[Live-demo] OSGeo-Live 8.5 released

[Angelos Tzotsos]

26 February 2015

Version 8.5 of the OSGeo-Live GIS software collection 
[http://live.osgeo.org] has been released, featuring over 50 open 
source, standards compliant geospatial applications.

*Release Highlights*

* Added Cesium*
Cesium is a JavaScript library for creating 3D globes and 2D maps in a 
web browser without any plugins. It uses WebGL for hardware-accelerated 
graphics, and is cross-platform, cross-browser, and tuned for 
dynamic-data visualization.

* Added IPython*
IPython notebooks contain a list of input/output cells which can contain 
code, text, mathematics, plots, maps and other media. They are a bit 
like a spreadsheet in that each cell can contain code or a formula, and 
a bit like a web page in that authors can create structured text along 
with easily embedding rich and sophisticated media.

* Updated to GRASS 7*
GRASS 7 is a major upgrade, in the making since 2008, and offers new 
modules, tools, analysis capabilities, optimisations, user interface 
improvements, new Python interface, and SQLite database driver as default.

* Updated to OpenLayers 3*
OpenLayers 3 is a fundamental redesign of the OpenLayers web mapping 
library to use modern design patterns.

* Applications*
25 geospatial programs have been updated to newer versions.

*About OSGeo-Live*
OSGeo-Live is a self-contained bootable DVD, USB flash drive and Virtual 
Machine, pre-installed with robust open source geospatial software, 
which can be trialled without installing anything. It includes:

     - Over 50 quality geospatial Open Source applications installed and 
pre-configured
     - Free world maps and sample datasets
     - Project Overview and step-by-step Quickstart for each application
     - Lightning presentation of all applications, along with speaker's 
script
     - Overviews of key OGC standards
     - Translations to multiple languages

Homepage: http://live.osgeo.org

Download details: http://live.osgeo.org/en/download.html

*Credits*

Over 180 people have directly helped with OSGeo-Live packaging, 
documenting and translating, and thousands have been involved in 
building the packaged software.

Developers, packagers, documenters and translators include:

Activity Workshop, Agustín Dí­ez, Aikaterini Kapsampeli, Alan Beccati, 
Alan Boudreault, Alessandro Furieri, Alexander Bruy, Alexander Kleshnin, 
Alexander Muriy, Alexandre Dube, Alexey Ardyakov, Alex Mandel, Amy Gao, 
Andrea Antonello, Andrea Yanza, Andrey Syrokomskiy, Andry Rustanto, 
Angelos Tzotsos, Anna Muñoz, Antonio Falciano, Antonio Santiago, Anton 
Novichikhin, Anton Patrushev, Argyros Argyridis, Ariel Núñez, Assumpció 
Termens, Astrid Emde, Balasubramaniam Natarajan, Barry Rowlingson, 
Benjamin Pross, Brian Hamlin, Bruno Binet, Bu Kun, Cameron Shorter, 
Christophe Tufféry, Christos Iossifidis, Cristhian Pin, Damian Wojsław, 
Dane Springmeyer, Daniel Kastl, Danilo Bretschneider, Daria Svidzinska, 
David Mateos, Denis Rykov, Diego González, Diego Migliavacca, Dimitar 
Misev, Dmitry Baryshnikov, Dominik Helle, Edgar Soldin, Eike Hinderk 
Jürrens, Elena Mezzini, Eric Lemoine, Erika Pillu, Estela Llorente, 
Etienne Delay, Etienne Dube, Evgeny Nikulin, Fabian Schindler, Fran 
Boon, François Prunayre, Frank Gasdorf, Frank Warmerdam, Friedjoff 
Trautwein, Gavin Treadgold, Giuseppe Calamita, Grald Fenoy, Grigory 
Rozhentsov, Guy Griffiths, Hamish Bowman, Haruyuki Seki, Henry Addo, 
Hernan Olivera, Hirofumi Hayashi, Howard Butler, Hyeyeong Choe, Ian 
Edwards, Ian Turton, Ilya Filippov, Jackie Ng, Jan Drewnak, Jane Lewis, 
Javier Rodrigo, Javier Sánchez, Jesús Gómez, Jim Klassen, Jing Wang, 
Jinsongdi Yu, Jody Garnett, Johan Van de Wauw, John Bryant, Jorge 
Arévalo, Jorge Sanz, José Antonio Canalejo, José Vicente Higón, Judit 
Mays, Klokan Petr Pridal, Ko Nagase, Kristof Lange, kuzkok, Lance McKee, 
Larry Shaffer, Lars Lingner, Luca Delucchi, Lucía Sanjaime, Mage 
Whopper, Manuel Grizonnet, Marc-André Barbeau, Marco Curreli, Marco 
Puppin, Marc Torres, Margherita Di Leo, Maria Vakalopoulou, Mario 
Andino, Mark Leslie, Massimo Di Stefano, Matteo De Stefano, Matthias 
Streulens, Mauricio Miranda, Mauricio Pazos, Maxim Dubinin, Michaël 
Michaud, Michael Owonibi, Micha Silver, Mike Adair, Milena Nowotarska, M 
Iqnaul Haq Siregar, Nacho Varela, Nadiia Gorash, Nathaniel V. Kelso, Ned 
Horning, Nobusuke Iwasaki, Oliver Tonnhofer, Òscar Fonts, Otto Dassau, 
Pasquale Di Donato, Patric Hafner, Paul Meems, Pavel, Pedro-Juan Ferrer, 
Pirmin Kalberer, Raf Roset, Regina Obe, Ricardo Pinho, Roald de Wit, 
Roberta Fagandini, Roberto Antolin, Roberto Antolí­n, Roger Veciana, 
Ruth Schoenbuchner, Samuel Mesa, Scott Penrose, Sergey Grachev, Sergey 
Popov, Sergio Baños, Simon Cropper, Simon Pigot, Stefan A. Tzeggai, 
Stefan Hansen, Stefan Steiniger, Stephan Meissl, Steve Lime, Takayuki 
Nuimura, Thierry Badard, Thomas Baschetti, Thomas Gratier, Tom Kralidis, 
Toshikazu Seto, Trevor Wekel, Valenty González, Vera, Xianfeng Song, 
Yoichi Kayama, Zhengfan Lin, Zoltan Siki

*Sponsoring organisations*

     - The Open Source Geospatial Foundation [http://www.osgeo.org] 
provides development & hosting infrastructure for OSGeo-Live and many of 
the included applications.
    - LISAsoft [http://www.lisasoft.com] provides sustaining resources 
and staff toward management and packaging.
    - Information Center for the Environment (ICE) 
[http://ice.ucdavis.edu] at the University of California, Davis provides 
hardware resources and development support.
    - Remote Sensing Laboratory at the National Technical University of 
Athens [http://www.ntua.gr], provides hardware resources and development 
support.
    - The DebianGIS [http://wiki.debian.org/DebianGis] and  UbuntuGIS 
[https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuGIS] teams provide and quality-assure 
many of the core packages.
    - Okeanos [https://okeanos.grnet.gr] is the Greek Academic cloud 
service (IaaS) which is providing virtualized computing resources for 
building the OSGeoLive iso images.