can deliver Open Data through Open Standards. Publishing data through Open Standards is critical to make your work a success. It allows consumers to make optimal use of your data.

Bridge has been optimized to work with the GeoServer map server and the GeoNetwork opensource metadata catalog. This free and open source server platform publishes your data in the most common data formats. Your data can be combined with Open Street Map, Google Maps™, Bing® or other base maps. 

“GeoCat Bridge is the long awaited product that promises to fill the gap between our open - and closed source hybrid geospatial frameworks” according to Thijs van Menen from Rijkswaterstaat (Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment, The Netherlands). “Specific knowledge on how to make services is no longer needed. Finally we can fulfill the needs of our staff by providing them with a tool to make services by themselves in an easy way”

Comply with the INSPIRE Directive

GeoCat Bridge makes it extremely easy to comply with the European INSPIRE directive. You can create INSPIRE View Services with related metadata that complies to INSPIRE or is based upon an even more specific country profile (check availability). 

”The combination of ArcGIS Desktop and publishing data to an open source server platform in accordance with INSPIRE regulations is exactly what our customers need” said Sjaak Dieleman of Nieuwland Geo-Informatie “It is one of the main reasons why we were asked to build the INSPIRE services for all 25 Regional Water Authorities and the Department of Cultural Heritage (RCE) in The Netherlands”

New in Version 1.1 - Exhaustive Symbology and PostGIS Support

With the introduction of Version 1.1 a lot of improvements were implemented that contribute to an even better end-result and user experience. An exhaustive list of complex symbols is supported allowing a one-on-one conversion from Desktop to Web Map. Publishing map legends, ArcGIS 10 support, GeoSticker support and ArcSDE layer support have been added or further improved. 

Another major step is the support for PostGIS. It is now possible to upload data directly into a PostGIS database and configure map services on GeoServer using that data store. This can dramatically boost your map server performance.

“GeoCat Bridge is a key part of our Neftex Earth Model publishing workflow, enabling us to easily replicate the geological symbols used to style our ArcGIS produced content” said Alex Rushfort of Neftex ”Now we can deliver Web Map Services to our international oil industry clients through GeoServer, retaining the familiar appearance of our desktop GIS data products”

You can do it!

No advanced skills required! As a Bridge user you can fully enjoy all of the relevant functionality GeoServer and GeoNetwork have to offer without the need to be a web mapping or metadata expert. Map services and metadata are automatically linked, complexity of map symbology is no longer an issue, preview images are automatically generated and much, much more. 

“We are very excited to offer the GeoCat Bridge plugin to users of the OpenGeo Suite” said Chris Holmes, OpenGeo President ” This will greatly improve workflows for our users of Esri Desktop software, and make it much simpler for everyone to put their maps onto the web"

Pricing & Availability - Try Now for Free

GeoCat Bridge is available worldwide for a retail price of €1200,-  for a single Standard license and €1500,- for the Premium version (Prices Excluding VAT). More details, also regarding other types of licenses and volume discounts, can be found on  http://www.geocat.net/bridge/order-now. 

During the month of January 2012 we offer you a one week FREE trial license to give you the possibility to experience all functionality first hand (http://www.geocat.net/bridge/try-now). In addition to the Bridge software GeoCat offers premium support contracts and services on GeoNetwork and the OpenGeo Suite to get you up and running quickly.

About GeoCat bv

GeoCat bv, The Government Geographic Data Publishing Company, was established in the Netherlands in 2007 and offers cutting-edge, customized software and services that make publishing geospatial data on the Internet easier and more efficient than ever. GeoCat offers consultancy and support for GeoNetwork and has a direct partnership with OpenGeo to deliver OpenGeo Suite Support and Services. GeoCat provides consulting services and products that contribute to the development of National Spatial Data Infrastructures for The Netherlands, Swiss, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Scotland, ESA and many others. GeoCat’s Jeroen Ticheler founded the GeoNetwork opensource metadata catalog project.

Copyright © 2012 GeoCat bv. All rights reserved. GeoCat Bridge is a trademark of GeoCat bv. Esri, ArcGIS Desktop, ArcSDE and GeoSticker are trademark or registered trademarks of Esri in the United States, the European Community, or certain other jurisdictions. Google Maps is a trademark of Google Inc in the United States and/or other countries. Bing is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.

# # #

Press Information:

Harald Pouwel, GeoCat B.V.
Tel.: +31 (0)6 29 06 65 15
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.geocat.net

Here's the recent open source geospatial news.

