<div>In case anyone is interested, URISA has posted their response to the RFI:</div>
<div><a href="http://www.urisa.org/URISA%20Response%20to%20Federal%20Geospatial%20Line%20of%20Business%20RFI.pdf">http://www.urisa.org/URISA%20Response%20to%20Federal%20Geospatial%20Line%20of%20Business%20RFI.pdf</a></div>
<div> </div>
<div>-Mike<br><br> </div>
<div><span class="gmail_quote">On 5/2/06, <b class="gmail_sendername">Mike Davis</b> <<a href="mailto:mike.and.kerry@gmail.com">mike.and.kerry@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</span>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid">
<div>
<div>Good additions... have to admit that some of the questions fly a little over my head (change management??) but I think we should be able to come up with some consensus pretty easily.<br> </div>
<div>-Mike<br> </div></div>
<div><span class="e" id="q_10af75f86b6c4938_1">
<div><span class="gmail_quote">On 5/2/06, <b class="gmail_sendername">Ned Horning</b> <<a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:nedh@lightlink.com" target="_blank">nedh@lightlink.com</a>> wrote:
</span>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid">Hello again,<br><br>I made a few changes to the RFI wiki. I probably won't be able to spend time<br>on this tomorrow (Wednesday) but may be able to look at it again on
<br>Thursday. It has to be turned in by e-mail by 5:00 PM EDT this Friday so<br>there isn't a lot of time to wrap this up. Comments and edits are needed. As<br>I mentioned yesterday this is not my area of expertise and I'm hoping some
<br>other folks will be able to help craft this into a decent document.<br><br>At this point it's probably best to write in full sentences unless there is<br>someone willing to convert some of the (excellent) bullets into a paragraph
<br>format Thursday or Friday.<br><br>Here is what I added today in case you can't access the Wiki. There is some<br>other good text on the Wiki page from other contributors so I encourage you<br>to check it out if you can.
<br><br>--<br>2.2.2 What are the critical change management issues and best practices for<br>successful transition to and full implementation of common solutions?<br><br>A fundamental change management issue is to promote and adapt open standards
<br>for the collection (protocols), storage (file formats, media, and metadata),<br>access, and processing of geographic data. A recently released report by the<br>Digital Connections Council of the Committee for Economic Development, "Open
<br>Standards, Open Source, and Open Innovation: Harnessing the Benefits of<br>Openness" (<a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="http://www.ced.org/projects/ecom.shtml#open" target="_blank">http://www.ced.org/projects/ecom.shtml#open
</a>) highlights the<br>benefits from adapting open standards. This report found that openness can <br>be used effectively to build standards that in turn can be used to enhance<br>interoperability.<br><br><br>2.2.3 What cultural impediments and training issues are paramount at which
<br>stages of the transition? What are the solutions to them? <br><br>Although the United States is a global leader in providing public access to<br>data the process of collecting/creating, storing and processing these data
<br>are less open largely because vendors providing these services use secret <br>and proprietary methods with the intent of gaining a competitive edge over<br>their competition. This approach is rooted in traditional intellectual
<br>property protection ideals and can result in incompatibly and high costs to <br>the government. This mindset is a significant cultural impediment to<br>achieving common solutions for working with geospatial data and can be
<br>overcome by developing open data and software standards and promoting the <br>benefits of this approach to the business community and government<br>organizations.<br><br><br>2.2.8 How do you retain the advantages of competition while reaping the
<br>benefits of geospatial coordination and optimization? <br><br>Advantages of competition are perceived to be improved innovation (producing<br>a better product) and reduced cost to the consumer. By developing and using
<br>open standards innovation is improved because of the size and diversity of <br>the community developing the standards. Cost is also reduced because once<br>the standards and clearly defined metrics of success are in place the cost
<br>of entry to begin developing products is reduced. Competition is important <br>but to strengthen competition it helps if companies can compete on a level<br>playing field that is promoted through the use of open standards.
