[Ica-osgeo-labs] BOF in Portland: Some Ideas of certification

Tue Jan 13 05:40:49 PST 2015

Hi Arnulf,

Thanks for all your efforts that you put in for the certification ideas  and inspite of good ideas and discussions it is disappointing that we had not made  progress in implementing this. One of the reasons why Proprietery vendors are running successful certification programs for their software is that they invest lot of time and effort for this as they see the importance of this for their business and expansion.

I think, as a group we have a strong educational programs now in place for starting this. For example, the Geo Academy program that Phil and others are offering which is based on essential curriculum of  Geospatial Technology Competency Model (GTCM) covering  both the background theory of geospatial science as well as the hands-on application using Open Source GIS software should be used to launch the Certification program for Open source GIS. Any student who successfully completed all the five courses of this program should be offered the Open Source Geospatial Certificate  or similar along with the university certificate offered by GeoTech.

So i suggest that Phil should take the lead on this and contact GISCI for this. Hopefully GISCI can advise us on the best way to move forward. We can provide  Letter of support from Geo for All for this.

Phil and all - please let us know your thoughts and how we can help you for this.

Suchith

________________________________________
From: ica-osgeo-labs-bounces at lists.osgeo.org [ica-osgeo-labs-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf Of Arnulf Christl [arnulf.christl at metaspatial.net]
Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2015 11:04 AM
To: ica-osgeo-labs at lists.osgeo.org
Subject: Re: [Ica-osgeo-labs] BOF in Portland: Some Ideas of certification

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Folks,
I have been following the long and broad discussion around certification
last year. Again. Lots of fantastic ideas and then - nothing. It feels a
bit like "same procedure as every year" [1] mixed with Groundhog Day[2].
Which is why this time round I did not bother to join the choir.

Ah, admittedly, I am somewhat frustrated.

So where do we go from here? I have spent considerable time and effort
trying to push this forward as a privately funded initiative but to no
avail. So I am closing this project as failed and try not to mourn the
loss. It will not work in the way I though it would. Shit happens.

The last question before this thread died was whether OSGeo would give
its blessing to approach GISCI to lead such an effort. Answering
Phillip's question: Please go ahead.

But. Without somebody taking the lead nothing will happen (Q.E.D.). Who
will step up and finally get this going? I am happy to support anybody
who can push the right buttons but will not continue on my own account.

Have fun,
Arnulf

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boisQwkK7rs
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groundhog_Day_%28film%29

