[OSGeo-Discuss] Re: [postgis-users] A bit off topic, but FOSS GIS clients...
Landon Blake
lblake at ksninc.com
Wed Jan 2 09:41:34 PST 2008
Well put Paul. A little harsh...but well put.
Landon
-----Original Message-----
From: discuss-bounces at lists.osgeo.org
[mailto:discuss-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf Of Paul Ramsey
Sent: Wednesday, January 02, 2008 9:41 AM
To: PostGIS Users Discussion
Cc: OSGeo Discussions
Subject: [OSGeo-Discuss] Re: [postgis-users] A bit off topic,but FOSS
GIS clients...
> I realize it ain't easy. But could consolidation
> (future effort) make it easier?
The only thing that can be consolidated is developer effort, and even
where there are no programming language barriers (such as in the Java
world) there are lots of countervailing reasons that make mergers
impractical.
"Everyone should drop their projects and work on uDig." But all the
gvSIG developers are supported by funding from Spanish government
that requires all the work be GPL; and they also prefer a pure Java
implementation to the SWT/Eclipse implementation that uDig uses. And
the OpenJUMP people have an existing rich set of editing tools that
are not easily portable to the uDig application model. Are they going
to throw away all their existing functionality to move to another
platform? Why? OpenJUMP works fine for them.
You are thinking the developers are working for you, the user, but
they aren't. They are working for themselves and their employers, and
they have perfectly good reasons to keep working on what they want to
work on. You, the freeloading user, are incidental to the process.
We, the developers and employers, are well aware of the strategic
implications of choosing to join, or not join, a particular
community, probably to a far finer degree than you, and don't worry
-- we are looking after our interests.
> What's Refractions' model? Paul? Presumably
> Refractions is a for-profit entity and not an ESRI
> Business Partner. Refractions seems to be quite
> successful with PostGIS. PostGIS seems to be the de
> facto FOSS spatial database extension, with PostgreSQL
> being its host. Longer lead time, I know.
Actually we have been an ESRI business partner in the past, and would
not mind being so again. We do a large percentage of our revenue on
projects that use ESRI, Oracle and other proprietary tools. PostGIS
provides us with no direct revenue at all, nor does uDig.
http://geotips.blogspot.com/2005/10/open-source-company-oxymoron.html
> Does Refractions not implement the FOSS GIS products
> they help develop for pay? Do they not, like Google
> (although Google has endless capital), allow their
> programmers to work, at least part-time, on FOSS GIS
> products during work hours?
To a degree, but relative to our overall revenue flow, not really.
The pay-back on dollars spent on OSS development is much harder to
put metrics around than the payback on things like direct sales
effort, or proprietary software development.
> Also, wasn't there a FOSS4G presentation about
> consulting as a way to further FOSS GIS development
> and make a living at it as well?
Bit of a myth, as far as I can tell. This open source technology
wedge is still so small that the business opportunities remain
relatively tiny, particularly in North America, where the technology
base is so homogenous and the mental lock-in to a vendor-led
mentality so strong.
> Is there a QGIS foundation? If not, could there be?
> Should there be?
No, there's an OSGeo foundation, of which QGIS is a member, that's
good enough. Once it's a 5013c, US donors will even be able to get
tax receipts for their donations to QGIS development, and write off
the donations.
P
>
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