Autodesk product naming poll

Fawcett, David David.Fawcett at PCA.STATE.MN.US
Thu Dec 22 09:11:45 EST 2005


Dave, 

I think that sharing a common name could have some value, but I do not
agree that the shared portion of the name should be MapServer.  I think
that the best way to achieve this is to have unique project names that
share an additional prefix/suffix that reflects the foundation name.
e.g. (if the foundation name was the hypothetical OpenSource Geospatial
Tools Foundation) OSGT MapGuide and OSGT MapServer or GeospatialTools
MapGuide and GeospatialTools MapServer.  

You achieve the common brand and implied cooperation/synergy, without
creating product confusion and imposing a false sense of hierarchy on
the first two foundation products.

My feelings about MapGuide taking on the MapServer name are pretty clear
from past posts, and I will put them in the new survey.  In short,
MapGuide should not be called MapServer and adding Enterprise only makes
it worse.  

If this foundation is to house/support/foster many projects, the idea of
using project names that share the MapServer name is problematic.  If
other commercial products are opensouced and come into the foundation,
will we end up with MapServerIMS, MapServerIMS Enterprise,
MapServerGeomedia, MapServerMS, MapServerMapXtreme,
MapServerStreetAtlas?  

I once heard an anecdote about the guy who started Domino's Pizza.
Their current logo is a Domino with three dots on it.  His original idea
was that for each pizza joint that he bought or opened, he would add
another dot to the logo.  With the bzillion stores now open, that would
never have worked.  Think similarly with foundation product names.

Sincerely, 

David.  

PS.  I still like the People's Front for the Liberation of Web
Mapping!!! 

  

-----Original Message-----
From: UMN MapServer Users List [mailto:MAPSERVER-USERS at LISTS.UMN.EDU] On
Behalf Of Dave McIlhagga
Sent: Wednesday, December 21, 2005 3:23 PM
To: MAPSERVER-USERS at LISTS.UMN.EDU
Subject: Re: [UMN_MAPSERVER-USERS] Autodesk product naming poll


Hi Ken,

I hope everything is well in Vancouver these days .. I'll be there 
myself in about 24 hours for Christmas.


I felt compelled to write back about this issue -- because I still feel 
very strongly that there are many very good reasons for having a shared 
'MapServer' name with this new web mapping technology.

First of all -- there is a perception that this is simply 'Autodesk 
technology' but it's important to remember that as soon as the 
technology is in an arm's length body, under LGPL and with copyright 
assigned, it becomes as much yours, mine, Autodesk's or anyone elses 
technology. In fact, even less aligned with any one company than 
MapServer is today!

Autodesk then becomes a participant & contributor to open source as much

as our company, private consultants or any other contributing 
organization is today around MapServer. The Foundation becomes important

in this context to ensure fairness, and balance in how technology 
continues to be developed for the sake of all stakeholders.

And I believe this is just the beginning -- there are sure to be many 
other organizations discovering that open source web mapping is the 
platform of choice for the future. We're all going to be working to 
bring them into the fold.


The question you have to really ask is, do we want to grow the MapServer

community to be inclusive of a major new participant, and hopefully many

more in the future? This is a great way to send a message that MapServer

is truly open to everyone.


As many have pointed out, MapServer has built up a good reputation over 
the years -- but the majority of this good reputation has been within 
the converted .. I can tell you as someone who does a lot of outreach 
work to the outside world that everyone knows about Google Maps, some 
folks know about ESRI and MapInfo, and only the most knowledgeable about

MapServer. We still have a lot of work to do to reach those people 
outside of our immediate world -- work I do every day, so working 
together on a common message makes a lot more sense to me than working 
apart.


well -- that's my pitch. I hope everyone has wonderful holidays and I'd 
like to wish you a Happy New year.

Dave








Ken Lord wrote:
> ... And please do check out the comments.
> 
> So far I seem to be the most adamently against Autodesk taking the 
> MapServer name ... and I think I give some good reasons.
> 
> To restate what I said in my poll comment, I have already seen a few 
> potential clients confused over the MapServer / Autodesk issue that 
> could easily work to Autodesk's favour ... and I don't actually spend 
> much time building mapserver websites, I'm sure the hard core 
> developers have seen more of this than me.
> 
> I also don't appreciate the misleading messages I've seen in the media

> regarding Autodesk open sourcing MapServer as if it were their's to 
> open source.  My less open source aware friends have been giving 
> Autodesk a lot of undeserved credit because of this lately.
> 
> This may not be directly Autodesk's fault (unless they have let the 
> media go uncorrected with their misleading articles), but I can add to

> this that a coworker attended the recent Autodesk conference in 
> Orlando where the big announcement was made and he came back with some

> very different ideas on what the origins of MapServer actually was.
> 
> Don't get me wrong, I don't hate Autodesk, I spend most of my working 
> hours using Autodesk products, and without these products I'm not sure

> what I would have been doing in the last 5 years.
> 
> But they need to be kept under control.  Want another example on a 
> different topic?
> 
> ... At that same conference, my coworker was shocked to find that 
> sensitive data from one of our clients was being used as lesson 
> material in a short-course, without our permission, without even 
> removing his name or our company's logo from the map.  This was data 
> sent in confidence to Autodesk to help us overcome an issue with using
> the software.   The sad thing is that the solution they demonstrated
> in the course never was sent to us to fix our problem.  Hopefully no 
> one else recognized the data, it was for a very important client to us

> whom we do not want to loose.
> 
> Don't let the Gorilla step on us ... It's welcome in the zoo, but not 
> in the same cage.
> 
> Happy Holidays,
> Ken Lord
> Vancouver BC
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On 12/21/05, Tyler Mitchell <tylermitchell at shaw.ca> wrote:
> 
>>At Gary's request, I've posted another poll to the MapServer website 
>>to help capture how the community feels about the naming of Autodesk's

>>web mapping product.
>>
>>Please take the time to login and answer this poll: 
>>http://mapserver.gis.umn.edu/community/polls/autodesk_name/
>>
>>Tyler
>>
> 
> 
> 



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