[ Ø ] Harsh's GIS Blog

Mobile Webinar

Related:
* Mash-ups as Planning Tools
* GISP and AICP
* Technology Division of the American Planning Association (APA) Webinar Series – TECH 101: Mashups for Planning
* APA Technology Division: Education
* APA Technology Division Webinar Series: Event

This GCN article titled ‘Geospatial and the elite: Old-school geographic information systems still dig deep on mapping and analyses’ points to a tortuous debate within the traditional GIS industry, and the new industry push to remodel itself as solely an “enterprise class” industry while it continues to loose ground to an increasing domestication or democratization of GIS services.

ESRI: Elitist or Commonplace?

But this new industry push is not without some strategy confusion as old-school GIS faces its mid-life identity crisis without the “cool factor” spouse.

–π

Related:
• More

Following on the heels of E2, Google recently consolidated GE’s usergroups through some interesting collaborations with Wikipedia and Panoramio. These follow earlier deals with UNEP, NASA, USGS, ESA, Discovery, National Geographic et al.

These steps slowly push one other software- ESRI’s ArcGlobe, part of the ArcGIS 3D Analyst extension, further away from all that is important. ArcGlobe was useful in that it eventually led to E2, but ESRI had much bigger plans- it was promoted to become widely adopted for 3D data mapping and visualization.

Then Google came along, and ArcGlobe and all the shabby flyby animations and painstaking multipatches in ArcScene, also part of 3D Analyst, suddenly became embarrassing.

That leads me to my prediction of the week: all this will force ESRI to either lower the inflation-adjusted cost of its pricey 3D Analyst- currently marked at $2500, or absorb some of it into E2 or the desktop. Note that Google Earth Pro today costs a fraction at $400.

Fortius One‘s GeoIQ: A free simple Spatial Analyst?

–π

Related:
• ArcGIS Extensions
• More via Google Earth Links
• More

After months of wild speculations and foot-dragging, ESRI finally released ArcGIS Explorer- twice as big as Google Earth and a shade shy. Here is why:

Google Earth [googleearth.exe]
+ Searches better
- Does not offer native support for popular spatial data types

ESRI ArcGIS Explorer [E2.exe]
+ Offers native support for popular spatial data types
- Clunkier navigation and interface

• Both show comparable spatial data displays and memory usages. I am pleasantly surprised by how consenting NASA of World Wind fame, has been to all such uses, given the murky legal waters of the future when others start using this precedent to demand equal treatment.

ESRI ArcGIS Explorer: Adding content

Being true to the misplaced compulsions of most commercial companies, ESRI only lets you export your layers in E2′s markup language [*.nmf]. However, to piggy-back on the growing user community around GE and because ESRI has no current alternative to Google SketchUp, E2 allows you to import *.kml and *.kmz files. GE, on the other hand, also imports *.gpz and *.loc GPS files in its commerical flavor.

E2 can also create geoprocessing tasks, and styles and symbologies; export identification results; display attribute tables.

So what is the bottom-line: GE is better suited for consumers of spatial data, while E2 is targeted more at the creators and editors. And how close does E2 come to following the “if you are late, you better be better” mantra? Not quite, but then again, it is just a beta.

Now the waiting game begins for arguably the most innovative internet company in recent times, notwithstanding the acquired nature of GE and SketchUp- Google, to hit back after losing ground to Yahoo Maps- better driving directions planning, and Microsoft Virtual Earth- ability to add and save shapes, and browser-based GE-esque 3D and street level views.

–π

PS:
•
I wonder how the good folks at Arc2Earth and Shape2Earth would maintain their rates of innovation in response?

Related:
• ArcGIS Explorer Overview Podcast
• ArcGIS Online Services
• Server Object Manager [SOM] Setup
• Sample *.nmf containing 1 point feature derived from feature class [e2.shp] in GCS_North_American_1983 coordinate system
• TerrainView
• Follow Up [4]: Graphic Software
• Follow Up [2]: Map Viewer and Google

Yet more evidence of acceptance of Google Maps and through it, of spatial relevance, by established publications:

• A Guide to Commuting and Readers’ Stories
• How Much Is Gas In Jersey?

In a related development, Microsoft continues to play catch-up with Google by acquiring GeoTango. However, with its “3D Internet Visualization- a truly open and web services-oriented solution”, GeoTango may just be the partner Microsoft needs for a tango.

–π

Related:
• ESRI ArcWeb Services
• NASA World Wind

This week Yahoo released its own take on online mapping. Its new service includes both Flash and AJAX APIs coupled with the ability to geocode.

