[OSGeo-Announce] New German, Spanish and Québécois OSGeo Local Chapters Approved

[Frank Warmerdam]

The OSGeo board has formally approved three new local chapters. OSGeo local 
chapters provide a venue to support local users and developers, as well as a 
mechanism to further OSGeo's mission and goals in a linguistic, or geographic area.

FOSSGIS e.V. has been approved as a local chapter for the german speaking 
countries of Germany, Austria and Switzerland with Dr. Georg Lösel as 
representative. FOSSGIS e.V. has existed since the year 2000 at which time is 
was incorporated as GRASS-Anwender-Vereinigung (GAV). It was recently renamed 
FOSSGIS e.V. FOSSGIS e.V is responsible for maintaining the FreeGIS Portal. 
Since 2006 it has held the FOSSGIS conference promoting FOSS4G software, with 
500 participants in 2008. FOSSGIS e.V. also plays an important role in 
supporting a FOSS4G role in other tradeshows such as InterGeo and AGIT.

    http://www.fossgis.de

The OSGeo Spanish Local Chapter has been approved for spanish speaking areas of 
all continents with Pedro-Juan Ferrer Matoses as representative. Since it's 
formation in 2007 the chapter has established a members list, and elected a 
board of directors. Key activities include work on the Free GIS Book, Spanish 
Localization and events including Jornadas de SIG Libre and the Jornadas gvSIG.

    http://es.osgeo.org

The Comité de direction du Chapitre québécois de l'OSGeo has been approved for 
the region of Québec (Canada) with Daniel Morissette as representative. This 
chapter seeks to provide a channel for communication, exchange and cooperation 
to facilitate the development of the Québec community around OSGeo products and 
Open Source Geospatial topics in general. With a primary focus on local 
community development, it also plans to cooperate with the Francophone Chapter 
on French translations, and with other nearby chapters on some events. The 
chapter has approximately 90 members, and has formed a steering committee.

    http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Chapitre_qu%C3%A9b%C3%A9cois