Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Hi Simon. In a FOSS4G tutorial we went through the desktop GIS applications included on the Live DVD and created the same map* in each one by way of introduction: - http://snapshots.dist.codehaus.org/udig/livedvd/ It was very educational for me and would probably create an excellent set of videos. Jody *The only exception is grass where Hydrologis was kind enough to provide an introduction using slightly different data. On Mon, Dec 21, 2009 at 9:23 AM, Simon Cropper (Botanicus Australia Pty Ltd) wrote: > I agree with Stefan. > > I have found comparison tables of little use as the compiler has to > summarize what is probably quite complex routines. They rarely give a > potential user like myself the complete picture. > > My view has been that the only way to evaluate the usefulness of a program > is to use it on actual data trying to do actual things. > > I have tried multiple OS GIS packages and they all do different things in > different ways. Some useful some novel (to me). > > What really counts is if you can use one program to complete your normal > workflow without needing to use other packages. > > I am not saying that someone should not use multiple packages during their > normal work week only that you should be able to do your normal work without > having to transfer data (and half the time actually convert data) between > various packages to get what you need done. > > So from my point of view projects should not look at other projects, > developers should not list functionality of their program or any other > combination. Users should provide standard workflow tasks -- repetitive > tasks sequences they complete regularly. Then be asked to complete those > tasks on each of the programs being tested. Then the users rate ease of > setup, ease of use, suitability of output, support, etc. The actual list of > user experience ratings can be knocked up by an overview committee. This > committee could also vet the users who put their hand up to ensure a good > spectrum of users and tasks, from different sections of society (academic, > commercial, newbie) are all represented and no bias exists. > > If developers think this might be too harsh (as users may not fully > understand what is going on or how the program works), maybe a middle ground > would be that the developers submit a solution to these workflow processes. > The users follow these instructions and evaluate the outcome. This avoids > users baulking at some quite eccentric GUI interfaces or program setup > (solution must provide clear setup instructions for Windows and Linux). > These solutions are tried and reviewed by the user. The workflows, results, > comments and developer solutions can be collated onto one site (the OSGeo > site seems appropriate) as a valuable resource for developers and user > alike. > > Cheers Simon > > Simon Cropper > Botanicus Australia Pty Ltd > PO Box 160, Sunshine, Victoria 3020. > P: 9311 5822. M: 041 830 3437. > mailto: scrop...@botanicusaustralia.com.au > web: www.botanicusaustralia.com.au > > > Stefan Steiniger wrote: > > Hei all, > > thanks for Cameron on keeping me in the loop, and to Markus for > remembering :) I am now subscribed to this list. > > I think Pauls idea sounds interesting - because this whole comparison > thing is > a) quite cumbersome when we have 10 desktop GIS (+ X), and > b) neither really worth because desktop GIS are used for a multitude of > tasks, while web map Servers or databases aren't that much - right? > > So as Paul is quoted on the osgeo wiki: one needs to set up use cases > first (just wrote that today in a new article too, which contains a > section on selecting free GIS software). And I also discovered that just > most of the projects have a different focus during my evaluation. Which > of course does not mean that such thing should not be presented - but it > must be focussed in some way or the other to have a benefit. And as a > side note, I am not sure if measuring processing times makes sense > either, as GIS analysis feature sets are so different. > > However, I am in for testing with OpenJUMP. > > Two more notes: > - my comparison tables are now already 2 years old now (from 2007), i.e. > need some update (but the last pub in Ecological Informatics took into > account newer developments too, but is superficial and focused towards > the "average" GIS users). > - I gave a talk about this at OGRS: > http://www.ogrs2009.org/doku.php?id=keynotes > pdf can be downloaded from there. > > cheers from Germany right now (Xmas) > stefan > > PS: I know also of this comparison by T. Hengl et al. on Grass vs. SAGA > for Geomorphologic Analysis > http://www.igc.usp.br/pessoais/guano/downloads/Hengl_etal_2009_gmorph.pdf > > > Paul Ramsey schrieb: > > Interested in a different approach that is lower impact, but still > interesting and entertaining? Have developers review a "competing" > project and then present their findings, in the form of "What I love > about ___, what I hat
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
I haven't been following this thread closely, so my apologies if my suggestion has already been stated. Back in the mid-90s the USFS & BLM conducted a multi-year study called "Project 615" of the various GIS packages available. I would think that their work would make a good basis and would provide some inspiration as to how the various GIS systems could be compared in a fair manner. Craig --- Geospatial Software Architect Spatial Minds (206) 962-7754 ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Edu] Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Hi all, Helena Mitasova wrote: I have been promising Charlie to put this under OSGeo Edu svn for a long time, but I keep updating and improving it so it is never finished - I guess it will never be so I may as well upload it. I have created NCSU directory there and we started a coastal lidar data analysis tutorial - http://svn.osgeo.org/osgeo/education/UnderDevelopment/ (see more about the edu svn here http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Subversion_edu_instructions) Great discussion thread and let's indeed pick it up in the edu group. Helena, your side by side set of assignments and solutions looks great and thanks for your efforts on the subversion front. Regarding the comparison idea --here's a link [1] of this type of comparison in proprietary statistics packages created at UCLA (not open source). It provides another example of the kind of thing we might be working toward. FYI - I've contacted the lead editor of the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (David DiBase, at Penn State -- Ian Turton's colleague I imagine) about the possible use of their Geographic Information Science & Technology Body of Knowledge [2] as an organizational framework for educational material as a group we continue to develop and share. I'm awaiting his response. Using this I think we should try and collect and build material like what Helena has done and link it to appropriate places in this BoK framework. I'd like to create a subcommittee to help build this OSGeo edu "organizational scaffolding" and hold a meeting of this subcommittee over Skype in January. *Please email me if you'd like to be on this subcommittee*. Thanks and enjoy whatever holiday you might be celebrating, and I look forward to making 2010 a "watershed year" for the OSGeo edu effort. Cheers Charlie [1] http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/mult_pkg/whatstat/default.htm. [2] http://www.ucgis.org/priorities/education/modelcurriculaproject.asp <>___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Frank Warmerdam wrote: > Daniel Ames wrote: >> I teach ArcGIS 9.3 every semester, so I'll happily provide that >> perspective (as well as the MapWindow desktop perspective). >> By the way Tyler gave an awesome OSGeo talk at AGU in San Francisco >> last week and handled the "how does this stack up to ESRI" question >> brilliantly. I believe the answer was, "We see ESRI as a major >> success story for OSGeo since they've adopted GDAL and OGR." Couldn't >> have been addressed more perfectly. > > Folks, > > To be clear, I am unaware of any adoption of OGR by ESRI. They do make > extensive use of GDAL for raster translation and raster data access. Minor note - usually when I give this answer I say GDAL/OGR as a blanket project name, but I can see how that can be confusing when spoken verbally :) > > While this is a good point to mention, and helps point out that things > aren't as simple as "us and them", since even them is often one of us > in some respects, I'd like us to be able to give a deeper answer. > > Many workloads that are currently done with ArcGIS could also be done > with FOSS tools (most web mapping, much desktop work, and some deep > analysis). I'd like to get white papers, and presentations addressing > some of these easily transferrable workloads. I'd also like this workflow assessment angle from the perspective of "how I got this project done using FOSS tools" - with a backdrop of what they'd have to do otherwise (e.g. using a proprietary package). Tyler ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Cameron, I added it. Helena On Dec 22, 2009, at 7:13 PM, Cameron Shorter wrote: Helena, Excellent stuff. I don't suppose you could be tempted to add reference to your material to the OSGeo Case Studies page: http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Case_Studies#GRASS On 23/12/2009 8:20 AM, Helena Mitasova wrote: I have numerous examples of gis tasks done side-by-side in GRASS and ArcGIS here: http://courses.ncsu.edu/mea582/lec/001/GIS_anal_assign/ GIS_Anal_Assignall.html The data for the examples are available as GRASS data location and ArcGIS geodatabase (links on top of the document) as well as in shape and ArcGRID format (I could not get all rasters convert correctly to GeoTIFF at the time I was preparing the data) here http://www.grassbook.org/data_menu3rd.php It certainly does not cover everything (especially vector data and database examples are very limited) but there is plenty to show various aspects of GIS from simple display and visualization to complex analysis. It would be interesting to see some of these examples done in other systems - we tried QGIS but that ended up using GRASS plugin too much, so other more independent software would be more interesting. I will be updating the material in next few months to capture the latest developments and plan to add another course with examples in different software packages in fall. I am sure there will be a lot of interest here to see how at least some of the tasks are executed in MapWindows of gvSIG and also extension of this material to cover more vector / database and image processing material. Feel free to use the data, the examples are various modifications of the examples from the GRASbook, Helena Helena Mitasova Associate Professor Department of Marine, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences North Carolina State University 1125 Jordan Hall NCSU Box 8208 Raleigh, NC 27695-8208 http://skagit.meas.ncsu.edu/~helena/ email: hmit...