On 27.09.2014 15:33, Phillip Davis wrote:
> My feeling to. The new executive director of GISCI that manages US GISP
> is fellow Texan Bill Hodge.  He's one of the easiest people to work with
> ever. Bill served on my advisory board for GeoTech when we assisted US
> DOL in completing GTCM now used to create the 2015 GISP technical exam.
> Bill currently serves on our Business Industry Leadership Team for the
> NISGTC that funded the QGIS courses so he knows our work intimately.
>
> With OSGeos blessing we could approach GISCI to lead such an effort?
>
> On Sep 27, 2014 8:25 AM, Chris Pettit <cpettit at unimelb.edu.au> wrote:
> Hi All
>
> Interesting discussion.
>
> I have had quite a bit to do with certification in Australia and you might
> be interested to know that we have GISP-AP (Asia Pacific) which is linked
> directly to GISP so there is a model for GISP to work internationally.
>
> In my humble opinion I think we should further explore working with URISA
> and GISP and see if can  get something that meets our needs but is
> delivered in an existing certification program like GISP.
>
> Cheers
> Chris
>
> On 25/09/14 5:08 AM, "Phillip Davis" <pdavis at delmar.edu> wrote:
>
>>I would like to add Mr Bill Hodge of GISCI into the conversation.
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: Maria Antonia Brovelli [mailto:maria.brovelli at polimi.it]
>>Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2014 11:36 AM
>>To: Phillip Davis; Alex Mandel; Strobl Josef;
>>ica-osgeo-labs at lists.osgeo.org
>>Subject: RE: [Ica-osgeo-labs] BOF in Portland: Some Ideas of certification
>>
>>Phil, 89 labs as of today!
>>I agree with you.
>>Maria
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>----------------------------------------------------
>>Prof. Maria Antonia Brovelli
>>Vice Rector for Como Campus and GIS Professor Politecnico di Milano
>>
>>FOSS4G ASIA - Don't miss it!
>>http://www.foss4g-asia.org/2014/
>>
>>ISPRS WG IV/5 "Web and Cloud Based Geospatial Services and Applications";
>>OSGeo; ICA-OSGeo-ISPRS Advisory Board; NASA WorldWind Europa Challenge;
>>SIFET
>>
>>Via Natta, 12/14 - 22100 COMO (ITALY)
>>Tel. +39-031-3327336 - Mob. +39-328-0023867 - fax. +39-031-3327321
>>e-mail1: maria.brovelli at polimi.it
>>e-mail2: prorettrice at como.polimi.it
>>
>>
>>________________________________________
>>Da: ica-osgeo-labs-bounces at lists.osgeo.org
>><ica-osgeo-labs-bounces at lists.osgeo.org> per conto di Phillip Davis
>><pdavis at delmar.edu>
>>Inviato: mercoledì 24 settembre 2014 18.23
>>A: Alex Mandel; Strobl Josef; ica-osgeo-labs at lists.osgeo.org
>>Oggetto: Re: [Ica-osgeo-labs] BOF in Portland: Some Ideas of certification
>>
>>Correct Alex except the EU and other representatives at the meeting
>>stated flatly the GISP and our US DOL GTCM are not going to be widely
>>recognized beyond our own geographical borders.  I agree.  What I would
>>say is the Process and Procedure that was used to arrive at them, the DOL
>>Competency Model and the DACUM or Developing a Curriculum, methods are
>>easily applicable to any workforce in any nation.  I recommended URISA be
>>the international organization to perhaps lead this effort, but that too
>>was poo-pooed as not being truly internationally representative of the
>>global FOSS community...which sorta leads back to GeoForAll under OSGeo
>>as the only recognized organization to pull this off, globally.  With 85
>>nodes in every continent, no other organization has such broad
>>representation.
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: ica-osgeo-labs-bounces at lists.osgeo.org
>>[mailto:ica-osgeo-labs-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf Of Alex Mandel
>>Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2014 11:16 AM
>>To: Strobl Josef; ica-osgeo-labs at lists.osgeo.org
>>Subject: Re: [Ica-osgeo-labs] BOF in Portland: Some Ideas of certification
>>
>>Without the "Open" part these already exist and we don't want to compete
>>with:
>>GISP  http://www.gisci.org/
>>Master of GIS Science
>>
>>The issue from the community has been that neither of these indicate a
>>person has any experience with more than a single software, or that any
>>of that software is OpenSource by an opensource.org approved license.
>>
>>So yes one way to go would be a Certificate in OGC standards. Another is
>>to push/recommend that other orgs require demonstrated competency in more
>>than 1 GIS technology.
>>
>>Now from the software industry side, there are certifications is just
>>about everything, down to specific software.
>>MS Exchange Cert
>>Oracle Cert
>>Postgres Cert
>>
>>So I see a few ways forward, 1. a general FOSS4G cert or 2. Specific
>>subproject certs, or 3. If you do enough project specific certs you
>>become FOSS4G certified.
>>
>>The role of OSGeo playing the standards body that issues the certificates
>>or accredits institutions to do so.
>>
>>
>>Questions to think about:
>>What about an OSS cert is different from just any old cert on a
>>particular software?
>>
>>
>>Thanks,
>>Alex
>>
>>
>>On 09/24/2014 08:50 AM, Strobl Josef wrote:
