[OSGeo-Discuss] Case studies for migrating to Geospatial FOSS?
Paul Ramsey
pramsey at refractions.net
Thu Jan 31 11:44:55 PST 2008
Mapserver, of course, is probably rife with great case-study
candidates... the ideal ones are large government organizations or
corporations, because the point is to establish "brand credibility".
I believe Apache is good because I know IBM uses is. I believe
Mapserver is good because I know that <large company X> uses it.
Academics and small companies need not apply. The point, in
approaching people with low risk tolerance, is to show them that
other people with low risk tolerance have already taken the plunge.
Nothing but nothing is as convincing as reference case.
Can PostGIS scale? Sure can, the largest national mapping database in
the world, UK Ordnance Survey MasterMap (500M features!) has been
loaded into it, by a very large UK data provision firm, and they are
using it operationally: http://postgis.refractions.net/documentation/
casestudies/infoterra
P.
On 31-Jan-08, at 11:36 AM, Paul Ramsey wrote:
> There are not very many extant descriptions of case studies of the
> kind I consider useful, namely the "traditional IT shop examines
> options and makes a change" sort. gvSIG in Valencia makes a poor
> case study because it's so "big bang"... I mean, it's amazing a
> whole province decided to plunge off the OSS cliff, but it's not
> the stuff of most IT manager's dreams. They want small and
> incremental. "We developed a new system from scratch" is the wrong
> message. The right message is "we examined this wee module, and it
> looked OK, and we slotted it into our existing infrastructure".
> The North Dakota postgis study is a good one. Another one that is
> non-PostGIS, but a nice one is the BC ILMB integration of Mapserver
> into their operations. They didn't actually replace anything at
> all, they just used Mapserver to enhance what they already had.
>
> http://www.foss4g2007.org/presentations/view.php?abstract_id=172
>
> Now that gvSIG is mature, I bet it has some good studies around the
> edges. Not Valencia itself, but other Spanish organizations that
> have been able to independently look at it and fold it into the
> edges of what they are doing.
>
> P.
>
> On 31-Jan-08, at 11:22 AM, Cameron Shorter wrote:
>
>> Daniel, here is some feedback from one of the Australian agencies,
>> I'm hoping for more feedback in the next day or so:
>>
>> I'd like to see where an organisation has successfully
>> implemented OS Spatial products, including:
>> - what drove them to do this
>> - what evaluation they did
>> - what benefits they found
>> - what problems they faced and how they overcame them
>> - unresolved issues
>> - integration with existing spatial products and IT infrastructure
>> - future plans
>>
>> Daniel Ames wrote:
>>> Cameron,
>>>
>>> What type of a document are you looking for? In other words how
>>> much detail and what focus? We might be able to find something
>>> that exists with respect to this EPA effort, or we could perhaps
>>> put it together.
>>> Dan
>>>
>>> On Jan 29, 2008 1:10 PM, Cameron Shorter
>>> <cameron.shorter at gmail.com <mailto:cameron.shorter at gmail.com>>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Dr Dan Ames,
>>>
>>> Gary suggested that you might be able to provide a case study or
>>> similar
>>> into the EPA's migration from ESRI to Open Source.
>>> Specifically I have some Australian Government Agencies who
>>> would be
>>> interested to use such work, and in general, such case studies
>>> would be
>>> very beneficial for the uptake of Open Source globally.
>>>
>>> Gary Watry wrote:
>>> > Contact Dr. Dan Ames at Idaho State University
>>> > amesdani at isu.edu <mailto:amesdani at isu.edu>
>>> >
>>> > ----- Original Message -----
>>> > From: Cameron Shorter
>>> > Date: Monday, January 28, 2008 22:11
>>> > Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Case studies for migrating to
>>> Geospatial FOSS?
>>> > To: OSGeo Discussions
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >> Yes Gary, that would be great. Do you know where we can find
>>> information about this?
>>> >>
>>> >> On Jan 29, 2008 2:07 PM, Gary Watry wrote:
>>> >>
>>> >>> Would the U.S. EPA moving from ESRI to Open Source for their
>>> >>>
>>> >> Watershed model help
>>> >>
>>> >>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> >>> From: Cameron Shorter
>>> >>> Date: Monday, January 28, 2008 21:39
>>> >>> Subject: [OSGeo-Discuss] Case studies for migrating to
>>> >>>
>>> >> Geospatial FOSS?
