[Board] Support needed for FOSS SDI and it's viability

[Ravi]

My Dear Fellow board members of OSGeo,

Some so called SDI experts feel that FOSS SDI cannot perform at-par with
Proprietary SDI.
Please
 provide examples to fight a case from an Indian state which swears by 
Free and Open Source Software. We can never expect a better level 
playing field. 

Kerala - India

Here are some excerpts from a document that has false claims supporting Proprietary Software.

However,
 it is worthwhile to mention here that the OSS (Open Source Software) 
does not match the advanced functionalities of many of the commercial 
(proprietory) software that is in the market. Image processing and 
analysis capabilities of the open source software is not comparable to 
the commercial software when one require to carry out advanced data 
manipulations, image fusion, 3D modeling, ortho-correction, 
auto-georeferencing,
 stereo-image/air photo interpretation (PROBABLY REFERRING TO GRASS), advanced geospatial analysis 
etc., In such cases, certain proprietary software become an integral 
part of the Spatial Data Infrastructures, which can not be avoided. At a
 later stage the some of the proprietary software need to be purchased.

It is a well known fact that web portal that run with OSS are neither OGC-compliant nor
interoperable. At the present juncture it is only possible to establish the KSDI Geoportal
with the available COTS enterprise software.

The detailed PDF document will be emailed on demand.

This is a case that has the potential to set trends in India. Hope to have a good discussion such that we can sum it up and present at a meeting being conducted on August 11th 2010, to settle the issue. 

regards
Ravi Kumar



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