Hi all,

    @Praseed : I agree to your assumptions to an extent praseed. But the thing 
is, Its hard to believe that an Organization that launches Multi-Billion Rupee 
space vehicles, is unable to find funding for a project which may cost much 
much 
less than half of the money that is required to launch a rocket into space :). 
Well, economics apart; i believe your second point could be really valid. Which 
is finding expertise in the Free Software sector to develop such a tool. Its 
actually much easier (but may not be economical in the long run) to purchase an 
engine from a third party and implement it.. Well the proof; I found out that 
BHUVAN uses a plugin called "Terra explorer" which is developed by a U.S Based 
company called Skyline. So i just searched for a GPL based 
terrain rendering plugin or engine and found out one :).. Hope my findings are 
correct. Please verify that the links below i have given can be used as a 
replacement for the proprietary Terra Explorer plugin in BHUVAN.

Reference (where i found about the plugin used in BHUVAN) :
 http://www.pluggd.in/isro-bhuvan-download-297/

Skyline's Home page 
: http://www.skylineglobe.com/SkylineGlobe/Corporate/Home/index.aspx

Actually my search ended on this page :
http://www.vterrain.org/Packages/GovEdu/ and http://www.vterrain.org/

And finally the plugin i believe could be used as a replacement 
: http://ratman.sourceforge.net/

  
      @Rashad : I am really happy to know that you and your team have taken 
such 
a great initiative. Its worth appreciable. Wishing all the very best in the 
future. And by the way..Its not harm in competing with BHUVAN or Google earth. 
It only makes things much better i believe :). I really have no prior knowledge 
(nor am i a hard core programmer) to understand about the technologies that you 
are using now. But of course, i do understand software, and was once a good 
programmer too :).


Best Regards,
S.Sreekanth
"Happy Hacking!! ;)"


________________________________
From: Mohammed Rashad <[email protected]>
To: "This List discusses GNU/Linux & GNU, GPL Software" 
<[email protected]>
Sent: Sat, 11 September, 2010 1:48:03 PM
Subject: Re: [ILUG-Cochin.org] ISRO vs Opensource GIS


Praseed Pai,
   Yes, I am working now at IIIT Hyderabad. The wondeful thing is that here 
also 
I can work on opensource GIS. Now I am working on GRASS but we will start the 
India GIS/webGIS project in parallel with my current works. If we succeeded in 
that project it MAYBE be good as ISRO Bhuvan. we are not competiting with ISRO 
or other commercial GIS companies. Our plan is to spread the good word of 
OpenSource and GIS

All we need for raster,vector is available in the Opensource GIS tools. But the 
part we need is a custom webGIS interface running on top GRASS GIS. Its not 
easy. 

My plan is merge OL with GRASS and a good scripting tool to make this possible.

Hope it works :)





On Sat, Sep 11, 2010 at 11:18 AM, Praseed Pai <[email protected]> wrote:

