[OSGeo-Discuss] OSGeo-fr - IGN meeting

[Yves Jacolin (free)]

Hi list,

This email aims to resume a meeting between OSGeo-fr and french IGN [0] which 
took 
place in november 2008. I will split this mail into two other for improving 
discussion.

People present:
* Patrick Leboeuf: Director of "Online infromation" service  (where the 
Geoportail [1] took place)
* Didier Richard, Technical Division of Géoportail (INSPIRE expert from the 
European Commission, he is working on issues on OGC standards with the IGN 
standardization service, many contributions to open source projects);
* Alain Chaumet, project manager for partnerships for Géoportail and other 
service
* Gilles Martinoty, project manager in partnerships for data integration in
he is a delegate of the public authority Service (which defines the production 
program of IGN in relation to the control of the government).

Gilles Martinoty was the IGN contact for OSGeo sponsorship [2].

OSGeo-fr and french IGN presented themself (organisation, work, purposes, 
etc.). IGN worked on lot of Open Source tehchnologies:
- Coordinate reference system: Proj4, Proj4JS, MetaCRS;
- raster processing: GDAL, MicMac (from IGN laboratoy - DEM processing from 
multiple images - used by IGN Bati3D product, http://www.micmac.ign.fr/ );
- vectorial processing: Geotools/GeoTidy, Geoserver, GeOxygene [3];
- DataBase: PostGres SQL, IGN is the provider of all coordinate reference 
system in PostGIS (I suppose for french system);
- Clients: OpenLayers (API), Quantum GIS, UDIG, OpenEV, OpenJump;
- data processing and maping: internal laboratory research. Issues : which 
licence do they need to use?

IGN will work on other projects:
   - 3D (CityGML/Collada), Clients/Servers ( for Bati3D products);
   - WCTS / WPS (coordinate transformation ) - INSPIRE;
   - OpenLS (for accurate geocoding );
   - GeoAPI;
   - IHM creator (API);
   - GeoDRM: spatial DRM used in the geoportail.

All this projects using open-source technologies are not (always) share to the 
community. The Institute wishes share it now and participate more actively in 
the community. The examples of participation discussed at the meeting were:
    - Translating software and documentation;
    - Setting up training on Open Source tools;
    - Contribute to Open Source tools as part of Inspire;
    - Participate in International Symposium and RMLL in July 2009 in Nantes. 

One issue was also raised the problem of Contributor License Agreement (CLA)
Corporate or Corporate Contributor Agreement (CCLA) Open Layers and many 
others projects of this type. The CLA is still in English, which is a problem 
for an organization like the IGN which can not legally sign a document in 
English. This is not the only issue (CCLA assignment to MetaCarta for 
example).

To formalize its position towards the open source, both internally and 
externally, IGN would sign an agreement with the OSGeo-fr. The contents of 
this agreement is to develop and discuss. Please note that OSGeo-fr is a legal 
association from august 2008. The CCLA issues will be a topic of another 
email.

It was agreed to meet us again in late March 2009.

About what OSGeo-fr wants from IGN: we clearly asked them about free data. 
They said there are not against free data, and we decided to work on this 
together. OSGeo-fr clearly hopes IGN will share some data and move to free  
data service model. I will contact GeoData Mailing list later to know more 
this (mainly documentation about free data licence, free data economic model, 
etc.)

What OSGeo-fr need from you:
We need support to help us to work on those projects: free data, CCLA issues. 
This is the first time for OSGeo-fr to show that we are a true local chapter, 
a local representation of the OSGeo in "France". This project is important for 
OSGeo, OSGeo-fr and IGN, we must not fail! ;)

Thanks very much to read my email until the end.

Best regards,

Y.
-- 
Yves Jacolin
[0] http://www.ign.fr/
[1] http://www.geoportail.fr/
[2] http://www.osgeo.org/node/457
[3] http://oxygene-project.sourceforge.net/
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"Give freedom to people is not enough, we also have to give them the power 
to use this freedom, to act". M Gauchet
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