[postgis-users] ESRI GDB format into PostGIS

[Simon Greener]

Alan ,

> My 3.25 cents (the $AUS is rising)

That much?!!

> "Geometry is just another data type" - one of my favourite mantras for
> years.

Yep, mine too. But I've been a database guy since my Computer Science degree days: now well over 25 years ago!

> I'm not so sure that ESRI "forces" the divide between spatial and attribute
> but they are driving the spatial - it's the "be-all-and-end-all" of what
> they do according to Jack.

What I meant to say is that it seems to me that if you swallow the Enterprise GeoDatabase thing and attempt to implement
it then you will come up against the IT world which doesn't think in such terms or use such narrow, stovepipe, technology.
My last paid employer's developers used ERWin to develop around 5 database applications (property rights, asset management,
conservation, inventory and supply chain) based on Oracle + spatial. The datamodels had all sorts of modelling that ESRI simply
has never "allowed" over the years: multiple spatial columns per table; multiple spatial objects per column; circles etc.

What ESRI is saying to IT Departments is that that approach is wrong: if the datamodel contains spatial data it is a GeoDatabase and
must be modelled in Visio and deployed into their database, middle-tier and client-tier technologies.

As if.

I have asked ESRIlites over the years how many GeoDatabases are fully designed, specified and implemented? Shall we start a survey on what people in this forum think? 

> It is sooo tempting to fiddle the data model to make the application
> modelling easier. ESRI caught this disease with INFO and, it seems, just
> can't quite shake it off. But, as you say Simon, why should they? It works
> for them.

Sure it works for them and the audience they have captured with their education, sales and marketing efforts. But I can't help think that to the bigger, broader, IT world they are a niche player. We worry about them because we ply our trade in a market segment dominated by the ESRI zeitgeist.

> The first GIS I worked with was GeoVision (a geometry engine sitting on top
> of Oracle). When I first encountered ArcINFO I was horrified at the INFO
> "database" but bewitched and beguiled by the Arc geometry engine.

Mate, me too! I hated INFO (preferred Genamap's theoretical and flawed approach) and have come over 25 years of use to respect the algorithmns in the Arc fortran code.

> So, I'm interested Simon: "Do you think the ESRI Workspace XML has any
> future as a 'logical interface'?

I know nothing about the Workspace XML format. My experience has been more with the XML Schema of the GeoDatabase. Now with this format the problem is that everything inside the XML is couched in ESRI terminology and speak. Also, I am not convinced that the format is as open as they seem to imply. Try and get a hold of the XSD. There is a legal gray area around this format that scares me. Also there is no evidence to say that ESRI will play fair: the shapefile format is OPEN but they never published the spatial index file formats (Gee, I wonder why?). Finally, very few ESRIlites know how to generate such a document such that it contains:

1. Schematics;
2. Instance Data
3. Schematics and Instance data.

Frankly, ESRI never plays fair: why do we waste our time looking over our shoulders?

S
-- 
SpatialDB Advice and Design, Solutions Architecture and Programming,
Oracle Database 10g Administrator Certified Associate; Oracle Database 10g SQL Certified Professional
Oracle Spatial, SQL Server, PostGIS, MySQL, ArcSDE, Manifold GIS, FME, Radius Topology and Studio Specialist.
39 Cliff View Drive, Allens Rivulet, 7150, Tasmania, Australia.
Website: www.spatialdbadvisor.com
  Email: simon at spatialdbadvisor.com
  Voice: +61 362 396397
Mobile: +61 418 396391
Skype: sggreener
Longitude: 147.20515 (147° 12' 18" E)
Latitude: -43.01530 (43° 00' 55" S)
NAC:W80CK 7SWP3