@unity.ncsu.edu ph: 919-513-1327 (no voicemail) fax 919 515-7802 On Dec 22, 2009, at 3:19 PM, Stefan Steiniger wrote: Hei Dan, thanks for the thoughts - I like them too and thats what I see too.. we need not only to bring up the highlights between FOSGIS but even more to convince people to eventually have a look on FOSGIS by comparing it to ESRIs desktop software, since they have set a bit the standards (at least for teaching higher level geography GIS courses). But two notes: I doubte that ESRI has 80% because this would mean the utility market is not considered. And I think one talks here more about ESRI in a gegraphical analysis perspective. While I am not sure what the average GIS user actually does (i.e. How many do queries, do editing, do "real" analysis?). I like your subquestions - and allow me to add comments :) And the three main sub-questions are: Can I open the same files? well.. on the c-tribe side yes thanks to Gdal/OGR? But i would restrict to core file types (shp, dxf, mif, raster stuff) Can I make the same maps? uuhmmm - not yet, but...? Can I do the same analyses? With Sextante probably yes, now. Can I teach the same lessons? Ahh.. that hits a point. As we need to tell students about "this open source stuff". I actually plan to check out the next days if I can replace some arcgis analysis tools with sextante for a course. So maybe we check what is taugth in the GIS core curriculum? Something like the MS thesis about GRASS and ArcGIS that was mentioned, but web-based and updated by the various project members. Sounds good and its great if you would have even student resources. I actually tried to do such comparison already in my second publication on GIS in landscape ecology and in my last talks - my result was: Most of the FOS desktop GIS are on the ArcView level and a bit beyond, but we can not compete with ArcInfo (leave a side the need for an easy map making tool - not sure how good the last QGIS tool is). So by now I see our chance in providing "specialist" tools for target groups that are either too small for ESRI, Pitney Bowes & Intergraph & Co to be ever included in their official distribution or that may be to expensive to be bought as extension for some (I remember a friend who once needed Maplex for labeling but not the rest of ArcGIS ArcInfo analysis features). And we would need to highlight which whose things are. here a link to that pub: http://www.geo.uzh.ch/~sstein/finalpub/ steiniger_geographic_information_tools_ecoinf2009.pdf stefan ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss -- Cameron Shorter Geospatial Solutions Manager Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050 Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254 Think Globally, Fix Locally Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Sta
Re: [OSGeo-Edu] Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Daniel, yes, I am definitely more interested in the educational aspect of the comparison than the performance which I think would be very difficult to measure because accuracy and quality of the results (whatever that means) may be as important as speed, if not more. I have been promising Charlie to put this under OSGeo Edu svn for a long time, but I keep updating and improving it so it is never finished - I guess it will never be so I may as well upload it. I have created NCSU directory there and we started a coastal lidar data analysis tutorial - http://svn.osgeo.org/osgeo/education/UnderDevelopment/ (see more about the edu svn here http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/ Subversion_edu_instructions) I will upload some of the course material and we can try to add a MapWindow solution? We can do two topics for a start, e.g. Buffers and cost surfaces Flow routing and watershed analysis The power point slides for relevant lectures explain the tasks and show some example results. I used plain text for the assignment tasks to make it manageable and easy to update and it seems that the students are OK with it and can follow the GUI procedure for ArcGIS. I use screen capture only where I feel it is absolutely necessary, e.g. for visualization with nviz. I will let you know when I upload it, Helena On Dec 22, 2009, at 4:49 PM, Daniel Ames wrote: Helena, perhaps we should move this discussion to the EDU list, since this side by side comparison you have done could be expanded to include multiple desktop applications and would be fantastic to have as an educational tool. Perhaps we can copy your exercises on a WIKI page and then encourage other teams to post solutions using other desktop apps where they can? Then we'd all have this as a resource to use in classes... - Dan On Tue, Dec 22, 2009 at 2:20 PM, Helena Mitasova wrote: I have numerous examples of gis tasks done side-by-side in GRASS and ArcGIS here: http://courses.ncsu.edu/mea582/lec/001/GIS_anal_assign/ GIS_Anal_Assignall.html The data for the examples are available as GRASS data location and ArcGIS geodatabase (links on top of the document) as well as in shape and ArcGRID format (I could not get all rasters convert correctly to GeoTIFF at the time I was preparing the data) here http://www.grassbook.org/data_menu3rd.php It certainly does not cover everything (especially vector data and database examples are very limited) but there is plenty to show various aspects of GIS from simple display and visualization to complex analysis. It would be interesting to see some of these examples done in other systems - we tried QGIS but that ended up using GRASS plugin too much, so other more independent software would be more interesting. I will be updating the material in next few months to capture the latest developments and plan to add another course with examples in different software packages in fall. I am sure there will be a lot of interest here to see how at least some of the tasks are executed in MapWindows of gvSIG and also extension of this material to cover more vector / database and image processing material. Feel free to use the data, the examples are various modifications of the examples from the GRASbook, Helena Helena Mitasova Associate Professor Department of Marine, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences North Carolina State University 1125 Jordan Hall NCSU Box 8208 Raleigh, NC 27695-8208 http://skagit.meas.ncsu.edu/~helena/ email: hmit...@unity.ncsu.edu ph: 919-513-1327 (no voicemail) fax 919 515-7802 On Dec 22, 2009, at 3:19 PM, Stefan Steiniger wrote: Hei Dan, thanks for the thoughts - I like them too and thats what I see too.. we need not only to bring up the highlights between FOSGIS but even more to convince people to eventually have a look on FOSGIS by comparing it to ESRIs desktop software, since they have set a bit the standards (at least for teaching higher level geography GIS courses). But two notes: I doubte that ESRI has 80% because this would mean the utility market is not considered. And I think one talks here more about ESRI in a gegraphical analysis perspective. While I am not sure what the average GIS user actually does (i.e. How many do queries, do editing, do "real" analysis?). I like your subquestions - and allow me to add comments :) And the three main sub-questions are: Can I open the same files? well.. on the c-tribe side yes thanks to Gdal/OGR? But i would restrict to core file types (shp, dxf, mif, raster stuff) Can I make the same maps? uuhmmm - not yet, but...? Can I do the same analyses? With Sextante probably yes, now. Can I teach the same lessons? Ahh.. that hits a point. As we need to tell students about "this open source stuff". I actually plan to check out the next days if I can replace some arcgis analysis tools with sextante for a course. So maybe we check what is taugth in the GIS core curriculum? Som
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Helena, Excellent stuff. I don't suppose you could be tempted to add reference to your material to the OSGeo Case Studies page: http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Case_Studies#GRASS On 23/12/2009 8:20 AM, Helena Mitasova wrote: I have numerous examples of gis tasks done side-by-side in GRASS and ArcGIS here: http://courses.ncsu.edu/mea582/lec/001/GIS_anal_assign/GIS_Anal_Assignall.html The data for the examples are available as GRASS data location and ArcGIS geodatabase (links on top of the document) as well as in shape and ArcGRID format (I could not get all rasters convert correctly to GeoTIFF at the time I was preparing the data) here http://www.grassbook.org/data_menu3rd.php It certainly does not cover everything (especially vector data and database examples are very limited) but there is plenty to show various aspects of GIS from simple display and visualization to complex analysis. It would be interesting to see some of these examples done in other systems - we tried QGIS but that ended up using GRASS plugin too much, so other more independent software would be more interesting. I will be updating the material in next few months to capture the latest developments and plan to add another course with examples in different software packages in fall. I am sure there will be a lot of interest here to see how at least some of the tasks are executed in MapWindows of gvSIG and also extension of this material to cover more vector / database and image processing material. Feel free to use the data, the examples are various modifications of the examples from the GRASbook, Helena Helena Mitasova Associate Professor Department of Marine, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences North Carolina State University 1125 Jordan Hall NCSU Box 8208 Raleigh, NC 27695-8208 http://skagit.meas.ncsu.edu/~helena/ email: hmit...@unity.ncsu.edu ph: 919-513-1327 (no voicemail) fax 919 515-7802 On Dec 22, 2009, at 3:19 PM, Stefan Steiniger wrote: Hei Dan, thanks for the thoughts - I like them too and thats what I see too.. we need not only to bring up the highlights between FOSGIS but even more to convince people to eventually have a look on FOSGIS by comparing it to ESRIs desktop software, since they have set a bit the standards (at least for teaching higher level geography GIS courses). But two notes: I doubte that ESRI has 80% because this would mean the utility market is not considered. And I think one talks here more about ESRI in a gegraphical analysis perspective. While I am not sure what the average GIS user actually does (i.e. How many do queries, do editing, do "real" analysis?). I like your subquestions - and allow me to add comments :) And the three main sub-questions are: Can I open the same files? well.. on the c-tribe side yes thanks to Gdal/OGR? But i would restrict to core file types (shp, dxf, mif, raster stuff) Can I make the same maps? uuhmmm - not yet, but...? Can I do the same analyses? With Sextante probably yes, now. Can I teach the same lessons? Ahh.. that hits a point. As we need to tell students about "this open source stuff". I actually plan to check out the next days if I can replace some arcgis analysis tools with sextante for a course. So maybe we check what is taugth in the GIS core curriculum? Something like the MS thesis about GRASS and ArcGIS that was mentioned, but web-based and updated by the various project members. Sounds good and its great if you would have even student resources. I actually tried to do such comparison already in my second publication on GIS in landscape ecology and in my last talks - my result was: Most of the FOS desktop GIS are on the ArcView level and a bit beyond, but we can not compete with ArcInfo (leave a side the need for an easy map making tool - not sure how good the last QGIS tool is). So by now I see our chance in providing "specialist" tools for target groups that are either too small for ESRI, Pitney Bowes & Intergraph & Co to be ever included in their official distribution or that may be to expensive to be bought as extension for some (I remember a friend who once needed Maplex for labeling but not the rest of ArcGIS ArcInfo analysis features). And we would need to highlight which whose things are. here a link to that pub: http://www.geo.uzh.ch/~sstein/finalpub/steiniger_geographic_information_tools_ecoinf2009.pdf stefan ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss -- Cameron Shorter Geospatial Solutions Manager Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050 Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254 Think Globally, Fix Locally Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source http://www.lisasoft.com ___ Discuss mailing list Discus
