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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 06/15/2015 09:23 AM, Bernhard Ströbl
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote cite="mid:557E6F56.2040805@jena.de" type="cite">Hi
Joseph,
<br>
<br>
could you elaborate why "it would be unrealistic to say we
<br>
could ever be a 100% QGIS"? I am curious because I lost contact
with ESRI products a couple years ago.
<br>
<br>
</blockquote>
<br>
From our point of view, we need support for dwg. That side of vendor
lock-in is, unfortunately, even stronger that the ties to ESRI. So
we stay with Arc* not because of the GIS capabilites, but more or
less only because of the ability to read Autocad plans and surveys.<br>
<br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:557E6F56.2040805@jena.de" type="cite">Bernhard
<br>
<br>
Am 12.06.2015 um 19:23 schrieb Joseph Sloop:
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">To All,
<br>
I am glad to see the discussion and interest in QGIS in local
government. I
<br>
have been interested in QGIS in local government for sometime
now. I work
<br>
for MapForsyth| City-County Geographic Information Office in
Forsyth
<br>
County, North Carolina (USA). We have and use both QGIS and ESRI
products
<br>
(more of ESRI than QGIS). In our case it would be unrealistic to
say we
<br>
could ever be a 100% QGIS (FOSS) shop at this point, but it is
our goal to
<br>
have QGIS integrated with more of our departments and through
time we will
<br>
be able to increase the use of QGIS.
<br>
<br>
I know from my experience, case studies and showing return on
investment
<br>
(ROI) are very important to have and show decision makers.
However, let us
<br>
not for get our IT departments, especially in local government.
In our case
<br>
we partnered with them so they could see, understand, and ask
questions
<br>
regarding QGIS or any open source software we use. I have found
that they
<br>
are becoming some of our best supporters.
<br>
<br>
Some of my other thoughts are support and governance of QGIS
<br>
installations...best practices etc.
<br>
<br>
Just my two cents, but glad to see the discussion.
<br>
<br>
Cheers,
<br>
<br>
Joseph Sloop
<br>
<br>
On Fri, Jun 12, 2015 at 9:11 AM, Randal Hale <
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:rjhale@northrivergeographic.com">rjhale@northrivergeographic.com</a>> wrote:
<br>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">In the states it's all ESRI all day.
<br>
<br>
A few small governments might try to run in a FOSS4G direction
but it's
<br>
rare. In the Southeast they go "what is the next town over
doing? we will
<br>
do the same thing". The models that ESRI provide are tempting
for many
<br>
because suddenly everyone is doing the exact same thing. So
with no thought
<br>
- Gov't A can share with Gov't B. They feel as thought they
are adhering to
<br>
a standard - of course a standard put forth by a software
company.
<br>
<br>
My business is swinging in a more foss4g direction although I
still use
<br>
ESRI software as many of my customers do - but it's getting
rare. So rare I
<br>
opted to not renew my ESRI licensing this year. Many of my
clients are
<br>
versions back so I can sit on 10.2 for a while. I still get
"well that free
<br>
stuff can't be that good" but I'm slowly winning over clients
as They are
<br>
getting very good data with qgis/postgis and the word is
spreading. Yes
<br>
it's free but it's very professional.
<br>
<br>
Well - we seem to have started something - question is where
do we go next
<br>
with this?
<br>
<br>
Randy
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
On 06/12/2015 04:34 AM, Andreas Neumann wrote:
<br>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">Hi Steve,
<br>
<br>
Thank you for raising this important discussion.
<br>
<br>
In some European countries the situation is a bit different
and Open
<br>
Source solutions are gaining an increasing market share. I
live and work in
<br>
Switzerland - and while the majority of the markets still
uses ESRI
<br>
products - there is an increasing number of provinces who
also increasingly
<br>
use Postgis, QGIS, OpenLayers, etc - sometimes exclusively
and sometimes
<br>
side by side with proprietary software.
<br>
<br>
I also think that the next couple of years we will see an
increasing
<br>
number of governmental organisations introducing OpenSource
GIS side by
<br>
side with commercial GIS and will gradually shift more and
more
<br>
applications to FOSSGIS.
