In+ersec+ion for Spatial People

Quite a few interesting news in this batch mode edition.

From the open source front:

• It was the first time I heard about the open source LSI Viewer, an online Shapefile viewer
• There's the new MapProxy 1.5.0 released
• And Portable GIS is now at version 3.1
• It is also the first time we mention GisClient.org, "an open source software written in AJAX, Javascript, PHP/MapScript that offers an innovative way to manage complex GIS projects. The main strength in it is that allows to configure a big range of tools and functionalities easily and quickly."
• If you're working with the U.S. Federal government, take a look at FedGeo Day, to be held in Washington DC on February 28, here's the official website
• Here's the MapBox New Features Roundup
• Regarding QGIS, visualising QGIS data in 3D with Blender and on Sharing QGIS Symbols
• Here's the just released OSGeo 2011 Annual Report
• A bugfix, PostGIS 2.0.2 has been released
• And there's the call for papers and new website for FOSS4G 2013, in the U.K. this year
• The open source ArcGIS for Local Government Apps Available Now on GitHub

From the Google front:

• Google announced two new features for the Google Places API: Place Photos and Radar Search.
• Google wants us to know that they're listening to our Google Maps feedback
• The GEB shares links for The making of the "Powers of Ten", the 1977 video
• The GEB also reports that Botswana not happy with Google Street View, since it "compromise their security"

In the miscellaneous category:

• APB informs us about cloud-offloaded GPS (CO-GPS) to decrease power needed by GPS devices
• DM reports that the National Geologic Map Database Gets a Face Lift
• We now have drones that can infect with software virus other drones
• Here's an OGC summary of Location Business Summit USA 2012
• Augmented reality to the extreme, Belgian Researchers Build LCD Contact Lenses
• Extending their offer, MapBox Teams Up with DigitalGlobe on Satellite Imagery
• Here's the ArcGIS Online World Topographic Map December 2012 updates, and also Esri-related, Esri Updates Terms of Use on (Free) Personal Accounts for ArcGIS Online
• On geospatial jobs, APB shares two interesting entries; NZ Report on Geospatial Skill Shortage and Four of Eight Emerging Careers for 2013 Demand Geospatial Skills

in the maps category:

• Here's an entry named Using Series of Maps to Represent Changes in Time: How Diabetes Swept the U.S.
• VerySpatial links to an entry and map on the geography of US charity
• Let's end this issue with a fake map on procrasti-nation

Still in my geonews catching up process, here's the open source-related geonews not shared yet.

• Via LinkedIn I learned about HSLayers and Proxy4OWS,
  • For HSLayers: "HSLayers is yet another JavaScript Mapping framework. You can use it for building rich mapping portals, as well as use it’s parts for improving your simple OpenLayers-based map."
  • For Proxy4OWS: "It is transforming OGC WMS request types from the client, into WCS or WFS requests, so that the target server can accept them."
• For OpenStreetMap, I liked the 'Worst of OSM' page showing failed imports, I guess we wouldn't see this from proprietary providers (via)
• For those unable to move to 2.0, PostGIS 1.5.4 was released
• If you want to learn about GeoExt 2 development
• GeoNode 1.1.1 was released
• And so was MapProxy 1.4.0
• As an indirect user of GEOS, I'm happy that GEOS graduated OSGeo incubation
• The OSGeo also informed us of the First Open Source Geospatial Laboratory in South America and First African Open Source Geospatial Laboratory
• You might have an interest in the Comprehensive preview of MapGuide Open Source 2.4 series
• libais 0.7 was released: "C++ decoder for Automatic Identification System for tracking ships and decoding maritime information"
• APB informs us  that the famous AP, Associated Press, is moving to TileMill and Leaflet for their interactive maps

We mentioned the open source MapProxy a few times since 2010, including the 1.0.0 release about a year ago. Less than two weeks ago, MapProxy 1.3.0 was released. Anyone with an interest in tile caching might be interested in reading this previous story named FOSS4G 2011: What about a Tiling Shootout?

Amongst the new features for the 1.3.0 release: "

• RESTful WMTS: The MapProxy WMTS now also supports the RESTful API. This service also supports custom URL templates for your service.
• CouchDB cache backend: You can now use a CouchDB as a backend for tile caches. Each cache gets stored into a separate database and you can configure the layout of the URLs of each tile. You can also add additional metadata for each tile."

The MapProxy project is pleased to announce the 1.0.0 release of MapProxy.

MapProxy is a tile cache solution, but also offers many new and innovative features like full support for any WMS clients.

MapProxy is actively developed and supported, it was released as Open Source in March 2010 under the GNU AGPL License 3.0, runs on Unix/Linux and Windows and is easy to install and to configure.

More information can be found at: http://mapproxy.org

The updated documentation: http://mapproxy.org/docs/1.0.0/

Here are some of the features that where added in the last year:

Seeding-Tool:
MapProxy comes with an advanced seeding tool that allows you to create, update and remove tiles for specific areas. You can use Shapefiles and other sources to define the geometries of these areas. The seed tool is also multithreaded and optimized to work with WMS services with large datasets. MapProxy also handles "empty" tiles (e.g. blue ocean) to save disk space.

Complex WMS:
MapProxy supports nested layer groups and each layer or layer group can be cached or cascaded. Cached layers can be 10-100 times faster. You can combine layers from different servers and make opaque layers transparent. It also supports GetLegendGraphics and GetFeatureInfo requests. Feature info responses can be transformed with XSLT scripts. You can mix all WMS versions, image formats and SRS: MapProxy will translate, convert and reproject on-the-fly if necessary.

There is also a new interface that allows the integration of fine-grained user authorization.

You can find more information about all features in the updated documentation
http://mapproxy.org/docs/1.0.0/

You can join our mailing list if you have any questions:
http://mapproxy.org/support.html