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Daniel Ames wrote: I teach ArcGIS 9.3 every semester, so I'll happily provide that perspective (as well as the MapWindow desktop perspective). By the way Tyler gave an awesome OSGeo talk at AGU in San Francisco last week and handled the "how does this stack up to ESRI" question brilliantly. I believe the answer was, "We see ESRI as a major success story for OSGeo since they've adopted GDAL and OGR." Couldn't have been addressed more perfectly. Folks, To be clear, I am unaware of any adoption of OGR by ESRI. They do make extensive use of GDAL for raster translation and raster data access. While this is a good point to mention, and helps point out that things aren't as simple as "us and them", since even them is often one of us in some respects, I'd like us to be able to give a deeper answer. Many workloads that are currently done with ArcGIS could also be done with FOSS tools (most web mapping, much desktop work, and some deep analysis). I'd like to get white papers, and presentations addressing some of these easily transferrable workloads. Best regards, -- ---+-- I set the clouds in motion - turn up | Frank Warmerdam, warmer...@pobox.com light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/~warmerdam and watch the world go round - Rush| Geospatial Programmer for Rent ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Helena, perhaps we should move this discussion to the EDU list, since this side by side comparison you have done could be expanded to include multiple desktop applications and would be fantastic to have as an educational tool. Perhaps we can copy your exercises on a WIKI page and then encourage other teams to post solutions using other desktop apps where they can? Then we'd all have this as a resource to use in classes... - Dan On Tue, Dec 22, 2009 at 2:20 PM, Helena Mitasova wrote: > I have numerous examples of gis tasks done side-by-side in GRASS and > ArcGIS here: > > > http://courses.ncsu.edu/mea582/lec/001/GIS_anal_assign/GIS_Anal_Assignall.html > > The data for the examples are available as GRASS data location and ArcGIS > geodatabase > (links on top of the document) > as well as in shape and ArcGRID format (I could not get all rasters convert > correctly to GeoTIFF > at the time I was preparing the data) here > http://www.grassbook.org/data_menu3rd.php > > It certainly does not cover everything (especially vector data and database > examples are very limited) > but there is plenty to show various aspects of GIS from simple display and > visualization to complex > analysis. > > It would be interesting to see some of these examples done in other systems > - we tried QGIS but that ended up > using GRASS plugin too much, so other more independent software would be > more interesting. > I will be updating the material in next few months to capture the latest > developments and plan > to add another course with examples in different software packages in fall. > I am sure there will be a lot of interest here to see how at least some of > the tasks are executed > in MapWindows of gvSIG and also extension of this material to cover more > vector / database > and image processing material. > > Feel free to use the data, the examples are various modifications of the > examples from the GRASbook, > > Helena > > > > Helena Mitasova > Associate Professor > Department of Marine, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences > North Carolina State University > 1125 Jordan Hall > NCSU Box 8208 > Raleigh, NC 27695-8208 > http://skagit.meas.ncsu.edu/~helena/ > > email: hmit...@unity.ncsu.edu > ph: 919-513-1327 (no voicemail) > fax 919 515-7802 > > > > > > On Dec 22, 2009, at 3:19 PM, Stefan Steiniger wrote: > > Hei Dan, >> >> thanks for the thoughts - I like them too and thats what I see too.. we >> need not only to bring up the highlights between FOSGIS but even more to >> convince people to eventually have a look on FOSGIS by comparing it to ESRIs >> desktop software, since they have set a bit the standards (at least for >> teaching higher level geography GIS courses). >> >> But two notes: I doubte that ESRI has 80% because this would mean the >> utility market is not considered. And I think one talks here more about ESRI >> in a gegraphical analysis perspective. While I am not sure what the average >> GIS user actually does (i.e. How many do queries, do editing, do "real" >> analysis?). >> >> I like your subquestions - and allow me to add comments :) >> >>> And the three main sub-questions are: >>> Can I open the same files? >>> >> well.. on the c-tribe side yes thanks to Gdal/OGR? But i would restrict to >> core file types (shp, dxf, mif, raster stuff) >> >> Can I make the same maps? >>> >> uuhmmm - not yet, but...? >> >> Can I do the same analyses? >>> >> With Sextante probably yes, now. >> >> Can I teach the same lessons? >>> >> Ahh.. that hits a point. As we need to tell students about "this open >> source stuff". I actually plan to check out the next days if I can replace >> some arcgis analysis tools with sextante for a course. >> >> So maybe we check what is taugth in the GIS core curriculum? >> >> Something like the MS thesis about GRASS and ArcGIS that was mentioned, >>> but web-based and updated by the various project members. >>> >> >> Sounds good and its great if you would have even student resources. >> I actually tried to do such comparison already in my second publication on >> GIS in landscape ecology and in my last talks - my result was: Most of the >> FOS desktop GIS are on the ArcView level and a bit beyond, but we can not >> compete with ArcInfo (leave a side the need for an easy map making tool - >> not sure how good the last QGIS tool is). So by now I see our chance in >> providing "specialist" tools for target groups that are either too small for >> ESRI, Pitney Bowes & Intergraph & Co to be ever included in their official >> distribution or that may be to expensive to be bought as extension for some >> (I remember a friend who once needed Maplex for labeling but not the rest of >> ArcGIS ArcInfo analysis features). And we would need to highlight which >> whose things are. >> >> here a link to that pub: >> >> http://www.geo.uzh.ch/~sstein/finalpub/steiniger_geographic_information_tools_ecoinf2009.pdf >> >> stefan >> ___ >> Discuss mailing list >> Discuss@li
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
I have numerous examples of gis tasks done side-by-side in GRASS and ArcGIS here: http://courses.ncsu.edu/mea582/lec/001/GIS_anal_assign/GIS_Anal_Assignall.html The data for the examples are available as GRASS data location and ArcGIS geodatabase (links on top of the document) as well as in shape and ArcGRID format (I could not get all rasters convert correctly to GeoTIFF at the time I was preparing the data) here http://www.grassbook.org/data_menu3rd.php It certainly does not cover everything (especially vector data and database examples are very limited) but there is plenty to show various aspects of GIS from simple display and visualization to complex analysis. It would be interesting to see some of these examples done in other systems - we tried QGIS but that ended up using GRASS plugin too much, so other more independent software would be more interesting. I will be updating the material in next few months to capture the latest developments and plan to add another course with examples in different software packages in fall. I am sure there will be a lot of interest here to see how at least some of the tasks are executed in MapWindows of gvSIG and also extension of this material to cover more vector / database and image processing material. Feel free to use the data, the examples are various modifications of the examples from the GRASbook, Helena Helena Mitasova Associate Professor Department of Marine, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences North Carolina State University 1125 Jordan Hall NCSU Box 8208 Raleigh, NC 27695-8208 http://skagit.meas.ncsu.edu/~helena/ email: hmit...@unity.ncsu.edu ph: 919-513-1327 (no voicemail) fax 919 515-7802 On Dec 22, 2009, at 3:19 PM, Stefan Steiniger wrote: Hei Dan, thanks for the thoughts - I like them too and thats what I see too.. we need not only to bring up the highlights between FOSGIS but even more to convince people to eventually have a look on FOSGIS by comparing it to ESRIs desktop software, since they have set a bit the standards (at least for teaching higher level geography GIS courses). But two notes: I doubte that ESRI has 80% because this would mean the utility market is not considered. And I think one talks here more about ESRI in a gegraphical analysis perspective. While I am not sure what the average GIS user actually does (i.e. How many do queries, do editing, do "real" analysis?). I like your subquestions - and allow me to add comments :) And the three main sub-questions are: Can I open the same files? well.. on the c-tribe side yes thanks to Gdal/OGR? But i would restrict to core file types (shp, dxf, mif, raster stuff) Can I make the same maps? uuhmmm - not yet, but...? Can I do the same analyses? With Sextante probably yes, now. Can I teach the same lessons? Ahh.. that hits a point. As we need to tell students about "this open source stuff". I actually plan to check out the next days if I can replace some arcgis analysis tools with sextante for a course. So maybe we check what is taugth in the GIS core curriculum? Something like the MS thesis about GRASS and ArcGIS that was mentioned, but web-based and updated by the various project members. Sounds good and its great if you would have even student resources. I actually tried to do such comparison already in my second publication on GIS in landscape ecology and in my last talks - my result was: Most of the FOS desktop GIS are on the ArcView level and a bit beyond, but we can not compete with ArcInfo (leave a side the need for an easy map making tool - not sure how good the last QGIS tool is). So by now I see our chance in providing "specialist" tools for target groups that are either too small for ESRI, Pitney Bowes & Intergraph & Co to be ever included in their official distribution or that may be to expensive to be bought as extension for some (I remember a friend who once needed Maplex for labeling but not the rest of ArcGIS ArcInfo analysis features). And we would need to highlight which whose things are. here a link to that pub: http://www.geo.uzh.ch/~sstein/finalpub/steiniger_geographic_information_tools_ecoinf2009.pdf stefan ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
I teach ArcGIS 9.3 every semester, so I'll happily provide that perspective (as well as the MapWindow desktop perspective). By the way Tyler gave an awesome OSGeo talk at AGU in San Francisco last week and handled the "how does this stack up to ESRI" question brilliantly. I believe the answer was, "We see ESRI as a major success story for OSGeo since they've adopted GDAL and OGR." Couldn't have been addressed more perfectly. - Dan On Tue, Dec 22, 2009 at 2:15 PM, Tyler Mitchell (OSGeo) wrote: > > > So if this is true, then that means that 80% of GIS users are asking > > the question, "Why should I use desktop open source XXX instead of ESRI?" > > I get more questions asking about the differences between FOSS projects > than between FOSS and proprietary products. If people are already > coming to FOSS4G, or to OSGeo in some other way, they likely already > want to use open source but want help choosing a path. > > I do agree that many wonder how we stack up to proprietary but I hope we > stick to what we know best. That is, unless proprietary folks join the > shootout. :) > > Just a thought, > Tyler > ___ > Discuss mailing list > Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > -- Daniel P. Ames, Ph.D. PE Associate Professor, Geosciences Idaho State University - Idaho Falls amesd...@isu.edu geology.isu.edu www.hydromap.com www.mapwindow.org * See you at MapWindow GIS 2010! Orlando, Florida, USA 31 March - 2 April 2010 http://www.mapwindow.org/conference/2010 Also at: FOSS4G 2009: http://2009.foss4g.org/ AWRA GIS 2010: http://www.awra.org/meetings/Florida2010/ IEMSS 2010: http://www.iemss.org/iemss2010/ * ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
