Esri Insider : GIS for Everyone, by Anyone

Great post on the ESRI insider Blog by Bern Szukalski on the benefits and simplicity of using ArcGIS Online to create web-based map templates.

Here is the post in its entirity:


Earlier this week I was meeting with one of the directors of a large state agency. Among other topics we discussed, he told me that his organization was adopting a policy to move away from custom application development. Whenever possible they would serve internal and public needs with off-the-shelf applications, or better yet, with those that can be easily custom-configured without the need for programming.

When asked why, he explained the last custom application they'd deployed had to be abandoned - the programmer had left for another job, had taken knowledge of its internal workings with him, and they were unable to hire (because of budget constraints) the programming expertise needed to make the necessary updates to the application.

What color is your parachute?

This same sentiment was echoed while I was visiting with a user in Florida earlier this year. They'd also been stung when several programmers left, leaving behind a key public application that they could no longer maintain.

But before I incur the wrath of developers everywhere, it's often the case that a totally custom application is the only way to provide a finely tuned user experience, or bring into play additional capabilities and components that are essential to the target user. You can only go so far with a configurable application. Nevertheless, configurable applications are easy to maintain and deploy, can be created more quickly and easily than ever before, and perhaps most importantly can be built by just about anyone.

For example, using ArcGIS Online I can assemble a map and configure how the user interacts with it, including choosing from a variety of basemaps, adding my operational layers, adjusting layer transparency, setting display scales, and also configuring what the user sees and experiences in the pop-up window when they click a map feature.

This easily authored webmap is now a building block that can be used in configurable templates that can be published directly from ArcGIS Online (see this blog post for more details), providing the ability to build a custom-configured application and deploy it literally in a matter of minutes.

In the past, doing all of the above and lifting something by coding from the ground-up would have taken a long time and a lot of skill.

A custom-configured application being authored with an ArcGIS Online map. Simply fill in the blanks and check the boxes to include the tools you want.

For more customized and extensible solutions, ArcGIS Viewer for Flex has been popular among Esri users since its introduction, and there is also a configurable ArcGIS Viewer for Silverlight, currently in beta, that leverages the same webmaps and offers the same ease of configuration; both allow you to build custom applications with little or no programming skills.

The ArcGIS Viewer for Silverlight application builder even lets you plug-in geoprocessing tools to extend the applicaton's capabilities.

While visiting a local government user a few months ago, I spoke with one of the GIS staff members who had been building a custom application using ArcGIS Viewer for Flex. He said he had chosen it not because he was particularly interested in Flex, but because he found it very easy to create a custom application even though he was not a programmer himself.

"Esri has always built great developer tools for programmers and software for the GIS professional," he told me. "My problem is I want to reach non-GIS users in my organization and post some public-facing apps. Now for the first time I feel empowered. Even I can build custom applications."

It's clear that it's easier than ever for anyone to build simple custom applications, and all you need is a browser or a text editor. "This isn't just GIS for everyone," he went on to say. "It's GISby anyone."

I couldn't agree more.

By: Bern Szukalski

PostGIS Version 2: A Game Changer?

There is a great post over on GeoRelated.com about PostGIS Version 2 being a game changer. Good summary of how PostGIS Version 2 relates to PostGRES and the options PostGIS Version 2 provides.  Here's the post:

PostGIS Version 2: a game changer?

PostGIS for PostGres

For many years there has been a limited choice of geodatabases when looking for a single solution for all geodata models. Only Oracle and ESRI offered comprehensive coverage of spatial models. OracleSpatial provided database models and algs for vector, network, raster and topology in addition to the usual database refinements and in database geocoding. ESRIoffered ArcGIS Server with comprehensive support for Vector, Network and raster models but left topology to the clients and had no offering for geocoding.Competitors such as PostGIS, MapInfo Spatialware, Microsoft SQL Server and MySQL only offered support for vectors.

It seems the status quo may be about to change. The elephant in the room has started to shuffle its feet towards the finish line. PostGIS version 2.0  not only has big plans but appears to a considerable way into delivering the promise of support for network and raster models. For those of you in the US a tiger geocoder is also available. It looks like the initial support will provide a reasonable coverage of raster and topological models but as always seems to be the problem with open source projects there is very little supporting visual tools.

Raster
Raster support is delivered through dedicated database data types for raster and GDAL based PostGIS drivers to support a wide range of raster formats. There is reasonably rich support for a first edition including:

• Range of functions to access raster metadata
• Raster band manipulation
• Raster processing
• Raster value manipulation/calculation (Algebra, reclass, value manipulation)
• Reprojection
• Vector to raster conversion
• Transform to GDAL formats

Topology
Support for topology is also provided using PostGres data types. The implementation looks less mature than the raster model appearing to offer predominantly CRUD and import/export style capability only at this stage. There are also limited support for transforming data into the topological model in the database.

Vector  Geometry, Geography and Linear Referencing
PostGIS already has comprehensive support for vector geometries including 2D, 3D and linear referencing. PostGIS also supports geography types often used for global representations in its vector model.

PostGIS v2 will be worth watching in 2012 as it heads strongly into the world of GIS. The open source community makes a strong step forward with this release.

