[postgis-users] CartoWeb4 and other alternatives

[Paragon Corporation]

Nicolas,

Thanks for the update.  We look forward to playing around with MapFish more
and maybe posting some examples of our own.

Thanks,
Regina 

-----Original Message-----
From: postgis-users-bounces at postgis.refractions.net
[mailto:postgis-users-bounces at postgis.refractions.net] On Behalf Of Nicolas
Ribot
Sent: Tuesday, October 21, 2008 4:45 AM
To: PostGIS Users Discussion
Subject: Re: [postgis-users] CartoWeb4 and other alternatives

> This may not be the best list to ask this question, but thought I 
> would try here first since presumably many people in this list are in 
> the similar boats.
>
> I have a client who is using CartoWeb 3.3 and its heavily integrated 
> in their emergency response app.  They are more or less happy with it 
> (e.g. the ability to save views, draw widgets, print PDF maps and so 
> forth is important for emergency response which Cartoweb seems to do 
> nicely without having to install anything other than PHP and 
> Mapserver), but they also want to overlay third party layers like Virtual
Earth.
>
> I heard that upcoming CartoWeb 4 will be using OpenLayers which 
> presumably will allow them to do just that without us having to 
> rewrite a lot of their existing glue code or try to build in 
> functionality from scratch that CartoWeb already does nicely. But I 
> don't see any mention of it aside from
> Foss4G2007 docs.
> http://www.foss4g2007.org/presentations/view.php?abstract_id=216
>
> I thought MapFish was supposed to be CartoWeb4, but that seems to be a 
> completely different animal or maybe its an animal in the fetal state 
> at the moment and seems to have a lot more dependencies than 
> CartoWeb3.  Anyrate I have staff experimenting with MapFish, but from 
> the surface it looks like we'll have to rewrite a lot of code to swap out
CartoWeb3 for Mapfish.
>
> Does anyone happen to know if my assumptions are correct?
>
> Also I would be curious if people are using other frameworks similar 
> to this since I get asked this question a lot.  Mainly people are 
> looking for functionality they can integrate fairly easily and 
> seamlessly with their homegrown tracking applications.  By that 
> functionality I mean
>
> 1) Print a map to PDF
> 2) Save named views
> 3) Markup Maps
> 4) Location short-cuts
> 5) Ajax map movement
> 6) Easy api for integrating map authentication with their main 
> application (e.g. controlling what groups in their app can see what 
> maps)
> 7) Ability to overlay non-standard OGC mapping services (e.g. google, 
> virtual earth, mapquest with their custom layers)
> 8) Easy install on server - without having to install 20 dependencies.
> 9) Ideally can run on both Windows and Linux without too much fuss.
>

Hello Regina,

I will try to clarify a little bit the difference between Cartoweb and
MapFish:

We, at camptocamp, had to think about an evolution of our Cartoweb mapping
framework, especially with the raise of lightweight, map-tiled client
Javascript API allowing to easily integrate map components into web pages.

The Mapfish project (see mapfish.org for examples, wiki, etc.) aims at
providing this kind of mapping API based on the OpenLayers framework.
It adds some advanced GIS controls, thanks to the Ext/Js framework and
allows to overlay layers from several sources (OGC, MapServer, Google,
Yahoo, MS, etc).
It also allows to edit geographic objects with advanced features like vertex
and edge snapping.
The server part of MapFish adds some functionalities like attribute searcher
or PDF printing service. It is based on Pylons (python) but also offers
python, java and PHP librairies to help users implement web services.
The printing service, for instance, offers a Python and Java API and can
also be called on a command line.

So yes indeed, MapFish is a different animal than Cartoweb, though not in a
fetal state. We already deployed it in several productive projects,
unfortunately not publicly available).

Currently, Mapfish is not functionally as rich as Cartoweb because it's a
young project. We aim at completing its list of features to allow users to
build their own web mapping application.

One big advantage of MapFish over Cartoweb is that it integrates much easier
in existing web applications.

To summarize some features:

> 1) Print a map to PDF
Yes, with a engine-independant printing service (both vector and raster
printing, multipage, page rotation, etc.). see demo here:
http://demo.mapfish.org/mapfishsample/1.0/examples/print/simple.html

> 2) Save named views
OpenLayers permalink could mimic some of these functionalities

> 3) Markup Maps
Yes for point, line, polygon markers.

> 4) Location short-cuts
yes

> 5) Ajax map movement
Yes full ajax, with tiled images.

> 6) Easy api for integrating map authentication with their main 
> application (e.g. controlling what groups in their app can see what 
> maps)
Yes, partially if using MapFish server

> 7) Ability to overlay non-standard OGC mapping services (e.g. google, 
> virtual earth, mapquest with their custom layers)
Yes.

> 8) Easy install on server - without having to install 20 dependencies.
Hmm, some dependencies on the server, but into a virtual environment
dedicated to the application (not intrusive into your own OS).

> 9) Ideally can run on both Windows and Linux without too much fuss.
Yes, (also MacOS...). See wiki page for Windows as Python stuff does not
install as easilly as on Linux.

I hope thinks are clearer concerning these frameworks.

Cartoweb project is still alive, and the 3.5 maintenance release is
available.

I also have to mention another OS project that uses mapfish a lot and aims
at providing a web-based geographic data management application.
It is called GeoAdminSuite (geoadminsuite.org) and allows to browse geo
data, to compose maps and to graphically publish and export MapFish web
sites.

Nicolas
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