> So if this is true, then that means that 80% of GIS users are asking > the question, "Why should I use desktop open source XXX instead of ESRI?" I get more questions asking about the differences between FOSS projects than between FOSS and proprietary products. If people are already coming to FOSS4G, or to OSGeo in some other way, they likely already want to use open source but want help choosing a path. I do agree that many wonder how we stack up to proprietary but I hope we stick to what we know best. That is, unless proprietary folks join the shootout. :) Just a thought, Tyler ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Hei Dan, thanks for the thoughts - I like them too and thats what I see too.. we need not only to bring up the highlights between FOSGIS but even more to convince people to eventually have a look on FOSGIS by comparing it to ESRIs desktop software, since they have set a bit the standards (at least for teaching higher level geography GIS courses). But two notes: I doubte that ESRI has 80% because this would mean the utility market is not considered. And I think one talks here more about ESRI in a gegraphical analysis perspective. While I am not sure what the average GIS user actually does (i.e. How many do queries, do editing, do "real" analysis?). I like your subquestions - and allow me to add comments :) And the three main sub-questions are: Can I open the same files? well.. on the c-tribe side yes thanks to Gdal/OGR? But i would restrict to core file types (shp, dxf, mif, raster stuff) Can I make the same maps? uuhmmm - not yet, but...? Can I do the same analyses? With Sextante probably yes, now. Can I teach the same lessons? Ahh.. that hits a point. As we need to tell students about "this open source stuff". I actually plan to check out the next days if I can replace some arcgis analysis tools with sextante for a course. So maybe we check what is taugth in the GIS core curriculum? Something like the MS thesis about GRASS and ArcGIS that was mentioned, but web-based and updated by the various project members. Sounds good and its great if you would have even student resources. I actually tried to do such comparison already in my second publication on GIS in landscape ecology and in my last talks - my result was: Most of the FOS desktop GIS are on the ArcView level and a bit beyond, but we can not compete with ArcInfo (leave a side the need for an easy map making tool - not sure how good the last QGIS tool is). So by now I see our chance in providing "specialist" tools for target groups that are either too small for ESRI, Pitney Bowes & Intergraph & Co to be ever included in their official distribution or that may be to expensive to be bought as extension for some (I remember a friend who once needed Maplex for labeling but not the rest of ArcGIS ArcInfo analysis features). And we would need to highlight which whose things are. here a link to that pub: http://www.geo.uzh.ch/~sstein/finalpub/steiniger_geographic_information_tools_ecoinf2009.pdf stefan ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Hi all, This is a great discussion and I think that we're all generally on the same page. Here's a little more food for thought regarding a desktop shootout: Why compare to ESRI? The answer is because they own the lion's share of the market with "one-third of the global market share, and are used by nearly 80 percent of GIS users worldwide from all professions." (at least that's what Wikipedia says...). So if this is true, then that means that 80% of GIS users are asking the question, "Why should I use desktop open source XXX instead of ESRI?" And the three main sub-questions are: Can I open the same files? Can I make the same maps? Can I do the same analyses? Can I teach the same lessons? So rather than looking inward at ourselves and watching a "shoot out" between the FOSS solutions (which presumably results with someone lying dead and bleeding on the floor...), it be more productive and better for the "cause" to look *outward *and do some kind of a comparison that helps those 80% of all GIS users answer the questions above? Something like the MS thesis about GRASS and ArcGIS that was mentioned, but web-based and updated by the various project members. I'd be happy to commit some student resources to this evaluation, particularly if some subcommittee of people could agree on what the tests would entail. - Dan On Tue, Dec 22, 2009 at 2:01 AM, Miguel Montesinos < mmontesi...@prodevelop.es> wrote: > Hello, > > > > I think that a simple comparison to what ArcGIS does is limitating. Several > issues arises: > > > > - Why compare to ArcGIS 9.3 and not Geomedia, MapInfo,…? > > - What about features that OS GIS desktops provides not present > in ArcGIS 9.3? > > > > I’d rather have a comparison among all of them under equal conditions, for > instance a feature comparison based on the maximum features all products > offer, as well as a perfomance analysis. > > > > For this, a common dataset of both file and service based data should be > available. In Spain there are “a lot” of public official geodata which could > be used as test datasets. > > > > I also like very much Paul Ramsey’s approach about what I like and what I > don’t made by people belonging to different projects. > > > > Regards, > > > > > > - > > Miguel Montesinos > > CTO > > PRODEVELOP, S.L. > > mmontesinos [at] prodevelop [dot] es > > www.prodevelop.es > > > > Miguel Montesinos > > > > *De:* discuss-boun...@lists.osgeo.org [mailto: > discuss-boun...@lists.osgeo.org] *En nombre de *Daniel Ames > *Enviado el:* lunes, 21 de diciembre de 2009 19:25 > *Para:* Maxim Dubinin; OSGeo Discussions > *Asunto:* Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout > atFOSS4G 2010? > > > > Folks, I like the structured comparison approach that Cameron outlined. > Also equally (or perhaps more useful) would be to put together a wiki page > with goals and benchmarks based on ArcGIS 9.3. And then indicate where the > os packages compare. This would provide us with the ability to answer the > most important question which is "can this do what the proprietary software > does." For example, we could post a couple of maps made in AG and then > challenge each desktop team to create and upload the same maps. Etc. I have > a line shapefile with 200 shapes. We could upload it and have everyone do > some timing to show how fast to load,pan, etc on the data. This could also > serve as a way for some of the teams to see their own deficiencies and find > critical tasks to work on (they could then update their reporting on the > wiki and indicate the version number)... - Dan > > ___ > Discuss mailing list > Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > > -- Daniel P. Ames, Ph.D. PE Associate Professor, Geosciences Idaho State University - Idaho Falls amesd...@isu.edu geology.isu.edu www.hydromap.com www.mapwindow.org * See you at MapWindow GIS 2010! Orlando, Florida, USA 31 March - 2 April 2010 http://www.mapwindow.org/conference/2010 Also at: FOSS4G 2009: http://2009.foss4g.org/ AWRA GIS 2010: http://www.awra.org/meetings/Florida2010/ IEMSS 2010: http://www.iemss.org/iemss2010/ * ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
I do not think a simple feature comparison is very useful. Seeing workflows that happen to use XYZ software or.. how we transitioned from ABC proprietary software to XYZ open source and improved performance 10% while reducing costs 20% etc.. that's useful and convincing. Knowing that ABC proprietary supports 3 methods of kriging while XYZ open source supports 2 may be earthshattering or completely irrelevant. The real answer is an unexciting "It depends". You can tweak feature comparisons to make yourself look good, the competition look bad.. etc.. It's just like statistics. I see this in camera reviews all the time, The Pentax K200D has a 96% viewfinder. Comparable models from Nikon and Canon offer 95% viewfinders. Call me cynical, but I find it hard to believe that someone at Pentax didn't say "Let's make our number bigger". Of course, in many reviews of those models, the Pentax scores higher on that feature because 96 > 95 [1]. Does that make it a better camera? Well gee I guess if you only cared about that 1 thing; I don't know anyone that does (or should). What you don't see in feature comparisons are solid, no-B$ analyses of how they let you do your job better. Usability for example is something that you cannot easily quantify. You can have the best product/software in the world but if I can't get the results due to UI/UX failure, or an unnecessarily steep learning curve, etc; then for me the user - your software is 100% useless (actually it's worse because now I have to find a tool that does work). Handtools are a classic example of this; anyone that works with wood or mechanical parts will understand how some tools just don't "feel" right. Do they feel 20% less right? Doesn't work that way. Not to say that feature comparisons are completely useless, especially for new people they can be good; but overall they're coarse, imprecise, and not very knowledge-rich IMO. Case studies of transition are much more powerful; speaking both as a user and a decisionmaker. I think moving towards active real-world presentations is far more powerful than lifeless comparisons. Another example is people that love SSDs (solid state drives) and rave about their Windows boot times. Yeah SSDs are great but.. do you just sit around and reboot your computer all day? A 2000% improvement on something I do once a month is probably not that big of a deal. - bri p.s. I shoot nikon but I really don't care what you shoot and have 0 vested interest; just an example. 1. http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/pentaxK200D/page20.asp On Mon, Dec 21, 2009 at 11:01 PM, Miguel Montesinos < mmontesi...@prodevelop.es> wrote: > Hello, > > > > I think that a simple comparison to what ArcGIS does is limitating. Several > issues arises: > > > > - Why compare to ArcGIS 9.3 and not Geomedia, MapInfo,…? > > - What about features that OS GIS desktops provides not present > in ArcGIS 9.3? > > > > I’d rather have a comparison among all of them under equal conditions, for > instance a feature comparison based on the maximum features all products > offer, as well as a perfomance analysis. > > > > For this, a common dataset of both file and service based data should be > available. In Spain there are “a lot” of public official geodata which could > be used as test datasets. > > > > I also like very much Paul Ramsey’s approach about what I like and what I > don’t made by people belonging to different projects. > > > > Regards, > > > > > > - > > Miguel Montesinos > > CTO > > PRODEVELOP, S.L. > > mmontesinos [at] prodevelop [dot] es > > www.prodevelop.es > > > > Miguel Montesinos > > > > *De:* discuss-boun...@lists.osgeo.org [mailto: > discuss-boun...@lists.osgeo.org] *En nombre de *Daniel Ames > *Enviado el:* lunes, 21 de diciembre de 2009 19:25 > *Para:* Maxim Dubinin; OSGeo Discussions > *Asunto:* Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout > atFOSS4G 2010? > > > > Folks, I like the structured comparison approach that Cameron outlined. > Also equally (or perhaps more useful) would be to put together a wiki page > with goals and benchmarks based on ArcGIS 9.3. And then indicate where the > os packages compare. This would provide us with the ability to answer the > most important question which is "can this do what the proprietary software > does." For example, we could post a couple of maps made in AG and then > challenge each desktop team to create and upload the same maps. Etc. I have > a line shapefile with 200 shapes. We could upload it and have everyone do > some timing to show how fast to load,pan, etc on the data. This could also &