<br><br><br>2.2.9 How do you ensure and manage ongoing innovation in geospatial <br>coordination and optimization?<br><br>The most effective way to ensure continued innovation with regard to<br>geospatial coordination and optimization is to promote and adopt open
<br>standards for the creation/collection, storage, access, and processing of <br>geospatial data. This includes contributing to the development of open<br>source geospatial software. It is in the data users' and producers' interest
<br>to have interoperable solutions and the most effective way to accomplish <br>this is to include them in the process of developing standards and software.<br>The benefits of using open methods are becoming well publicized (could use a
<br>citation here). To further benefit from current open approaches it is <br>necessary to fund research to further develop open geospatial-focused<br>standards for improved interoperability and access. Research should also be
<br>conducted on innovative open approaches for creating and maintaining <br>geospatial data layers in an open environment. The potential of openness in<br>the geospatial sector is great but funded research is needed to expedite the
<br>realization of these benefits.<br><br><br>2.2.12 What governance model do you use or would you recommend for <br>coordinating the use of geographic information or optimizing related spatial<br>data activities?<br><br>
A refined and clear cut governance model for coordinating the use of<br>geographic information and related activities does not exist but as with <br>developing standards this should be developed using an open process. There
<br>is a wealth of information related to governance models that can be drawn<br>from the open source software community. The open source software community <br>is thriving by leveraging the expertise and interests from a diverse group
<br>of individuals and a similar model can be used to benefit from and better<br>coordinate the use of geographic information and to optimize related spatial <br>data activities.<br><br><br>2.2.13 What is the best approach for assembling and using multiple data sets
<br>from diverse fields where scale, units of analysis and data types differ?<br><br>The key to working with diverse data is interoperability and this can be <br>best achieved through the use of open standards for data and software. Open
<br>source geospatial software offerings have a proven track record for often<br>being the first to implement geospatial standards developed by the Open <br>Geospatial Consortium (OGC).<br><br>The inability to read a particular file format is often the factor
<br>preventing access to a particular data set. This can occur for several<br>reasons but two common problems are an insufficient capability of a software <br>program to read a particular file format or the inability to read a
<br>proprietary file format using incompatible software. Adopting open standards<br>and open source software can alleviate both of these problems. Having a <br>community of individuals and organizations build on open source software
<br>libraries can help strengthen the ability of software packages to handle a<br>wide variety of format. A good example of this is the open source Geospatial <br>Data Abstraction Library (GDAL) and OGR which are raster (GDAL) and vector
<br>(OGR) translator libraries. Building on open source libraries provides<br>excellent resources for open source and proprietary software developers <br>alike.<br>--<br><br>All the best,<br><br>Ned<br><br><br>> -----Original Message-----
<br>> From: Ned Horning [mailto:<a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:nedh@lightlink.com" target="_blank">nedh@lightlink.com</a>]<br>> Sent: Monday, May 01, 2006 4:34 PM <br>> To:
<a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:discuss@mail.osgeo.org" target="_blank">discuss@mail.osgeo.org</a><br>> Subject: [OSGeo-Discuss] Geospatial LoB RFI<br>><br>> All,<br>><br>
> I'm going to have to run for the day but wanted to let you know what I <br>plan<br>> to do with this document tomorrow and maybe later in the week. I would<br>also<br>> like to put out a couple requests for help. Again, here is the URL to the
<br>> document:<br>> <a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/Response_to_RFI_for_US_Gov_GeoSpatial" target="_blank">http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/Response_to_RFI_for_US_Gov_GeoSpatial
</a><br>><br>> It is probably best to focus on a few sections of this RFI that are in<br>line<br>> with the OSGeo ideals and that we can put together a worthy response. This <br>> RFI does not focus on software but I think OSGeo can make a significant
<br>> contribution. I may take a shot at the following sections:<br>> 2.2.2<br>> 2.2.3<br>> 2.2.8<br>> 2.2.9<br>> 2.2.12<br>> 2.2.13<br>> Scenario 2<br>><br>> If someone wants to start any of the above sections please do. I'm just
<br>> letting folks know where I think I can contribute something. I'm not the<br>> most qualified person to be writing these sections but I do think this is <br>a<br>> good opportunity to discuss some of these issues and hopefully begin to
<br>make<br>> our presence known within the US Government. Please feel free to shred<br>> whatever I write and let me know if sections or the entire document are <br>not<br>> worth submitting.<br>><br>> We need to supply contact information (point of contact, phone number,
<br>> e-mail address). Any idea on how we should approach this?<br>><br>> Someone should write a paragraph or more for section 2.4 which is<br>> "additional information beyond the questions". This would be a good place
<br>to<br>> promote the ideals of OSGeo although we do have to be careful not to<br>market<br>> OSGeo (this is explicitly frowned upon). Can anyone volunteer? We can <br>> probably get a lot of reuse out of this section.
<br>><br>> In haste,<br>><br>> Ned<br>><br>><br>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------<br>> To unsubscribe, e-mail: <a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:discuss-unsubscribe@mail.osgeo.org" target="_blank">
discuss-unsubscribe@mail.osgeo.org</a><br>> For additional commands, e-mail: <a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:discuss-help@mail.osgeo.org" target="_blank">discuss-help@mail.osgeo.org
</a><br><br><br>--------------------------------------------------------------------- <br>To unsubscribe, e-mail: <a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:discuss-unsubscribe@mail.osgeo.org" target="_blank">
discuss-unsubscribe@mail.osgeo.org</a><br>For additional commands, e-mail: <a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:discuss-help@mail.osgeo.org" target="_blank">discuss-help@mail.osgeo.org </a>
<br><br></blockquote></div><br></span></div></blockquote></div><br>