>>> >>
>>> >>> To: OSGeo Discussions
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>>> After giving a presentation recently about Geospatial Open
>>> >>>>
>>> >> Source, we
>>> >> were asked whether there have been any case
>>> >> studies on migration to
>>> >>
>>> >>>> Geospatial Open Source.
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>> The audience were very sympathetic to Open Source, but
>>> felt is
>>> >>>>
>>> >> would> > be much easier to sell to upper management if
>>> they could
>>> >> draw upon
>>> >>
>>> >>>> experiences of other agencies who have done something
>>> similar.
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>> Can anyone point me to reports, or programs which have
>>> >>>>
>>> >> migrated from
>>> >>
>>> >>>> ESRI/Oracle applications (ArcGIS in particular) to Open
>>> Source
>>> >>>> equivalents?
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>> --
>>> >>>> Cameron Shorter
>>> >>>> Geospatial Systems Architect
>>> >>>> Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
>>> >>>> Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>> Think Globally, Fix Locally
>>> >>>> Commercial Support for Geospatial Open Source Solutions
>>> >>>> http://www.lisasoft.com/LISAsoft/SupportedProducts.html
>>> >>>> _______________________________________________
>>> >>>> Discuss mailing list
>>> >>>> Discuss at lists.osgeo.org <mailto:Discuss at lists.osgeo.org>
>>> >>>> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>>> >>>>
>>> >>>>
>>> >>> Gary Watry
>>> >>> Applications Developer/Designer
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Florida State University
>>> >>> Office of Telecommunications
>>> >>> 644 West Call Street
>>> >>> Tallahassee, Fl 32306
>>> >>> Phone: 645-6904
>>> >>> email: gwatry at fsu.edu <mailto:gwatry at fsu.edu>
>>> >>>
>>> >>> _______________________________________________
>>> >>> Discuss mailing list
>>> >>> Discuss at lists.osgeo.org <mailto:Discuss at lists.osgeo.org>
>>> >>> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>
>>> >> --
>>> >> Cameron Shorter
>>> >> Geospatial Systems Architect
>>> >> Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
>>> >> Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254
>>> >>
>>> >> Think Globally, Fix Locally
>>> >> Commercial Support for Geospatial Open Source Solutions
>>> >> http://www.lisasoft.com/LISAsoft/SupportedProducts.html
>>> >> _______________________________________________
>>> >> Discuss mailing list
>>> >> Discuss at lists.osgeo.org <mailto:Discuss at lists.osgeo.org>
>>> >> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>>> >>
>>> >>
>>> >
>>> > Gary Watry
>>> > Applications Developer/Designer
>>> >
>>> > Florida State University
>>> > Office of Telecommunications
>>> > 644 West Call Street
>>> > Tallahassee, Fl 32306
>>> > Phone: 645-6904
>>> > email: gwatry at fsu.edu <mailto:gwatry at fsu.edu>
>>> >
>>> > _______________________________________________
>>> > Discuss mailing list
>>> > Discuss at lists.osgeo.org <mailto:Discuss at lists.osgeo.org>
>>> > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>>> >
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Cameron Shorter
>>> Geospatial Systems Architect
>>> Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
>>> Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254
>>>
>>> Think Globally, Fix Locally
>>> Commercial Support for Geospatial Open Source Solutions
>>> http://www.lisasoft.com/LISAsoft/SupportedProducts.html
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Daniel P. Ames, PhD, PE
>>> Geospatial Software lab
>>> Department of Geosciences
>>> Idaho State University - Idaho Falls
>>> amesdani at isu.edu <mailto:amesdani at isu.edu>
>>> www.hydromap.com <http://www.hydromap.com>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Cameron Shorter
>> Geospatial Systems Architect
>> Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
>> Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254
>>
>> Think Globally, Fix Locally
>> Commercial Support for Geospatial Open Source Solutions
>> http://www.lisasoft.com/LISAsoft/SupportedProducts.html
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Discuss mailing list
>> Discuss at lists.osgeo.org
>> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>
> _______________________________________________
> Discuss mailing list
> Discuss at lists.osgeo.org
> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
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