RE: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Hello, I think that a simple comparison to what ArcGIS does is limitating. Several issues arises: - Why compare to ArcGIS 9.3 and not Geomedia, MapInfo,...? - What about features that OS GIS desktops provides not present in ArcGIS 9.3? I'd rather have a comparison among all of them under equal conditions, for instance a feature comparison based on the maximum features all products offer, as well as a perfomance analysis. For this, a common dataset of both file and service based data should be available. In Spain there are "a lot" of public official geodata which could be used as test datasets. I also like very much Paul Ramsey's approach about what I like and what I don't made by people belonging to different projects. Regards, - Miguel Montesinos CTO PRODEVELOP, S.L. mmontesinos [at] prodevelop [dot] es www.prodevelop.es <http://www.prodevelop.es/> Miguel Montesinos De: discuss-boun...@lists.osgeo.org [mailto:discuss-boun...@lists.osgeo.org] En nombre de Daniel Ames Enviado el: lunes, 21 de diciembre de 2009 19:25 Para: Maxim Dubinin; OSGeo Discussions Asunto: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010? Folks, I like the structured comparison approach that Cameron outlined. Also equally (or perhaps more useful) would be to put together a wiki page with goals and benchmarks based on ArcGIS 9.3. And then indicate where the os packages compare. This would provide us with the ability to answer the most important question which is "can this do what the proprietary software does." For example, we could post a couple of maps made in AG and then challenge each desktop team to create and upload the same maps. Etc. I have a line shapefile with 200 shapes. We could upload it and have everyone do some timing to show how fast to load,pan, etc on the data. This could also serve as a way for some of the teams to see their own deficiencies and find critical tasks to work on (they could then update their reporting on the wiki and indicate the version number)... - Dan ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
RE: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010? [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]
IMO: This may have already been covered. Several years ago Todd Buchanan prepared a thesis comparing ArcGIS and Grass [1]. The approach he used could provide a potential framework. It has features of Cameron's structured comparison; Simon's process approach; with a comparison of actual results of algorithm operations based on a control set of data. I'd like to see the list of features that Todd compared (at Table 13) expanded somewhat to include e.g. functionality related to data capture and maintenance; transformations; reprojections etc etc. Just a thought. -- Bruce Bannerman [1] http://www.toddbuchanan.net/thesis_ver.pdf > -Original Message- > From: discuss-boun...@lists.osgeo.org > [mailto:discuss-boun...@lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf Of Daniel Ames > Sent: Tuesday, 22 December 2009 5:25 AM > To: Maxim Dubinin; OSGeo Discussions > Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo > Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010? > > Folks, I like the structured comparison approach that Cameron > outlined. Also equally (or perhaps more useful) would be to > put together a wiki page with goals and benchmarks based on > ArcGIS 9.3. And then indicate where the os packages compare. > This would provide us with the ability to answer the most > important question which is "can this do what the proprietary > software does." For example, we could post a couple of maps > made in AG and then challenge each desktop team to create and > upload the same maps. Etc. I have a line shapefile with 200 > shapes. We could upload it and have everyone do some timing > to show how fast to load,pan, etc on the data. This could > also serve as a way for some of the teams to see their own > deficiencies and find critical tasks to work on (they could > then update their reporting on the wiki and indicate the > version number)... - Dan > > On Dec 20, 2009 4:40 PM, "Maxim Dubinin" > wrote: > > > Simon, > > I was merely suggesting an approach. As I said, we > didn't have a goal to inform other what Desktop GIS is the > best, we just wanted to present a model dataset for many > different packages, so that a person can try and choose by himself. > > However, there are some notes for each package at the > bottom of the page. Personally, I have a favorite, of course, > but I don't think this is appropriate to describe it here. > That said, I think this will be relatively easy to construct > a matrix based on our experience with missing bits for this > particular task. We're currently going through updating > software and this project and will discuss this among participants. > > Maxim > > Вы писали 20 декабря 2009 г., 16:52:06: > > > > Maxim, I looked at the webpage but could not find an > outcome -- which system worked the best? Chee... > > Sometime ago, we were also interested in why are there > so many desktop open GIS packages. So what w... > > ___ Discuss > mailing listdisc...@lists.osgeo.org > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > > ___ > Discuss mailing list > Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > > > > ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Folks, I like the structured comparison approach that Cameron outlined. Also equally (or perhaps more useful) would be to put together a wiki page with goals and benchmarks based on ArcGIS 9.3. And then indicate where the os packages compare. This would provide us with the ability to answer the most important question which is "can this do what the proprietary software does." For example, we could post a couple of maps made in AG and then challenge each desktop team to create and upload the same maps. Etc. I have a line shapefile with 200 shapes. We could upload it and have everyone do some timing to show how fast to load,pan, etc on the data. This could also serve as a way for some of the teams to see their own deficiencies and find critical tasks to work on (they could then update their reporting on the wiki and indicate the version number)... - Dan On Dec 20, 2009 4:40 PM, "Maxim Dubinin" wrote: Simon, I was merely suggesting an approach. As I said, we didn't have a goal to inform other what Desktop GIS is the best, we just wanted to present a model dataset for many different packages, so that a person can try and choose by himself. However, there are some notes for each package at the bottom of the page. Personally, I have a favorite, of course, but I don't think this is appropriate to describe it here. That said, I think this will be relatively easy to construct a matrix based on our experience with missing bits for this particular task. We're currently going through updating software and this project and will discuss this among participants. Maxim *Вы писали 20 декабря 2009 г., 16:52:06: * Maxim, I looked at the webpage but could not find an outcome -- which system worked the best? Chee... Sometime ago, we were also interested in why are there so many desktop open GIS packages. So what w... ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Title: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010? Simon, I was merely suggesting an approach. As I said, we didn't have a goal to inform other what Desktop GIS is the best, we just wanted to present a model dataset for many different packages, so that a person can try and choose by himself. However, there are some notes for each package at the bottom of the page. Personally, I have a favorite, of course, but I don't think this is appropriate to describe it here. That said, I think this will be relatively easy to construct a matrix based on our experience with missing bits for this particular task. We're currently going through updating software and this project and will discuss this among participants. Maxim Вы писали 20 декабря 2009 г., 16:52:06: Maxim, I looked at the webpage but could not find an outcome -- which system worked the best? Cheers Simon Simon Cropper Botanicus Australia Pty Ltd PO Box 160, Sunshine, Victoria 3020. P: 9311 5822. M: 041 830 3437. mailto: scrop...@botanicusaustralia.com.au web: www.botanicusaustralia.com.au Maxim Dubinin wrote: Sometime ago, we were also interested in why are there so many desktop open GIS packages. So what we did was the following, we created a model project with several groups of different type layers and recreated it with 10+ packages, opensource, proprietory, even some web-based ones. It is was quite interesting exercise, where a dozen of people participated and it was pretty clear in the end where opensource GIS are in comparison with proprietory and in between themselves. Of course this only covers simple project building and does not compare analysis etc. Moreover, the initial goal of this dataset was not comparison, but easy start with any common desktop GIS package + assistance to devs and education purposes, some ability to conclude which one was better was sort of a side-effect. You can check the results here, (originally in Russian): http://translate.google.com/translate?js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=1&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fgis-lab.info%2Fqa%2Fgeosample.html&sl=ru&tl=en Maxim ___ Discuss mailing listDiscuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Title: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010? Maxim, I looked at the webpage but could not find an outcome -- which system worked the best? Cheers Simon Simon Cropper Botanicus Australia Pty Ltd PO Box 160, Sunshine, Victoria 3020. P: 9311 5822. M: 041 830 3437. mailto: scrop...@botanicusaustralia.com.au web: www.botanicusaustralia.com.au Maxim Dubinin wrote: Sometime ago, we were also interested in why are there so many desktop open GIS packages. So what we did was the following, we created a model project with several groups of different type layers and recreated it with 10+ packages, opensource, proprietory, even some web-based ones. It is was quite interesting exercise, where a dozen of people participated and it was pretty clear in the end where opensource GIS are in comparison with proprietory and in between themselves. Of course this only covers simple project building and does not compare analysis etc. Moreover, the initial goal of this dataset was not comparison, but easy start with any common desktop GIS package + assistance to devs and education purposes, some ability to conclude which one was better was sort of a side-effect. You can check the results here, (originally in Russian): http://translate.google.com/translate?js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=1&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fgis-lab.info%2Fqa%2Fgeosample.html&sl=ru&tl=en Maxim ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Title: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010? Sometime ago, we were also interested in why are there so many desktop open GIS packages. So what we did was the following, we created a model project with several groups of different type layers and recreated it with 10+ packages, opensource, proprietory, even some web-based ones. It is was quite interesting exercise, where a dozen of people participated and it was pretty clear in the end where opensource GIS are in comparison with proprietory and in between themselves. Of course this only covers simple project building and does not compare analysis etc. Moreover, the initial goal of this dataset was not comparison, but easy start with any common desktop GIS package + assistance to devs and education