>>> Interesting discussion, and I am glad to see it popping up again - a
>>>good indicator that it might not just turn into a fluke ...
>>>
>>> My view is that a certification with 'open' as a defining criterion is
>>>hard to argue and justify - the only area where I could see this to work
>>>is in open specs like in OGC. Overall, individuals might be certified in
>>>software-specific competences (of course these can be FOSS), or in
>>>generic geospatial skills, knowledge and competences (this already is
>>>being done, though). Thus individual products, technologies and
>>>architectures, or workflows (implementation of services-based workflows,
>>>integrated portals etc) could be suitable targets for certification, but
>>>not so much their 'open' characteristics per se ...
>>>
>>> Avoiding 'open' as _the_ defining characteristic also would help
>>>navigating a terrain with sometimes fuzzy boundaries.
>>>
>>> .josef
>>>
>>> Prof. Dr. Josef Strobl | Josef.Strobl at sbg.ac.at University of Salzburg
>>> | Department of Geoinformatics - Z_GIS
>>> Phone: +43 (0)662 8044 7503 | http://jstrobl.zgis.net
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
>>> Von: ica-osgeo-labs-bounces at lists.osgeo.org
>>> [mailto:ica-osgeo-labs-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] Im Auftrag von Dr.
>>> Franz-Josef Behr
>>> Gesendet: Mittwoch, 24. September 2014 15:28
>>> An: ica-osgeo-labs at lists.osgeo.org
>>> Betreff: [Ica-osgeo-labs] BOF in Portland: Some Ideas of certification
>>>
>>> Dear colleagues,
>>>
>>> during the BoF meeting in Portland we discussed the topic of FOSS4G
>>> certification and Arnulf shared some of his thoughts and insights (see
>>> also his talk/discussion [2] which I unfortunately missed, the slides
>>> at
>>> [3].)
>>>
>>> After the BoF meeting I had a further informal discussion with Philip
>>>Davis.
>>>
>>> One idea:
>>>
>>> ***
>>> The participating Universities (faculty members) could elaborate a set
>>>of prerequisites to award an FOSS4G certification and try to achieve an
>>>agreement amongst the academians as well with the OSGeo foundation.
>>> ***
>>>
>>> The certificates could point out that they are acknowledged by the
>>>faculties/Unviersities who joined the Ica-osgeo-lab movement plus OSGeo.
>>>
>>> The certificate could be granted by these Universities (for their
>>>respective students/for participants in courses9 and by other
>>>acknowledged institutions (i.e. MetaSpatial).
>>>
>>> I found some keywords for Postgres certification [1], see below. Such
>>>keywords could be transfered easily to our aimed fields of certification.
>>>
>>> Arnulf lists some types of certification [4]:
>>>
>>>      Open Source Geospatial Software Developer
>>>      Open Source Geospatial Software Professional
>>>      Open Geospatial Standards Expert
>>>      Open Geospatial Data Expert
>>>      Open Geospatial Consultant
>>>
>>> Further/other types could be:
>>>
>>>      Certified OS GIS Technologist
>>>      Certified QGIS/... developer
>>>      Certified Web GIS solution architect
>>>      Certified PostGIS Associate ...
>>>
>>> We could start with one of them...!?
>>>
>>> Regards
>>>
>>> Franz-Josef
>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> ------------------------------------------------------
>>> Postgres Plus Associate Certification
>>>
>>>
>>>      PostgreSQL System Architecture
>>>      Installation
>>>      Configuration
>>>      Creating and Managing Databases
>>>      Introduction to PSQL
>>>      pgAdmin III
>>>      Security basics
>>>      SQL
>>>      Backup and Recovery
>>>      Point-in Time Recovery
>>>      Routine Maintenance
>>>      Postgres Data Dictionary
>>>      Moving Data
>>>
>>> Postgres Plus Professional Certification
>>>
>>>      PostgreSQL System Architecture
>>>      Transactions and Concurrency
>>>      Performance Tuning
>>>      Table Partitioning
>>>      High Availability & Replication
>>>      Connection Pooling
>>>      Monitoring
>>>      Procedural Languages
>>>      Add on Utilities - Contrib
>>>
>>>
>>> [1] http://www.daseq.de/schulungen/enterprisedb/edb-pgac/
>>> [2] http://vimeo.com/106231984
>>> [3]
>>> http://www.metaspatial.net/conferences/metaspatial-institute.html#/3
>>> [4]
>>> http://www.metaspatial.net/conferences/metaspatial-institute.html#/8
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> ica-osgeo-labs mailing list
>>> ica-osgeo-labs at lists.osgeo.org
>>> http://lists.osgeo.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ica-osgeo-labs
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> ica-osgeo-labs mailing list
>>> ica-osgeo-labs at lists.osgeo.org
>>> http://lists.osgeo.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ica-osgeo-labs
>>>
>>
>>
>>--
>>Alex Mandel
>>
>>Geography Graduate Group
>>University of California, Davis
>>http://geography.ucdavis.edu
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- --
Arnulf Christl (Director)
The metaspatial Institute Certification:
Open Source - Open Data - Open Standards
http://www.metaspatial.net/en/institute
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