If you think about it, sooner or later this had to happen- developers finally mustering the courage to embrace arty Macromedia Flash for distributing spatial information in a big way, like Geocentric. Actually, Google has been using Flash for a different distribution for quite some time now. But this release by Yahoo and its under-1000 dollar price-tag should help Flash emerge as a more visible player in the online mapping game.

Did the earlier musings portend this?

–π

Related:
• Yahoo Developer Network
• GeoCool! Tutorial
• Google Local, MSN Virtual Earth, Amazon A9, AOL MapQuest
• Application: Google Earth
• Discussion Forum

• Website
• Post
• Hacks
• Follow Up [1]: Map Viewer and Google

–π

Two companies whose product GUI I enjoy interfacing with- Adobe and Macromedia, announced their merger earlier this month.

Both their flagship products have become industry-standards in exchanging documents and creating experience-rich applications across platforms. The largely unused spatial potential within Macromedia Flash combined with the increasingly widespread use of Adobe PDF/SVG maps and the sprouting of some exciting derivatives like geoPDF, pstoedit and GSview, make this merger important to how spatial information is exchanged in the near future.

–π

A quick note on the happenings at Google: Yesterday, Google added satellite imagery to its mapping. For speedy displays, 256px*256px JPEG image-tiles scanned at different zoom-levels and each weighing around 30 KB, coupled with some nifty AJAX come handy.

Such a drag-and-drool tiling paradigm, although practised for some time now by website developers to load large images, when applied to internet mapping represents a refreshing out-of-the-box approach. The GET HTTP request method uses a cryptic naming convention to fetch these image-tiles from a preexisting pallette, like so:

http://kh.google.com/kh?v=1&t=TILE…

WHERE in one instance, TILE zooms closer from [tqtsqr] to [tqtsqrtssssrq] and still closer to [tqtsqrtssssrtrttr].

Unlike for its regular mapping where Google predictably uses GIF image-tiles each sized at 128px*128px, for its satellite imagery, Google’s preference for JPEG over another competitive format PNG, is worthy of a second glance: As is common knowledge, JPEG supports millions of colors, but is infamous for its lossy compression. PNG on the other hand, is lossless while supporting millions of colors. However, PNG is currently not supported by all browsers and depending on compression settings, may end-up weighing more.

–π

It is good to know that some professionals concur with the views expressed in my earlier post on the potential for graphic software, like Macromedia Flash. One comment links to an impressive demonstration of this largely untapped potential.

–π

The discussion “So …How About That Election Coverage?” at Directions Magazine makes you think about graphic software, like Macromedia Flash, that cater to small-time spatial needs.

Such graphic software, minus the topology and advanced query benefits, function well as basic spatial tools and comfortably serve data over the web with a “fair” amount of interactivity.

Does this make your overpriced IMS overhyped and overblown too?

[my comment]
“Macromedia Flash fills this niche quite well as demonstrated [here]. And as the market seems to indicate, it does that [while] satisfying more customers than what an overly fancy GIS would. [This] reminds me of the MapQuest survey when polled customers had expressed great contentment with their level of map detail, whereas cartographers were red with indignation. Akin to using an atomic clock to serve your wake-up call- not needed!”
[/my comment]

So is the complexity in Geospatial, better still Spatial, Information System or SIS overblown too? Much of SIS requires common-sense logic arranged linearly. If a person can drive her car in rush-hour traffic as she deciphers vague directions off a schematic map while trying to make sense of rain-washed road signs and maintain a semblance of conversation with her passenger, and still manage to engage the kid in the back-seat [read “multi-linear tasking”]; she can achieve a sound understanding of spatial databases with little persistence, except for the eye-for-details that comes with practice.

My point: SIS is non-complex and not at the cutting-edge of technological change, and there is ample room for non-traditional spatial software!

–π

PS:
• This rise of non-traditional spatial software challenges the accepted definition of SIS. If you were to follow the modernist’s approach to design where in the end you remove everything you can without taking away from the essence of your creation and apply it to defining a SIS, you wonder what such a conceptual SIS would be in its simplest stark-naked Spartan form?

Interesting web-based map viewer- very snazzy. Now only if the download was quicker.

In related news, Google acquires Keyhole: a company promising a similar 3D interface. Right now, if you google an address, Google provides links to its 2D maps from Yahoo!Maps and MapQuest. Google also provides possible address matches and map links if you type in a name, akin to what Switchboard does.

It would be better if you could click and drag on a map to limit the spatial extent for your search. Although that would clutter the clean interface of Google Local, which by the way, does show maps.

Note to self- invest in Google.

PS:

• Google acquires gbrowser.com, and moves into video search. And here‘s the Google Blog.