purposes, some ability to conclude which one was better was sort of a side-effect. You can check the results here, (originally in Russian): http://translate.google.com/translate?js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=1&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fgis-lab.info%2Fqa%2Fgeosample.html&sl=ru&tl=en Maxim ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Simon, I agree 99% with you, but why you left Mac out of the tests. AFAICT Grass, Qgis, Udig, OpenJump, OrbisGis, geoserver, mapserver and somehow gvSIG work on Mac. Agustin > > > > > > > > I agree with Stefan. > > I have found comparison tables of little use as the compiler has to > summarize what is probably quite complex routines. They rarely give a > potential user like myself the complete picture. > > My view has been that the only way to evaluate the usefulness of a > program is to use it on actual data trying to do actual things. > > I have tried multiple OS GIS packages and they all do different things > in different ways. Some useful some novel (to me). > > What really counts is if you can use one program to complete your > normal workflow without needing to use other packages. > > I am not saying that someone should not use multiple packages during > their normal work week only that you should be able to do your normal > work without having to transfer data (and half the time actually > convert data) between various packages to get what you need done. > > So from my point of view projects should not look at other projects, > developers should not list functionality of their program or any other > combination. Users should provide standard workflow tasks -- repetitive > tasks sequences they complete regularly. Then be asked to complete > those tasks on each of the programs being tested. Then the users rate > ease of setup, ease of use, suitability of output, support, etc. The > actual list of user experience ratings can be knocked up by an overview > committee. This committee could also vet the users who put their hand > up to ensure a good spectrum of users and tasks, from different > sections of society (academic, commercial, newbie) are all represented > and no bias exists. > > If developers think this might be too harsh (as users may not fully > understand what is going on or how the program works), maybe a middle > ground would be that the developers submit a solution to these workflow > processes. The users follow these instructions and evaluate the > outcome. This avoids users baulking at some quite eccentric GUI > interfaces or program setup (solution must provide clear setup > instructions for Windows and Linux). These solutions are tried and > reviewed by the user. The workflows, results, comments and developer > solutions can be collated onto one site (the OSGeo site seems > appropriate) as a valuable resource for developers and user alike. > > Cheers Simon > > Simon Cropper > Botanicus Australia Pty Ltd > PO Box 160, Sunshine, Victoria 3020. > P: 9311 5822. M: 041 830 3437. > mailto:scrop...@botanicusaustralia.com.au";>mailto: > scrop...@botanicusaustralia.com.au > http://www.botanicusaustralia.com.au";>web: > www.botanicusaustralia.com.au > > > > > Stefan Steiniger wrote: > Hei all, > > > thanks for Cameron on keeping me in the loop, and to Markus for > > remembering :) I am now subscribed to this list. > > > I think Pauls idea sounds interesting - because this whole comparison > > thing is > > a) quite cumbersome when we have 10 desktop GIS (+ X), and > > b) neither really worth because desktop GIS are used for a multitude of > > tasks, while web map Servers or databases aren't that much - right? > > > So as Paul is quoted on the osgeo wiki: one needs to set up use cases > > first (just wrote that today in a new article too, which contains a > > section on selecting free GIS software). And I also discovered that > just > > most of the projects have a different focus during my evaluation. Which > > of course does not mean that such thing should not be presented - but > it > > must be focussed in some way or the other to have a benefit. And as a > > side note, I am not sure if measuring processing times makes sense > > either, as GIS analysis feature sets are so different. > > > However, I am in for testing with OpenJUMP. > > > Two more notes: > > - my comparison tables are now already 2 years old now (from 2007), > i.e. > > need some update (but the last pub in Ecological Informatics took into > > account newer developments too, but is superficial and focused towards > > the "average" GIS users). > > - I gave a talk about this at OGRS: > > http://www.ogrs2009.org/doku.php?id=keynotes";>http://www.ogrs2009org/doku.php?id=keynotes > > pdf can be downloaded from there. > > > cheers from Germany right now (Xmas) > > stefan > > > PS: I know also of this comparison by T. Hengl et al. on Grass vs. SAGA > > for Geomorphologic Analysis > > http://www.igc.usp.br/pessoais/guano/downloads/Hengl_etal_2009_gmorph.pdf";>http://www.igc.usp.br/pessoais/guano/downloads/Hengl_etal_2009_gmorph.pdf > > > > Paul Ramsey schrieb: > > Interested in a different approach that is > lower impact, but still > > interesting and entertaining? Have developers revi
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
I agree with Stefan. I have found comparison tables of little use as the compiler has to summarize what is probably quite complex routines. They rarely give a potential user like myself the complete picture. My view has been that the only way to evaluate the usefulness of a program is to use it on actual data trying to do actual things. I have tried multiple OS GIS packages and they all do different things in different ways. Some useful some novel (to me). What really counts is if you can use one program to complete your normal workflow without needing to use other packages. I am not saying that someone should not use multiple packages during their normal work week only that you should be able to do your normal work without having to transfer data (and half the time actually convert data) between various packages to get what you need done. So from my point of view projects should not look at other projects, developers should not list functionality of their program or any other combination. Users should provide standard workflow tasks -- repetitive tasks sequences they complete regularly. Then be asked to complete those tasks on each of the programs being tested. Then the users rate ease of setup, ease of use, suitability of output, support, etc. The actual list of user experience ratings can be knocked up by an overview committee. This committee could also vet the users who put their hand up to ensure a good spectrum of users and tasks, from different sections of society (academic, commercial, newbie) are all represented and no bias exists. If developers think this might be too harsh (as users may not fully understand what is going on or how the program works), maybe a middle ground would be that the developers submit a solution to these workflow processes. The users follow these instructions and evaluate the outcome. This avoids users baulking at some quite eccentric GUI interfaces or program setup (solution must provide clear setup instructions for Windows and Linux). These solutions are tried and reviewed by the user. The workflows, results, comments and developer solutions can be collated onto one site (the OSGeo site seems appropriate) as a valuable resource for developers and user alike. Cheers Simon Simon Cropper Botanicus Australia Pty Ltd PO Box 160, Sunshine, Victoria 3020. P: 9311 5822. M: 041 830 3437. mailto: scrop...@botanicusaustralia.com.au web: www.botanicusaustralia.com.au Stefan Steiniger wrote: Hei all, thanks for Cameron on keeping me in the loop, and to Markus for remembering :) I am now subscribed to this list. I think Pauls idea sounds interesting - because this whole comparison thing is a) quite cumbersome when we have 10 desktop GIS (+ X), and b) neither really worth because desktop GIS are used for a multitude of tasks, while web map Servers or databases aren't that much - right? So as Paul is quoted on the osgeo wiki: one needs to set up use cases first (just wrote that today in a new article too, which contains a section on selecting free GIS software). And I also discovered that just most of the projects have a different focus during my evaluation. Which of course does not mean that such thing should not be presented - but it must be focussed in some way or the other to have a benefit. And as a side note, I am not sure if measuring processing times makes sense either, as GIS analysis feature sets are so different. However, I am in for testing with OpenJUMP. Two more notes: - my comparison tables are now already 2 years old now (from 2007), i.e. need some update (but the last pub in Ecological Informatics took into account newer developments too, but is superficial and focused towards the "average" GIS users). - I gave a talk about this at OGRS: http://www.ogrs2009.org/doku.php?id=keynotes pdf can be downloaded from there. cheers from Germany right now (Xmas) stefan PS: I know also of this comparison by T. Hengl et al. on Grass vs. SAGA for Geomorphologic Analysis http://www.igc.usp.br/pessoais/guano/downloads/Hengl_etal_2009_gmorph.pdf Paul Ramsey schrieb: Interested in a different approach that is lower impact, but still interesting and entertaining? Have developers review a "competing" project and then present their findings, in the form of "What I love about ___, what I hate about". Jody Garnett presents "What I love about QGIS, what I hate about QGIS." Jorge Sanz presents "What I love about uDig, what I hate about uDig." Tim Sutton presents "What I love about gvSIG, what I hate about gvSIG." Not only do you get an unvarnished view, but you can have shorter presentations with a discussion segment at the end of each one. Works for almost any application category too. ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.o
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
When I started organising the Italian Desktop comparison, I tried to involve both the community of developers and users. Regarding developers, you might remember an email asking the QGis and gvSig for a first meeting in Sydney to which I got no answer. So nothing happened from that side. Also as much as I find the idea of people getting users of different GIS cool, I think that might end in being too much efforth people would like to put in. Also note that all of the presenters came with the latest versions of their software, straight out of the svn or even not yet in svn :) So probably they all will want to show the latest thing they have on. Regarding the user community, I got a couple of requests, but they were more on what the GIS can do and not benchmarking or so. Most of the people that contacted me were from public administrations that had to think about migrating, so they would have loved to find a GIS that could fullfill all their ArcView requirements. It came up to things like: can I print A0?, can I do a table join? Andrea On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 10:40 PM, Stefan Steiniger wrote: > mhm.. I like that idea (and also have some answers - that I got from the > iGeoDesktop Crew and OrbisGIS, two pretty new Desktop GIS). > > but here the question: is it as valuable for the end user? or rather "our" > thing. > > Brian Russo schrieb: >> >> I think a more interesting presentation would be why there are so many >> desktop GIS packages, the consequent pros/cons, and if/how efforts could be >> consolidated. >> > ___ > Discuss mailing list > Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
