[gdal-dev] Adding a "Commercial support" section on gdal.org?
Frank Warmerdam
warmerdam at pobox.com
Thu Aug 21 10:02:05 PDT 2014
Folks,
This is a somewhat sticky area, which is why I started just with just the
self-registration mechanism on the OSGeo site in the past.
A scenario that I could support would be a section somewhat like the
postgis.net support list where being added to it needs to be voted on by
the PSC. My criteria as a PSC member would be:
- The organization has made significant contributions to the project (in
code, docs, etc)
- The organization has staff that I personally know to be competent
GDAL/OGR developers.
It is a slippery sort of thing of course. Subjective, and I would hate to
be in the situation where I'm having to vote against an addition.
If we were to pursue this I actually think an RFC with an initial list of
entries, and some general principles would be appropriate (though additions
wouldn't need an RFC - just a up/down vote).
My perspective when consulting was that being active on the mailing list,
and noting in my email signature that I was available for consulting was
enough to give me some profile with those looking for someone.
PS. as happy customer of Even's (at Planet Labs) I can strongly endorse him
as a consultant!
Best regards,
Frank
On Thu, Aug 21, 2014 at 8:37 AM, Eli Adam <eadam at co.lincoln.or.us> wrote:
> Adding a support section like some other OSGeo projects is a good idea (in
> my opinion). This is a way for people to use the project webpage to find
> those who are most substantially contributing to the project and know the
> most about GDAL/OGR.
>
>
> On Thu, Aug 21, 2014 at 5:46 AM, <bertelli at charta.acme.com> wrote:
>
>> Charta is interested to be listed as experienced provider if gdal.org
>> will ever add info about commercial support.
>>
>> Nevertheless, I think this item has to receive more attention,
>> considering at least:
>> * the license of GDAL. Using MIT license means being expecially open to
>> commercial usage. I don't know if this is really consequential with
>> selecting a group of commercial providers instead of being agnostic about
>> usage of the code and technology created (I don't agree with this, but...);
>> * usually support means choice between several tools and technologies,
>> being a core contributor could mean some bias about recurring to a specific
>> tool. Being listed as such could become a double-edged sword;
>>
>
> If you are looking for GDAL/OGR support (on the gdal.org web page) you
> have already made your technology choice. If you are looking for support
> in selecting a technology you should not be looking on gdal.org but
> rather collecting references or otherwise doing research on appropriate
> support in whatever domain you're in. gdal.org is not the the proper
> place to look for support on javascript libraries or other non-GDAL/OGR
> topics. Someone may be better off with advice to use something other than
> GDAL/OGR but gdal.org is not the place to get that advice (the people and
> companies listed there may give that advice if approached but they would
> best know what is out of the GDAL/OGR scope).
>
>
>> * any evaluation aobut support should be based on the help provided to
>> the user and not about the contribution to the project. The client shoud be
>> able to choose if he needs "broad" or "focused" support, if he needs new
>> developments or better integration and so on. Listing experiences or
>> specialisation (geodatabases, remote sensing and so on) could be more
>> useful.
>>
>
> A prudent customer might evaluate support by referrals and reviews based
> on help provided to the user but gdal.org is in no place to evaluate
> that. gdal.org is certainly in a place to evaluate and recommend those
> who have a history of competently contributing to the project (tickets,
> patches, commits, emails correctly answered, relevant presentations at
> FOSS4G, etc).
>
> The OSGeo Service providers directory,
> http://www.osgeo.org/search_profile?SET=1&MUL_TECH[0]=00013 already
> provides a mechanism for self listing anything the person listing wants.
> This remains a valuable resource for researching support options but gives
> no indication of who is competently contributing to the project.
>
> The PostGIS support page lists focus area of support,
> http://postgis.net/support
>
> Best regards, Eli
>
>
>>
>> Even's case is noteworthy, because he is more than a "Core contributor",
>> but a project leader for GDAL. When his affiliation to École des Mines
>> changed to his own company, Spatialys, I thought this was a very good move
>> because he could more easily provide consulting services to commercial
>> entities. Maybe his visibility as a prominent person in this community is
>> already warranted, I understand that his proposal is addressed to others,
>> but I think gdal-dev is about developing, although the list provides a lot
>> of help to users, is this the right place?
