[Incubator] Considering Portable GIS as an OSGeo community project

Thu Aug 24 04:26:04 PDT 2017

Hi Jeff,

There's no relationship as such between Portable GIS and OSGeo4W- they are
really complimentary projects with different objectives. The way I see it,
Portable GIS provides a portable (hence the name) set of open source
geospatial tools that don't require installation and can be taken from
windows computer to windows computer on a USB stick,compared to OSGeo4W,
which provides a streamlined way of installing the tools on a machine. They
have some packages in common, but not all (I include PostgreSQL/PostGIS and
GeoServer alongside QGIS, Mapserver etc, but otherwise a much more limited
set of tools than OSGeo4W due to space considerations).

When OSGeo4W first came out (believe it or not, Portable GIS predates it)
there was some discussion about the possible relationship between the two
packages at that point, but like I say, they have different objectives and
exist in harmony together.

Hope that clears things up- I'll add some disambiguation to the readme and
website next time I do an update!

Jo

On Wed, Aug 23, 2017 at 9:16 PM, Jeffrey Johnson <ortelius at gmail.com> wrote:

> Just curious about the relationship to osgeo4w
>
> On Wed, Aug 23, 2017 at 1:06 PM, Cameron Shorter
> <cameron.shorter at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Hi Jo,
> >
> > I'm really excited to see you pushing Portable GIS forward. I think that
> > having a windows based OSGeo distribution is a great complement to
> > OSGeo-Live, as OSGeo-Live is tied into (and limited to) being a linux
> > distribution.
> >
> > I also see potential for collaboration between OSGeo-Live and Portable
> GIS.
> > Eg, the OSGeo-Live Project Overviews could note whether the project is
> > available on Portable GIS.
> >
> > We could also potentially align OSGeo-Live and Portable GIS release
> > schedules (which would help with aligning documentation).
> >
> > Re packaging, have you considered building with cygwin (which is Open
> > Source)?
> >
> > I'm happy to answer questions about license. While I'm not a lawyer, I
> have
> > been involved in plenty of licensing selection discussions, including for
> > OSGeo-Live.
> >
> > Re Portable GIS licensing, I assume your build tools are not embedded in
> the
> > final Portable GIS software distribution? That would mean that the final
> > software distribution does not inherit to the license of the build
> tools. So
> > I suspect you should be ok to select what ever license you choose for the
> > build tools. That is how we have approached the OSGeo-Live build scripts,
> > which are LGPL. (Documentation is licensed under CC-By for Project
> Overviews
> > and CC-By-SA for Quickstarts).
> >
> > Warm regards, Cameron
> >
> >
> > On 24/8/17 1:22 am, Jo Cook wrote:
> >
> > Hi Jody and list,
> >
> > Having had a bit of a think about licensing, I had previously chosen
> GPLv3
> > *for my components alone* and I think I'm happy with that. As far as I
> can
> > tell, I can license my modifications alone with GPLv3 regardless of what
> the
> > software projects themselves are. I've had a look at how OSGeo Live
> works,
> > but that doesn't help much (https://live.osgeo.org/en/copyright.html).
> Is
> > there anyone on the list who could help me out with this- basically to
> > confirm or deny?
> >
> > Thanks
> >
> > Jo
> >
> > On Wed, Aug 23, 2017 at 8:55 AM, Jo Cook <jocook at astuntechnology.com>
> wrote:
> >>
> >> Hi Jody,
> >>
> >> That all sounds really encouraging and yes I'd be happy to go through
> the
> >> process with you and the team. We (Astun) potentially have another
> project
> >> that we'd like to submit for consideration too, and I'll be in touch
> >> separately about that one.
> >>
> >> Regarding autoit, no you don't need to purchase anything to use it.
> Having
> >> thought about this in some more detail, I think I will try to move away
> from
> >> that dependency and try to find an open source alternative but that will
> >> obviously take some time to work through, so it would be good if we
> could
> >> start working through the process of becoming a community project while
> that
> >> is ongoing.
> >>
> >> I'll make some tweaks to the repository to make sure that the various
> docs
> >> are easy to find, and then maybe come back to you when that's ready. I
> want
> >> to think a little about whether I'm using the most appropriate license
> too.
> >>
> >> Regards
> >>
> >> Jo
> >>
> >> On Tue, Aug 22, 2017 at 6:12 PM, Jody Garnett <jody.garnett at gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> Glad to hear from you Jo!
> >>>
> >>> Although the "OSGeo community" initiative was started last year, we
> have
> >>> not had a chance to try it out yet (perhaps due to lack of publicity).
> If
> >>> you are patient with us we would enjoy going through this process with
> you,
> >>> and revising our notes as we go.
> >>>
> >>> The wiki OSGeo Community Projects page has the following recipe:
> >>>
> >>> If your project would like to join OSGeo the technology initiative
> asks:
> >>>
> >>> That your project is geospatial (or directly supports geospatial
> >>> applications);
> >>>
> >>> Data & doc projects would of course need an appropriate data or
> >>> documentation license
> >>>
> >>> That your project is open source
> >>>
> >>> Uses an OSI approved open source license
> >>> That you know where your source code came from, and that care is taken
> >>> when accepting external contributions
> >>>
> >>> Participatory (accepts pull-requests)
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Along with a few notes on how we can quickly check the LICENSE,
> >>> CONTRIBUTING, README files.
> >>>
> >>> autoit
> >>>
> >>> Your question about autoit is tricky, it is freely distributable - so
> not
> >>> a barrier to use. We are actually in a similar spot for the GeoTools