You're absolutely right, pretend I said collaborate instead of consolidate. On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 11:47 AM, Paul Ramsey wrote: > I'll do that talk, if there's really interest in it, but it has > nothing to do with technology or desktops, it's sociology and > psychology. And no, efforts cannot "be consolidated" (active > intervention) they "may consolidate" (natural progression). > > P. > > - Why? "Because, we felt like it, and we knew better." > - Pros and cons? Weighted in favor of the > > On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 1:33 PM, Brian Russo wrote: > > I think a more interesting presentation would be why there are so many > > desktop GIS packages, the consequent pros/cons, and if/how efforts could > be > > consolidated. > > > > On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 11:21 AM, Stefan Steiniger > > wrote: > >> > >> Hei all, > >> > >> thanks for Cameron on keeping me in the loop, and to Markus for > >> remembering :) I am now subscribed to this list. > >> > >> I think Pauls idea sounds interesting - because this whole comparison > >> thing is > >> a) quite cumbersome when we have 10 desktop GIS (+ X), and > >> b) neither really worth because desktop GIS are used for a multitude of > >> tasks, while web map Servers or databases aren't that much - right? > >> > >> So as Paul is quoted on the osgeo wiki: one needs to set up use cases > >> first (just wrote that today in a new article too, which contains a > section > >> on selecting free GIS software). And I also discovered that just most of > the > >> projects have a different focus during my evaluation. Which of course > does > >> not mean that such thing should not be presented - but it must be > focussed > >> in some way or the other to have a benefit. And as a side note, I am not > >> sure if measuring processing times makes sense either, as GIS analysis > >> feature sets are so different. > >> > >> However, I am in for testing with OpenJUMP. > >> > >> Two more notes: > >> - my comparison tables are now already 2 years old now (from 2007), i.e. > >> need some update (but the last pub in Ecological Informatics took into > >> account newer developments too, but is superficial and focused towards > the > >> "average" GIS users). > >> - I gave a talk about this at OGRS: > >> http://www.ogrs2009.org/doku.php?id=keynotes > >> pdf can be downloaded from there. > >> > >> cheers from Germany right now (Xmas) > >> stefan > >> > >> PS: I know also of this comparison by T. Hengl et al. on Grass vs. SAGA > >> for Geomorphologic Analysis > >> > http://www.igc.usp.br/pessoais/guano/downloads/Hengl_etal_2009_gmorph.pdf > >> > >> > >> Paul Ramsey schrieb: > >>> > >>> Interested in a different approach that is lower impact, but still > >>> interesting and entertaining? Have developers review a "competing" > >>> project and then present their findings, in the form of "What I love > >>> about ___, what I hate about". > >>> > >>> Jody Garnett presents "What I love about QGIS, what I hate about QGIS." > >>> Jorge Sanz presents "What I love about uDig, what I hate about uDig." > >>> Tim Sutton presents "What I love about gvSIG, what I hate about gvSIG." > >>> > >>> Not only do you get an unvarnished view, but you can have shorter > >>> presentations with a discussion segment at the end of each one. > >>> > >>> Works for almost any application category too. > >>> > >> ___ > >> Discuss mailing list > >> Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > >> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > > > > > > ___ > > Discuss mailing list > > Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > > > > > ___ > Discuss mailing list > Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
I'll do that talk, if there's really interest in it, but it has nothing to do with technology or desktops, it's sociology and psychology. And no, efforts cannot "be consolidated" (active intervention) they "may consolidate" (natural progression). P. - Why? "Because, we felt like it, and we knew better." - Pros and cons? Weighted in favor of the On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 1:33 PM, Brian Russo wrote: > I think a more interesting presentation would be why there are so many > desktop GIS packages, the consequent pros/cons, and if/how efforts could be > consolidated. > > On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 11:21 AM, Stefan Steiniger > wrote: >> >> Hei all, >> >> thanks for Cameron on keeping me in the loop, and to Markus for >> remembering :) I am now subscribed to this list. >> >> I think Pauls idea sounds interesting - because this whole comparison >> thing is >> a) quite cumbersome when we have 10 desktop GIS (+ X), and >> b) neither really worth because desktop GIS are used for a multitude of >> tasks, while web map Servers or databases aren't that much - right? >> >> So as Paul is quoted on the osgeo wiki: one needs to set up use cases >> first (just wrote that today in a new article too, which contains a section >> on selecting free GIS software). And I also discovered that just most of the >> projects have a different focus during my evaluation. Which of course does >> not mean that such thing should not be presented - but it must be focussed >> in some way or the other to have a benefit. And as a side note, I am not >> sure if measuring processing times makes sense either, as GIS analysis >> feature sets are so different. >> >> However, I am in for testing with OpenJUMP. >> >> Two more notes: >> - my comparison tables are now already 2 years old now (from 2007), i.e. >> need some update (but the last pub in Ecological Informatics took into >> account newer developments too, but is superficial and focused towards the >> "average" GIS users). >> - I gave a talk about this at OGRS: >> http://www.ogrs2009.org/doku.php?id=keynotes >> pdf can be downloaded from there. >> >> cheers from Germany right now (Xmas) >> stefan >> >> PS: I know also of this comparison by T. Hengl et al. on Grass vs. SAGA >> for Geomorphologic Analysis >> http://www.igc.usp.br/pessoais/guano/downloads/Hengl_etal_2009_gmorph.pdf >> >> >> Paul Ramsey schrieb: >>> >>> Interested in a different approach that is lower impact, but still >>> interesting and entertaining? Have developers review a "competing" >>> project and then present their findings, in the form of "What I love >>> about ___, what I hate about". >>> >>> Jody Garnett presents "What I love about QGIS, what I hate about QGIS." >>> Jorge Sanz presents "What I love about uDig, what I hate about uDig." >>> Tim Sutton presents "What I love about gvSIG, what I hate about gvSIG." >>> >>> Not only do you get an unvarnished view, but you can have shorter >>> presentations with a discussion segment at the end of each one. >>> >>> Works for almost any application category too. >>> >> ___ >> Discuss mailing list >> Discuss@lists.osgeo.org >> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > > > ___ > Discuss mailing list > Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > > ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
mhm.. I like that idea (and also have some answers - that I got from the iGeoDesktop Crew and OrbisGIS, two pretty new Desktop GIS). but here the question: is it as valuable for the end user? or rather "our" thing. Brian Russo schrieb: I think a more interesting presentation would be why there are so many desktop GIS packages, the consequent pros/cons, and if/how efforts could be consolidated. ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
I think a more interesting presentation would be why there are so many desktop GIS packages, the consequent pros/cons, and if/how efforts could be consolidated. On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 11:21 AM, Stefan Steiniger wrote: > Hei all, > > thanks for Cameron on keeping me in the loop, and to Markus for remembering > :) I am now subscribed to this list. > > I think Pauls idea sounds interesting - because this whole comparison thing > is > a) quite cumbersome when we have 10 desktop GIS (+ X), and > b) neither really worth because desktop GIS are used for a multitude of > tasks, while web map Servers or databases aren't that much - right? > > So as Paul is quoted on the osgeo wiki: one needs to set up use cases first > (just wrote that today in a new article too, which contains a section on > selecting free GIS software). And I also discovered that just most of the > projects have a different focus during my evaluation. Which of course does > not mean that such thing should not be presented - but it must be focussed > in some way or the other to have a benefit. And as a side note, I am not > sure if measuring processing times makes sense either, as GIS analysis > feature sets are so different. > > However, I am in for testing with OpenJUMP. > > Two more notes: > - my comparison tables are now already 2 years old now (from 2007), i.e. > need some update (but the last pub in Ecological Informatics took into > account newer developments too, but is superficial and focused towards the > "average" GIS users). > - I gave a talk about this at OGRS: > http://www.ogrs2009.org/doku.php?id=keynotes > pdf can be downloaded from there. > > cheers from Germany right now (Xmas) > stefan > > PS: I know also of this comparison by T. Hengl et al. on Grass vs. SAGA for > Geomorphologic Analysis > http://www.igc.usp.br/pessoais/guano/downloads/Hengl_etal_2009_gmorph.pdf > > > Paul Ramsey schrieb: > >> Interested in a different approach that is lower impact, but still >> interesting and entertaining? Have developers review a "competing" >> project and then present their findings, in the form of "What I love >> about ___, what I hate about". >> >> Jody Garnett presents "What I love about QGIS, what I hate about QGIS." >> Jorge Sanz presents "What I love about uDig, what I hate about uDig." >> Tim Sutton presents "What I love about gvSIG, what I hate about gvSIG." >> >> Not only do you get an unvarnished view, but you can have shorter >> presentations with a discussion segment at the end of each one. >> >> Works for almost any application category too. >> >> ___ > Discuss mailing list > Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Hei all, thanks for Cameron on keeping me in the loop, and to Markus for remembering :) I am now subscribed to this list. I think Pauls idea sounds interesting - because this whole comparison thing is a) quite cumbersome when we have 10 desktop GIS (+ X), and b) neither really worth because desktop GIS are used for a multitude of tasks, while web map Servers or databases aren't that much - right? So as Paul is quoted on the osgeo wiki: one needs to set up use cases first (just wrote that today in a new article too, which contains a section on selecting free GIS software). And I also discovered that just most of the projects have a different focus during my evaluation. Which of course does not mean that such thing should not be presented - but it must be focussed in some way or the other to have a benefit. And as a side note, I am not sure if measuring processing times makes sense either, as GIS analysis feature sets are so different. However, I am in for testing with OpenJUMP. Two more notes: - my comparison tables are now already 2 years old now (from 2007), i.e. need some update (but the last pub in Ecological Informatics took into account newer developments too, but is superficial and focused towards the "average" GIS users). - I gave a talk about this at OGRS: http://www.ogrs2009.org/doku.php?id=keynotes pdf can be downloaded from there. cheers from Germany right now (Xmas) stefan PS: I know also of this comparison by T. Hengl et al. on Grass vs. SAGA for Geomorphologic Analysis http://www.igc.usp.br/pessoais/guano/downloads/Hengl_etal_2009_gmorph.pdf Paul Ramsey schrieb: Interested in a different approach that is lower impact, but still interesting and entertaining? Have developers review a "competing" project and then present their findings, in the form of "What I love about ___, what I hate about". Jody Garnett presents "What I love about QGIS, what I hate about QGIS." Jorge Sanz presents "What I love about uDig, what I hate about uDig." Tim Sutton presents "What I love about gvSIG, what I hate about gvSIG." Not only do you get an unvarnished view, but you can have shorter presentations with a discussion segment at the end of each one. Works for almost any application category too. ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Hei all, thanks for Cameron on keeping me in the loop, and to Markus for remembering :) I am now subscribed to this list. I think Pauls idea sounds interesting - because this whole comparison thing is a) quite cumbersome when we have 10 desktop GIS (+ X), and b) neither really worth because desktop GIS are used for a multitude of tasks, while web map Servers or databases aren't that much - right? So as Paul is quoted on the osgeo wiki: one needs to set up use cases first (just wrote that today in a new article too, which contains a section on selecting free GIS software). And I also discovered that just most of the projects have a different focus during my evaluation. Which of course does not mean that such thing should not be presented - but it must be focussed in some way or the other to have a benefit. And as a side note, I am not sure if measuring processing times makes sense either, as GIS analysis feature sets are so different. However, I am in for testing with OpenJUMP. Two more notes: - my comparison tables are now already 2 years old now (from 2007), i.e. need some update (but the last pub in Ecological Informatics took into account newer developments too, but is superficial and focused towards the "average" GIS users). - I gave a talk about this at OGRS: http://www.ogrs2009.org/doku.php?id=keynotes pdf can be downloaded from there. cheers from Germany right now (Xmas) stefan PS: I know also of this comparison by T. Hengl et al. on Grass vs. SAGA for Geomorphologic Analysis http://www.igc.usp.br/pessoais/guano/downloads/Hengl_etal_2009_gmorph.pdf Paul Ramsey schrieb: Interested in a different approach that is lower impact, but still interesting and entertaining? Have developers review a "competing" project and then present their findings, in the form of "What I love about ___, what I hate about". Jody Garnett presents "What I love about QGIS, what I hate about QGIS." Jorge Sanz presents "What I love about uDig, what I hate about uDig." Tim Sutton presents "What I love about gvSIG, what I hate about gvSIG." Not only do you get an unvarnished view, but you can have shorter presentations with a discussion segment at the end of each one. Works for almost any application category too. ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Cameron Shorter ha scritto: A couple of links to reviews of desktop clients at: http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Case_Studies#Review_of_Open_Source_Desktop_Clients In particular Stefan's summary of clients is the best I've seen so far. http://www.spatialserver.net/osgis/ is quite comprehensive. The steps I see toward kicking off a Desktop comparison at FOSS4G are: 1. One person to step forward and offer to drive the comparison through to completion. (This can be a couple of people, but it usually starts with one). Effectively act as a project coordinator, setting up wiki pages, contacting potential parties, ensuring scope is capped. Paul Ramsey, Andrea Aime and Jeff McKenna seemed to be the driving people behind the WMS shootout. If you are reading this and think you might be able to fill this role, then please speak up. ... 5. Just before foss4g: Pens down, collate results, present. I think I can do something for QGIS, if I'm not left alone ;) All the best. ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Interested in a different approach that is lower impact, but still interesting and entertaining? Have developers review a "competing" project and then present their findings, in the form of "What I love about ___, what I hate about". Jody Garnett presents "What I love about QGIS, what I hate about QGIS." Jorge Sanz presents "What I love about uDig, what I hate about uDig." Tim Sutton presents "What I love about gvSIG, what I hate about gvSIG." Not only do you get an unvarnished view, but you can have shorter presentations with a discussion segment at the end of each one. Works for almost any application category too. P On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 12:12 PM, Cameron Shorter wrote: > A couple of links to reviews of desktop clients at: > http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Case_Studies#Review_of_Open_Source_Desktop_Clients > > In particular Stefan's summary of clients is the best I've seen so far. > http://www.spatialserver.net/osgis/ is quite comprehensive. > > The steps I see toward kicking off a Desktop comparison at FOSS4G are: > > 1. One person to step forward and offer to drive the comparison through to > completion. (This can be a couple of people, but it usually starts with > one). Effectively act as a project coordinator, setting up wiki pages, > contacting potential parties, ensuring scope is capped. Paul Ramsey, Andrea > Aime and Jeff McKenna seemed to be the driving people behind the WMS > shootout. If you are reading this and think you might be able to fill this > role, then please speak up. > > 2. The key projects need to be contacted, and at least one volunteer > identified for each project. Ideally, there will be at least 3/4 of the > projects represented. Within a year or two, any potential gis desktop user > will start their search for clients by reviewing the results of the Desktop > shootout, so projects represented in the shootout will become the dominant > projects. (This is why it will be important for projects to get on board) > > 3. Between the volunteers, and led by the coordinator, a set of benchmark > tests should be set up. This will probably include a core set of tests that > everyone should do relatively easily, and optional tests that each project > can do to show off their application. > > 4. Lots of hard work setting up environments, and running tests. Hence it is > important to start early if we want to have a good showing at foss4g. > > 5. Just before foss4g: Pens down, collate results, present. > > Paolo Cavallini wrote: >> >> sampe...@gmail.com ha scritto: >>> >>> A feature comparison is a good start and many masters projects have >>> already done that as well as xcompare them to closed source desktop apps. >>> >> >> Hi. >> I only have seen a few, rather incomplete, comparisons: do you have links >> for more? Thanks. >> All the best. >> ___ >> Discuss mailing list >> Discuss@lists.osgeo.org >> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > > > -- > Cameron Shorter > Geospatial Systems Architect > Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050 > Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254 > > Think Globally, Fix Locally > Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source > http://www.lisasoft.com > > ___ > Discuss mailing list > Discuss@lists.osgeo.org > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss > ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
A couple of links to reviews of desktop clients at: http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Case_Studies#Review_of_Open_Source_Desktop_Clients In particular Stefan's summary of clients is the best I've seen so far. http://www.spatialserver.net/osgis/ is quite comprehensive. The steps I see toward kicking off a Desktop comparison at FOSS4G are: 1. One person to step forward and offer to drive the comparison through to completion. (This can be a couple of people, but it usually starts with one). Effectively act as a project coordinator, setting up wiki pages, contacting potential parties, ensuring scope is capped. Paul Ramsey, Andrea Aime and Jeff McKenna seemed to be the driving people behind the WMS shootout. If you are reading this and think you might be able to fill this role, then please speak up. 2. The key projects need to be contacted, and at least one volunteer identified for each project. Ideally, there will be at least 3/4 of the projects represented. Within a year or two, any potential gis desktop user will start their search for clients by reviewing the results of the Desktop shootout, so projects represented in the shootout will become the dominant projects. (This is why it will be important for projects to get on board) 3. Between the volunteers, and led by the coordinator, a set of benchmark tests should be set up. This will probably include a core set of tests that everyone should do relatively easily, and optional tests that each project can do to show off their application. 4. Lots of hard work setting up environments, and running tests. Hence it is important to start early if we want to have a good showing at foss4g. 5. Just before foss4g: Pens down, collate results, present. Paolo Cavallini wrote: sampe...@gmail.com ha scritto: A feature comparison is a good start and many masters projects have already done that as well as xcompare them to closed source desktop apps. Hi. I only have seen a few, rather incomplete, comparisons: do you have links for more? Thanks. All the best. ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss -- Cameron Shorter Geospatial Systems Architect Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050 Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254 Think Globally, Fix Locally Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source http://www.lisasoft.com ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 8:01 PM, Paolo Cavallini wrote: > sampe...@gmail.com ha scritto: >> >> A feature comparison is a good start and many masters projects have >> already done that as well as xcompare them to closed source desktop apps. >> > Hi. > I only have seen a few, rather incomplete, comparisons: do you have links > for more? Thanks. Here's one: http://www.spatialserver.net/osgis/ An Overview of Free & Open Source Desktop GIS (FOS-GIS) (along with two publications) Markus ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
sampe...@gmail.com ha scritto: A feature comparison is a good start and many masters projects have already done that as well as xcompare them to closed source desktop apps. Hi. I only have seen a few, rather incomplete, comparisons: do you have links for more? Thanks. All the best. ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010?
Also keep in mind, unlike windows specific applications many foss4g apps rely on shared libraries like OGR and back end DB's. So the testing is not just of the application but also the libs and DB's. A feature comparison is a good start and many masters projects have already done that as well as xcompare them to closed source desktop apps. Cheers --Original Message-- From: Paolo Cavallini Sender: discuss-boun...@lists.osgeo.org To: OSGeo Discussions ReplyTo: OSGeo Discussions Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: Will there be an OSGeo Desktop shootout atFOSS4G 2010? Sent: Dec 20, 2009 5:15 AM On Sun, 20 Dec 2009 07:59:32 +1100, Cameron Shorter wrote: > Andrea, > That looks like an excellent basis to start from. > > Were the results of the desktop comparison written up somewhere? > > While a feature comparison is valuable, the end user is also interested > is other metrics which are harder to collect. Hi Cameron. Unfortunately we could not collect "hard" data about this, and frankly I think this would be very difficult to do - a desktop is much more subjective than a server. What is difficult for me can be easy for you, etc. Anyway, I think such a comparison is really necessary. Ideas welcome. All the best. -- http://faunalia.it/pc ___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss Sent from my BlackBerry device on the Rogers Wireless Network___ Discuss mailing list Discuss@lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