• O'Reilly mentioned AntiMap, an open source toolset for recording and visualising your own location data from a smartphone, such lat long, compass direction, speed, distance, time and POI
• Here's the shapefile-js project, allowing you to render local shapefiles with HTML5
• We mentioned Fiona before, Sean reports on where's Fiona, a python OGR API, now at its v0.5 release
• Quantum GIS 1.7.3 has been released, and they're getting closer to QGIS 1.8.0 and 2.0, apparently QGIS benefits from great momentum
• GeoServer 2.1.3 has been release, related, here's an entry named Robust Clustering Solution for GeoServer
• GeoTools 2.7.4 has been released
• Its been since last Spring that we heard about the open source virtual globe Marble, here's an entry on Marble's satellite view
• In this OpenGeo interview of Matt Priour, I learned about MapStory.org, "MapStory is an infrastructure for enabling “MapStorytelling” as a means of communicating important sociocultural dynamics to a global audience."
• In this entry, you'll learn about using PgRouting on OpenStreetMap data within QGIS
• Still on the same topic here's the vector transparency plugin for QGIS
• Here's how to create coloured rasters with GDAL
• If you're in Europe, the FOSS4G-CEE & Geoinformatics 2012 conference will be held in Prague May 21-23

Grontmij Joins OpenGeo’s International Partner Program

Grontmij to Provide Expert, Local Support of OpenGeo Suite to Scandinavia

Copenhagen, DK & New York, NY, December 19, 2011 — Grontmij, a leading European engineering consultancy and OpenGeo producer of the OpenGeo Suite, have announced a reseller agreement that will bring the OpenGeo Suite Enterprise Edition to Scandinavia.

OpenGeo is well known for its contributions and leadership in the development and evolution of powerful open source geospatial technologies. The OpenGeo Suite offers a fully integrated open source geospatial platform for serving maps and data through web applications, mobile devices, and desktop clients. The OpenGeo Suite Enterprise Edition is comprised of tested, integrated and supported geospatial components GeoServer, OpenLayers, GeoWebCache, PostGIS and GeoExt.

Grontmij will assume first line support of the OpenGeo Suite for local clientele in Scandinavia while having privileged access to OpenGeo for second line support. Upon making the announcement, Grontmij Director of GIS and IT, Nils Bo Wille-Jørgensen, said, "We are very pleased to offer our clients even better support and an even closer connection to the people behind these outstanding geospatial components."

Chris Holmes, OpenGeo president, added: "Grontmij is a well respected international organization that has joined a diverse group of businesses who see value in partnering with OpenGeo. Together we’re all able to offer our clients better service and support. What’s especially important is that we’re able to give back to the software projects that comprise the OpenGeo Suite. We’re very happy to be working with Grontmij and to have a local expert on the ground in Scandinavia."

About OpenGeo

OpenGeo is a social enterprise working to build the best web-based geospatial technology. The company brings the best practices of open source software to geospatial organizations around the world by providing enterprises with supported, tested, and integrated open source solutions to build the Geospatial Web. OpenGeo also supports open source communities by employing key developers of PostGIS, GeoServer, and OpenLayers. Since 2002, the company has provided successful consulting services and products to clients like the World Bank, Google, Ordnance Survey Great Britain, Portland TriMet, MassGIS, Landgate, and the Federal Communications Commission. OpenGeo is the geospatial division of OpenPlans, a New York-based 501(c)(3) non-profit that informs and engages communities through journalism and open source software. All of OpenGeo's revenue has been and will continue to be re-invested into innovative and useful software in support of the OpenPlans mission.

Media Contact

David Dubovsky

OpenGeo, a Division of OpenPlans

+1 917-388-9077

[email protected]

About Grontmij

Grontmij is the third largest engineering consultancy in Europe with nearly 10,000 professionals, almost 300 offices across the region, and a further 50 offices on other parts of the globe. The sustainability by design principle is at the heart of their business, and this leading value proposition for our customers is delivered via four business lines: planning/design, transportation/mobility, water/energy, and monitoring/testing.

Media Contact

Nils Bo Wille-Jørgensen

Grontmij, Denmark

+45 4348 6085

Here's the recent geonews that we haven't mentioned yet, in batch mode.

On the open source front:

• You can now animate your maps with the GeoServer WMS Animator Tool
• Here I found out about oculu-Z, an open source, open data platform for collaborative Computer Vision technology
• Want to know where OpenStreetMap is heading? Read this entry on the 2012 OpenStreetMap Foundation Board. Related to OSM, TripAdvisor now uses OpenStreetMap
• DM shared the first of a series of articles on open source geospatial software in the classroom, called Open Source Desktop GIS: Let’s Get Started
• APB mentions the Ushahidi2ArcGIS prototype, which imports Ushahidi data into ArcGIS
• I could only smile when I learned about the PostGIS Day, a day after 'GIS Day'
• gvSIG shares 60 new case studies

In the everything-else category:

• APB reports about an estimation of Esri's worldwide market share at 40.7% in 2010
• MapQuest wants to make certain we know that they don't have preset limits on their free Map API transactions
• DM shares an article named Effective Offshore GIS Data Management Services
• SS informs us that Trimble launched custom printed maps with MyTopo.com, for the U.S. and Canada
• The Map Room shares lists of Map Books of 2011 to help us with our Christmas gifts, TMR also reviews Maphead by Ken Jennings
• V1 discuss a EU Geographical Indications (GI) Scheme report, what ? "The aim of this program is to geographically assign product names, for example, champagne can only come from the Champagne region of France."

In the maps category:

• O'Reilly shares what they call A better U.S. migration [interactive] map
• The popular xkcd cartoon share a funny and geeky cartoon on what your favorite map projection says about you