Wednesday 6 Jan 2010 by Gary Sherman |
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Filed under:
GIS in General,
Open Source Tags:
Open Source,
os x,
unix
In a recent post on VerySpatial.com, Jesse was discussing the apparent dominance of U*nix and observed:
‘…the geospatial industry almost completely left behind support for UNIX-like OSes’
It is true that the proprietary GIS vendors have largely abandoned Unix and Unix-like operating systems and continue to do so. However the open source GIS community has embraced all major operating systems with software that runs on Linux, *BSD, Mac OS X, and yes, Windows. This support includes everything from the desktop to the server.
For those of us that prefer to operate in a Un*x environment, that’s good news.
Monday 4 Jan 2010 by Gary Sherman |
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Filed under:
ESRI,
Open Source Tags:
ESRI,
fgdb,
shapefile
The death of the shapefile has again been predicted—this time for 2010.
The technical description of the format has been around for going on 12 years. In that time it has become a sort of lowest common denominator for data exchange. They’re everywhere. Making them go away is going to require a revolution of sorts.
ESRI has been sounding the death knell for the shapefile for a while now. I agree that it isn’t a perfect format but it is nearly perfectly supported.
If ESRI really wants the shapefile to go away, they will produce a fully open API for the File Geodatabase—one that can be used outside the Arc* realm. One that can be obtained and used at no cost or license fee.
There is a raft of open source programmers waiting in the wings to code against it and provide support and interoperability for the open source GIS world.
We’re waiting…
Saturday 2 Jan 2010 by Gary Sherman |
5 Comments
Filed under:
Open Source
In my last post I created a poll to get an idea of the extent of migration to open source GIS on the desktop. The results indicated that nearly 50% of the people using open source GIS were still using their proprietary software as well. You can view the results of the poll using the Polls Archive link below the current poll.
This leads one to wonder if it is the state of the open source software or other reasons that prevent a full migration. Take a look at the poll (right margin) and if you are a partial adopter, please vote or post a comment on what’s holding you back.
Friday 20 Nov 2009 by Gary Sherman |
7 Comments
Filed under:
Open Source Tags:
Open Source
I keep seeing more evidence that many people and organizations are migrating to open source GIS on the desktop. In many cases a mix of proprietary and open source GIS is in use.
I’m wondering about other’s experiences in this area. To gain some insight, I’ve created a poll (right margin). Please take a second and vote.
Monday 10 Aug 2009 by Gary Sherman |
4 Comments
Filed under:
Open Source,
Platforms Tags:
linux
$ uptime
20:20:56 up 434 days, 15:31, 2 users, load average: 2.32, 0.89, 0.53
Monday 27 Apr 2009 by Gary Sherman |
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Filed under:
GDAL/OGR,
Open Source Tags:
gdal,
qgis
Take a look at:
The Volcano and the Buffer | Desktop GIS – the book
It includes an example that uses CSV, GDAL/OGR VRT, QGIS, and fTools to figure out if I was in danger of being buried in a volcanic ash fall (not much danger but sounds dramatic).
Saturday 21 Feb 2009 by Gary Sherman |
5 Comments
Filed under:
Python,
Quantum GIS
One of the hurdles in developing a QGIS plugin with Python is just getting the basics down. Getting the plugin setup so it is recognized by QGIS and properly adds it’s menu and toolbar items can be a bit of a chore, especially the first time.
To make the process easier, I put together a web tool to generate a plugin that can be used as a starting point. The tool creates a fully functional plugin that can be loaded in QGIS 1.x. The generated plugin contains an icon and a simple dialog with Ok and Cancel buttons.
Give the PyQGIS Plugin Builder a try and feel free to provide comments and suggestions.
Tuesday 10 Feb 2009 by Gary Sherman |
2 Comments
Filed under:
Open Source,
Quantum GIS
The recent release of QGIS 1.0 provides an excellent opportunity for developers looking to create standalone mapping applications with Python.
I recently posted an article on creating a very simple standalone application with Python and QGIS 1.0. Much of the Python efforts thus far have been devoted to creating QGIS plugins. I think now that we have a stable API, you’ll begin to see more custom applications that meet a specialized need.
If you are developing such applications, it would be great to hear from you.
Sunday 19 Oct 2008 by Gary Sherman |
1 Comment
Filed under:
GIS in General
Looks like the ink is dry on Desktop GIS and it should start shipping soon. You can get the full scoop from the Pragmatic Bookshelf.
Update: It’s now shipping. See the announcement.
Thursday 2 Oct 2008 by Gary Sherman |
No Comments
Filed under:
Open Source
After a rather long lapse, I had the occasion to write some Java code recently (mainly because it didn’t look like Howard’s PySDE was functional).
I didn’t like it.
Not to start a language flame war, but after using Python almost exclusively for 6 months, I found Java to be cumbersome. I kept thinking “if it were Python I could do it this way”.
Sending an email from Java—frightening. From Python—simple.
Lest you think I’m a Java newbie, I’ve been using it for both desktop and web applications for over 10 years.
Its ease of use and rapid development time, coupled with the fact that Python is the de facto “GIS” scripting language in most arenas, makes it my new favorite language.
Of course the old axiom still stands—To each his own…
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