>>
> c
>>
>> On Thu, Aug 20, 2014 at 10:02:35 PM, Even Rouault wrote:
>>
>> Date: Wed, 20 Aug 2014 22:02:35 +0200
>> From: Even Rouault <even.rouault at spatialys.com>
>> To: "gdal-dev at lists.osgeo.org" <gdal-dev at lists.osgeo.org>
>> Subject: [gdal-dev] Adding a "Commercial support" section on gdal.org
>> ?
>> Message-ID: <201408202202.36022.even.rouault at spatialys.com>
>> Content-Type: Text/Plain; charset="us-ascii"
>>
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I'm wondering if there would be a concensus and interest to add a
>> "Commercial
>> support" section on gdal.org. A number of OSGeo projects have such
>> page (see
>> [1]), so that wouldn't be completely awkward to have one for GDAL as
>> well.
>>
>> The OSGeo Service provider database reference 137
>> companies/individuals that
>> have registered themselves as providing GDAL support ([2]) ! Pretty
>> cool, but
>> I'm wondering how a user not familiar with the project could
>> effectively use
>> that list to identify core contributors from casual advanced users.
>>
>> If we agree for adding a "Commercial support" section, the question
>> is : on
>> which criteria do we accept an organization/individual to be listed
>> in the
>> section ? We would want them to be as most objective and non
>> debatable as
>> possible.
>> A simple criterion could be anyone who has commit rights (in trunk,
>> not just
>> in a sandbox or customer branch). There are currently 56 SVN
>> committers. That
>> could be strengthened with a minimum number of commits/lines changed
>> during a
>> period, but we perhaps don't need that level of complexity.
>> We could possibly also extend that to entities that provide public
>> support to
>> users through gdal-dev or other public forums (gis.stackexchange,
>> others?).
>> Other suggestions ?
>>
>> Should we distinguish several categories of actors ?
>> - QGIS makes a division between "Core contributors" vs "Contributors".
>> GeoServer has "Core contributors", "Experienced providers" and
>> "Additional
>> services" (the last one is populated on service provider request).
>> - On the other side, deegree, Geomoose or Geotools simply list them
>> in a
>> single section.
>> The answer likely depends on the number of organizations that would
>> be listed
>> (I guess below 10 we don't need much structure). The difficulty here
>> would be to
>> establish the categories and criteria.
>>
>> So, could entities interested in being listed reply to this email so
>> we can
>> have a better idea of how many would be listed, and if we need more
>> stricter
>> criteria or several categories ?
>> As far as I'm concerned, Spatialys would be interested.
>>
>> Best regards,
>>
>> Even
>>
>> [1] Non exhaustive list of OSGeo projects with a commercial support
>> section :
>> http://geoserver.org/support/
>> http://www.geomoose.org/info/commercial_support.html
>> http://docs.geotools.org/latest/userguide/welcome/support.html
>> http://wiki.deegree.org/deegreeWiki/GettingSupport
>> http://qgis.org/en/site/forusers/commercial_support.html
>>
>> [2] OSGeo Service Provider catalog with entities declaring GDAL
>> expertise :
>> http://www.osgeo.org/search_profile?SET=1&MUL_TECH[]=00013
>>
>>
>> --
>> Spatialys - Geospatial professional services
>> http://www.spatialys.com
>>
>>
>> --
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> --------------
>> Carlo A. Bertelli
>> Charta servizi e sistemi per il territorio e la storia ambientale srl
>> Dipendenze del palazzo Doria,
>> vc. alla Chiesa della Maddalena 9/2 16124 Genova (Italy)
>> tel. +39(0)10 2475439 fax +39(0)10 2475439 gsm:+39 393 1590711
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> --------------
>>
>>
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>> gdal-dev at lists.osgeo.org
>> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/gdal-dev
>>
>
>
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--
---------------------------------------+--------------------------------------
I set the clouds in motion - turn up | Frank Warmerdam,
warmerdam at pobox.com
light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/~warmerdam
and watch the world go round - Rush | Geospatial Software Developer
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