<br>
<br>
Some examples in Switzerland:
<br>
<br>
* The national mapping portal runs exclusively on OS
software (Postgis,
<br>
OpenLayers, and some more) - it runs very well, fast and is
very popular -
<br>
production of the data is still done exclusively in ESRI
<br>
* 2 provinces in Switzerland run exclusively in FOSSGIS,
about 7 and 8
<br>
additional provinces introduced FOSSGIS side by side with
commercial
<br>
products
<br>
* several cities and water/gaz providers are currently
migrating to
<br>
FOSSGIS to document utility networks
<br>
* The austrian province "Vorarlberg" introduced several
hundred
<br>
installations of QGIS as the main GIS in their
administration
<br>
* several Scandinavian countries/provinces/cities are
already using
<br>
FOSSGIS on both Desktop GIS and web mapping
<br>
<br>
The list would be much longer - but things are moving slowly
and steadily
<br>
to more FOSSGIS usage in Europe - at least I can tell
<br>
<br>
There are two other interesting points:
<br>
<br>
* in my opinion - it is not so much about money - but about
different
<br>
values: the ability to more easily influence the direction
of the software,
<br>
support of open standards, integration with other FOSS
software, etc.
<br>
* as an employee of a local government it is so much more
interesting
<br>
being able to actively contribute to FOSS software rather
than just using
<br>
software "as is".
<br>
<br>
As you can see above - it is more the "richer" countries
that are moving
<br>
towards Open Source and fewer "poorer" countries. This
indicates that the
<br>
factor "cost" is less important than people think.
<br>
<br>
Andreas
<br>
<br>
<br>
On 11.06.2015 22:28, Steve G wrote:
<br>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">I am not sure this is the correct
forum for a start to this discussion,
<br>
but
<br>
I've been pondering this for a while and interested what
others think. I
<br>
work for local government in the U.S. and when people
generally talk
<br>
about
<br>
GIS there is no doubt an automatic association with the
ESRI ArcGIS
<br>
platform. And beyond GIS itself, the dominance that ESRI
has is even
<br>
more
<br>
pronounced given the fact that many cities have
implemented other related
<br>
systems (permitting, computer aided dispatch, etc) that
are identified
<br>
business partners with ESRI. Furthermore, the "GIS Local
Government"
<br>
track
<br>
that ESRI developed has evolved to offer an "turnkey"
approach for local
<br>
government self-service to establish a robust geodatabase
(Local
<br>
Government
<br>
Information Model), maps, apps, web services, etc. This
extends a COTS
<br>
approach for local governments to establish, develop, and
maintain a
<br>
fairly
<br>
complete GIS. In my opinion, pure genius...because for a
lot of small
<br>
cities/governments with limited staff and budget, the
turnkey approach is
<br>
very appealing. For city bureaucrats thinking about
<br>
implementing/extending
<br>
GIS, what they might think as little $$$ and you get all
of this?
<br>
Awesome...here's my money.
<br>
<br>
HOWEVER, this approach has its drawbacks. Long-term
license/use costs,
<br>
vendor lock-in, continuous waiting for someone at the
company to fix
<br>
something....well, the list goes on (just read any blog
post supporting
<br>
open
<br>
source/FOSS).
<br>
<br>
So, with the evolution of QGIS as a prevailing
replacement/alternative
<br>
for
<br>
the other product, is anyone thinking about building more
of a turnkey
<br>
approach (database, maps, apps, web services, etc) geared
to local
<br>
governments? I like the direction of the OpenGeo platform
(and others)
<br>
trying to provide the whole software stack, but still if a
small local
<br>
government wants to have a full fledged interactive GIS,
it might seem
<br>
like
<br>
a lot of work to develop and maintain.
<br>
<br>
I am interested in other thoughts...perhaps this belongs
on a blog post
<br>
somewhere more independent, but perhaps this can be a
place to begin.
<br>
<br>
Steve G.
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
--
<br>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
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