> and
> >>> GeoServer projects. When they were first created Java was not open
> source so
> >>> there were some very heated discussions with the gvSig team on if you
> could
> >>> ever make a free software solution using Java.
> >>>
> >>> But we are an open source software foundation (not at a free software
> >>> foundation) allowing GeoTools, GeoServer .. and by extension autoit.
> >>>
> >>> This question of Java still troubles us, while Java is now open source,
> >>> the image processing library that was included in Java is still only
> free to
> >>> distribute. This causes problems for the OSGeo Live and uDig projects.
> >>>
> >>> I would be concerned though if people need to purchase autoit in order
> to
> >>> work on your project? There is a slight difference between being
> required to
> >>> purchase a tool, and optionally using a tool. For GeoTools we can "work
> >>> with" the Oracle Database (if user installs the right jars they have
> >>> downloaded from Oracle) or ArcSDE (if the user installs the right jars
> they
> >>> have purchased from ESRI). However if a contributor is not in
> possession of
> >>> these artifacts they can still work on the project as a whole.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> --
> >>> Jody Garnett
> >>>
> >>> On 22 August 2017 at 06:25, Jo Cook <jocook at astuntechnology.com>
> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> Hi Incubator List,
> >>>>
> >>>> As you may or may not know, I have been running a small project called
> >>>> Portable GIS (GIS on a USB stick for Windows) for a number of years.
> The
> >>>> basic premise is to provide a no-install, no-config version of many
> of the
> >>>> common open source GIS projects on a USB stick.
> >>>>
> >>>> Recently I built a website for the project (portablegis.xyz) and I'm
> >>>> working through the process of documenting and publishing all the
> >>>> configuration changes that need to be made to make projects portable
> (mainly
> >>>> batch files to be honest). This also includes the source code for
> building
> >>>> the menu and installer files.
> >>>>
> >>>> This is on Gitlab at https://gitlab.com/archaeogeek/portable-gis so
> that
> >>>> I can now start accepting contributions. Note that this repository
> does not
> >>>> contain the actual source code for the projects such as QGIS, it just
> >>>> contains the files that need to be adjusted to make it work portably.
> >>>>
> >>>> One of my colleagues has suggested that Portable GIS could be an OSGeo
> >>>> Community Project, so here I am, asking about it :-)
> >>>>
> >>>> My main concern is that autoit, which I used for building the menu, is
> >>>> freeware rather than opensource (see https://www.autoitscript.com/
> site/ and
> >>>> specifically https://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/docs/license.htm).
> My gut
> >>>> feeling is that this bars Portable GIS from being truly open source,
> and
> >>>> hence not suitable for being an OSGeo Community Project. Would that be
> >>>> correct?
> >>>>
> >>>> If this was the only bar to entry, I could certainly look at
> alternative
> >>>> options for building the menu.
> >>>>
> >>>> Regards
> >>>>
> >>>> Jo
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> --
> >>>> Jo Cook
> >>>> t:+44 7930 524 155/twitter:@archaeogeek
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> --
> >>>> Astun Technology Ltd, The Coach House, 17 West Street, Epsom, Surrey,
> >>>> KT18 7RL, UK
> >>>> t:+44 1372 744 009 w: astuntechnology.com twitter:@astuntech
> >>>>
> >>>> iShare - enterprise geographic intelligence platform
> >>>> GeoServer, PostGIS and QGIS training
> >>>> Helpdesk and customer portal
> >>>>
> >>>> Company registration no. 5410695. Registered in England and Wales.
> >>>> Registered office: 120 Manor Green Road, Epsom, Surrey, KT19 8LN VAT
> no.
> >>>> 864201149.
> >>>>
> >>>> _______________________________________________
> >>>> Incubator mailing list
> >>>> Incubator at lists.osgeo.org
> >>>> https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/incubator
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Jo Cook
> >> t:+44 7930 524 155/twitter:@archaeogeek
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Jo Cook
> > t:+44 7930 524 155/twitter:@archaeogeek
> >
> >
> > --
> > Astun Technology Ltd, The Coach House, 17 West Street, Epsom, Surrey,
> KT18
> > 7RL, UK
> > t:+44 1372 744 009 w: astuntechnology.com twitter:@astuntech
> >
> > iShare - enterprise geographic intelligence platform
> > GeoServer, PostGIS and QGIS training
> > Helpdesk and customer portal
> >
> > Company registration no. 5410695. Registered in England and Wales.
> > Registered office: 120 Manor Green Road, Epsom, Surrey, KT19 8LN VAT no.
> > 864201149.
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Incubator mailing list
> > Incubator at lists.osgeo.org
> > https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/incubator
> >
> >
> > --
> > Cameron Shorter
> > M +61 419 142 254
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Incubator mailing list
> > Incubator at lists.osgeo.org
> > https://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/incubator
>

-- 
*Jo Cook*
t:+44 7930 524 155/twitter:@archaeogeek

-- 
--
Astun Technology Ltd, The Coach House, 17 West Street, Epsom, Surrey, KT18 
7RL, UK 
t:+44 1372 744 009 w: astuntechnology.com twitter:@astuntech 
<https://twitter.com/astuntech>

iShare - enterprise geographic intelligence platform 
<https://astuntechnology.com/ishare/>
GeoServer, PostGIS and QGIS training 
<https://astuntechnology.com/services/#training>
Helpdesk and customer portal 
<http://support.astuntechnology.com/support/login>

Company registration no. 5410695. Registered in England and Wales. 
Registered office: 120 Manor Green Road, Epsom, Surrey, KT19 8LN VAT no. 
864201149.
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