Hi Rashad ,
>    I have heard about the stuff you are developing from Ashok Shenoy. It is a 
>great initiative on the past of Grass team. (Which includes you !.. if i am 
>not 
>mistaken , now
>you are working on the stuff from IIIT,hyd. ..r8 ? ) 
>
>The problem here is there should be commerical companies which can give 
>support 
>to the users like ISRO. The service providers will have to be cost 
>compettitive 
>to the proprietory companies. To have such a company around there should be 
>people 
>
>who are comfortable with Vector and Raster Graphics , File formats , Compilers 
>( 
>Lex and yacc ) etc. 
>
>
>We need to build that as part of the FOSS initiative
>
>
>
>
>regards
>Praseed Pai
>http://praseedp.blogspot.com
>
>
>--- On Sat, 9/11/10, Mohammed Rashad <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>>From: Mohammed Rashad <[email protected]>
>>Subject: Re: [ILUG-Cochin.org] ISRO vs Opensource GIS
>>
>>To: "This List discusses GNU/Linux & GNU, GPL Software" 
>><[email protected]>
>>Date: Saturday, September 11, 2010, 12:50 AM
>>
>>
>>
>>Hi all,
>>  ISRO bhuvan is something similar to Google Earth. But I am developing a GIS 
>>software which gives all information about India.
>>It does not use satellite data but uses static maps of the whole india. I had 
>>bought 25 maps from NATMO.
>>
>>
>>It will have a web version as well as desktop. It will be built using GRASS 
>>GIS 
>>and other FOSS tools.
>>From the 25 maps I have many layers
>>Roads
>>Rails
>>Airways
>>Postal & Telecommunication
>>Colleges
>>universities
>>Ports
>>soil
>>geology
>>medical institutions
>>etc..
>>......
>>and its a big list :)
>>
>>
>>It will highlight India rather than World as in google earth.It will also 
>>have 
>>many layers which ISRO Bhuvan and Google Earth are missing!!
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>On Sat, Sep 11, 2010 at 7:13 AM, Praseed Pai <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Hi all ,
>>>  Most probably ISRO will be relying on a Proprietory Engine from a Canadian 
>>>company like Arcview (etc) . Their Viewer on Windows will
>>>be using DirectX ( They are forced to use DirectX 9 , because MS has
>>>not deliberately implemented later versions of DirectX on XP. Still,
>>>a critical mass is using XP ). The Google has got support for DX or OGL.
>>>They can afford that because , their budget might be far bigger than
>>>that of ISRO
>>>
>>>I think project is a quick hack , if it was otherwise using a FOSS Library 
>>>would 
>>>have been better. But, the budgetory issues with FOSS on a project
>>>might have forced them to use Proprietory stuff.(Buy vs Make -your are 
>>>essentially making a engine when you use open source stuff )
>>>
>>>It is a complicated issue.
>>>
>>>Last , but not the least , let us see another view on the stuff
>>>@ http://praseedp.blogspot.com/2009/09/chandrayan-chinese-angle.html
>>>
>>>regards
>>>Praseed Pai
>>>http://praseedp.blogspot.com
>>>
>>>--- On Fri, 9/10/10, sreekanth sasikanth <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>
>>>> From: sreekanth sasikanth <[email protected]>
>>>> Subject: [ILUG-Cochin.org] ISRO Goes Proprietary Way!!! :(
>>>> To: "This List discusses GNU/Linux & GNU, GPL Software " 
>>>><[email protected]>
>>>> Date: Friday, September 10, 2010, 2:04 PM
>>>
>>>> Guys!!...i found this news on the net
>>>> today. We should do something about this
>>>> as soon as possible!!. ISRO has launched a project called
>>>> BHUVAN; which will
>>>> compete with Google Earth!!...and trust me, after reading
>>>> the contents of the
>>>> site, i was truly proud at what they are gonna achieve and
>>>> i am sure you will
>>>> also be.
>>>>
>>>>              But
>>>> all that faded away in a matter of minutes... First of all,
>>>> the
>>>> site is designed in ASP. Which made me unable to enter the
>>>> main link (Dont know
>>>> whether its mine or their issue, please check and let us
>>>> all know). And then, i
>>>> found that this thing is now available only on Windows and
>>>> DirectX9 or
>>>> higher!!!!! :( :(... all my expectations to try it out just
>>>> vanished. I believe
>>>> its a huge huge mistake on government side. I request u all
>>>> to go thorough the
>>>> site and please confirm my findings. Its a very ambitious
>>>> project.. Just giving
>>>> a quick comparison btw Google Earth and Bhuvan :
>>>>
>>>> Google Earth Bhuvan
>>>> Zoom levels up to 200 mt Zoom levels up to 10 mt
>>>> Single layer information Multi-layer information
>>>> Images upgraded every 4 years Images upgraded every year
>>>> No alternate viewing options Options of viewing on
>>>> different dates
>>>> Uses international satellites Uses Indian satellites
>>>>
>>>> The Links are as below :
>>>>
>>>> Bhuvan Official Site : http://bhuvan.nrsc.gov.in/index.asp
>>>>
>>>> News article that i found on Yahoo!
>>>> : 
>>>>http://in.news.yahoo.com/242/20090814/1334/tnl-bhuvan-isro-s-answer-to-google-earth.html
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Best Regards,
>>>> S.Sreekanth
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> Indian Libre User Group Cochin Mailing List
>>>> http://www.ilug-cochin.org/mailing-list/
>>>> http://mail.ilug-cochin.org/mailman/listinfo/mailinglist_ilug-cochin.org
>>>> #[email protected]
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>_______________________________________________
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>>>#[email protected]
>>>
>>
>>
>>-- 
>>Rashad
>>
>>-----Inline Attachment Follows-----
>>
>>
>>
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>
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-- 
Rashad


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