What's New in ArcGIS Online (September 2011)

ESRI's Bern Szukalski posted the "What's New in ArcGIS Online" last month in the ArcGIS Online Blog, Lots of great capability coming in ArcGIS Online. I have worked with ESRI products long enough to know that I am banking on ArcGIS Online becoming the best way to display and share geospatial data online for those of us trying to work without a web server.   They have made some great strides in the short amount of time ArcGIS Online has been up and running, and it seems as though they are listening to their customers.  ESRI seems interested in trying to build "mapping communities" rather than just map users. I believe ArcGIS Online goes a long way to building this capability. 

Building an Online Mapping Community

I really like what ESRI has been doing over the last year or so with ArcGIS Online.  I believe they underestimated the value and power of an online collaborative mapping community and were surprised by the popularity of the Google Earth Community.  The last couple of years at their International User Conferences ESRI has been pushing very hard to catch up and create an online collaborative mapping community platform of their own.  I think ArcGIS Online can fill this niche well.  It is nice to see ESRI put resources and effort into this capability.  I have heard ESRI talk for the last couple of years about how important it is to harness the power of crowd sourcing so that everyone can contribute content and create maps, but the price of their software was prohibiting that from happening.  They produce state-of-the-art mapping software, but it is professionally targeted and beyond the ability of the mapping hobbiest to pay for.  What ESRI has done with ArcGIS Online is provide significant mapping capability within the reach of all people.

I have been using ArcGIS Online extensively over the last couple of months and I believe ESRI has created a great collaborative mapping platform.  We are using ArcGIS Online as the platform to host our first online mapping community, the Route 66 Mappers.  I have posted the map of Illinois segment of Route 66 on ArcGIS Online and plan to develop the route from Chicago to Santa Monica via a community format through ArcGIS Online.

Community mapping is a powerful medium to share data in an online environment.  But beyond that, Google Earth has shown us the incredible capability and significant amount of information crowd sourcing can provide.  What ESRI does through ArcGIS Online does that Google through Google Earth can't do is bring professional mappers (GIS Professionals) and collaborative sourcing together into one mapping community. I think ESRI has hit a homerun with ArcGIS Online.

VerticalGeo plans to develop several online mapping communities and leverage ArcGIS Online as the platform for all of them.  No one is more passionate about what they do for a living that GIS Professionals, that is why ESRI's User Conferences continue to grow so quickly.  I am eager to see what projects can be done with this platform.

The Future Looks Bright for Spatial Thinkers

Great post the other day in the ESRI Insider Blog by ESRI's Jack Dangermond about the future of the geospatial industry.  Dangermond said:

Many industries have suffered during the current economic downturn.  So why is it that during this same period, demand for geospatial technology professionals has grown significantly?

I think that this trend is due to the growing understanding of the value of spatial information and analysis.  There are many reasons to implement GIS, but the benefits that we see driving organizations in lean times are cost savings resulting from greater efficiency.  And as we come out of this economic downturn, the efficiencies realized from GIS will become a standard way of doing business, so the need for geospatial professionals will increase even more.

Government has long been at the forefront of this movement, and there will be opportunities here for people with geospatial knowledge, most notably in the area of homeland security and in anything to do with increased transparency and accountability. But we’re now seeing a huge shift in momentum in the commercial arena.  Many of the future career opportunities for geospatial professionals will be in the private sector, as businesses increasingly realize the benefits that government has understood for some time.  

The current high unemployment rate is sending a lot of experienced workers “back to school” to learn new skills more relevant for the 21st century workplace. This is one factor driving the growth of focused geospatial programs at universities and community colleges, both at the degree level and the certificate level.  These programs are doing a great service by training the geospatial workforce of tomorrow. They are also providing many opportunities for seasoned geospatial professionals to take on new roles themselves—passing on their vast knowledge by instructing and teaching the next generation of geospatial professionals.

As the reach of spatial information expands, new opportunities are created for spatial thinkers in many areas.

But the career opportunities here are not just for the people who sit in front of keyboards and “do GIS”. It’s much bigger than that.  I think that the real growth opportunity is in the area of spatial thinking.  As people in all types of positions become more familiar with the value of geography, they begin to ask more intelligent questions about the world, and they begin to make more informed decisions. The coming opportunities for spatial thinkers will be even greater than those we are seeing for geospatial technology professionals.

By Jack Dangermond

Cloud GIS Is?

SlashGeo has an interesting poll going on just what people’s thoughts are on Cloud GIS.  The Poll Questions is:

“Cloud GIS Is?”

With 105 votes here are the results:

-  Just a buzz word that will pass away: 12%
-  Useful to only a few: 12%
-  Will eventually rule enterprise GIS: 11%
-  The natural evolution of enterprise GIS: 50%
-  The cloud will engulf everything: 11%

That is a pretty wide array of answers that goes all the way from people burying their head in the sand and hoping Cloud GIS will go away, to the cloud will engulf everything.   I will follow the results and report them as the poll matures.

Goings On at VGSI

We have been looking at leasing a location to hold GIS training classes in the local area (St Louis Metro East, Illinois). We have also been contacted by a couple of businesses about designing webpages for them. It has been a busy month at VGSI and one hopefully that will help define us in the future.

GiS, GIs and gIS

The All Points Blog has a good article on the changing scene involving GIS interoperability. It is locatd here. Link. It really is all about the enterprise architecture helping make consumption of data as easy as possible.