Google and their snowmobile StreetView is now in the swiss Alps. They have started a new contest to name the best resorts in the country and decide which one will be visited by their snowmobile. You can visite google contest page here.
You can view precious Street View imagery captured by the Google snowmobile in Canada at the Dave Murray Downhill, from the top of the 7th Heaven Chairlift on Blackcomb, and from the peak of Whistler.
The full text of the Public Sector Mapping Agreement (PSMA) between the Department for Communities and Local Government (CLG) and Ordnance Survey has been placed online by the Intra-governmental Group on Geographic Information (IGGI).
The Agreement, which comes into force 1 April, specifies the OS OpenData datasets. It appears that OS does not plan to provide for free any further datasets. The proposed list of datasets supplied under the OS OpenData Licence agreement remains identical to what was release last spring.
The full document can be found on the IGGI web site.
After the facebook map or the world, it is now possible to visulise your LiknkedIn network.
Here is an example based on my profile. Each colour shows contact from specific companies or university I have worked for or studied at.
Give it a go on : http://inmaps.linkedinlabs.com.
Today sees a major step in the progressive replacement of the good old ESRI Shape File as default mean to store and mange your geospatial data. The File Geodatabase API provides a non-ArcObjects based means by which advanced developers can work with File Geodatabases. A common user scenario is to open File Geodatabase tables in non-ESRI applications to view or modify data. This API provides access to the low-level File Geodatabase file I/O modules.
It can do the following:
As per reported by James Fee: “First off there is no raster support. Second you are totally on your own here. You have total control over screwing up your geodatabases here.” Obviously ESRI would still recommend using ArcObject as the best approach for handling data in the geodatabase. I notice that it does not either handles the topology rules or class relationships. This means that this API is very much aimed at a replacement to the shapefile, to store your vector data. I still think that the release of this API will provide a great mean to enhance interoperability with ESRI and other product. This provides a mean to manage your geospatial data without having to pay a high price for the ESRI product.
The ArcGIS File Geodatabase API is being made available through the ArcGIS Resource Centre. The API comes packaged with everything you need to get started including samples and a readme
As I was surfing the web searching for inspiration, I came across this new IGoogle theme. This made me wonder where this amazing geology map was from, with a bit of digging, I came across this blog, with more details on a set of amazing geology maps of the ancient course of the Mississippi River. This is by far some of the most amazing geology map I have ever seen.
(Fisk, 1944. Map of ancient courses of the Mississippi River, Cape Girardeau, MO - Donaldsonville, LA. Plate 22-10.)
I am a big believer that geospatial technology can be applied to virtually anything. Here is another great example, the “football supporter Map of London”, as initially reported by big think.
Football Supporter Map of London
Tribal community may not be so more obvious in our western society, but one can wonder. London is a fast city in continuous change, however this illustration clearly demonstrate the attachment that each areas in London have to a specific football club.
This map was initially reported on this forum, and it has clearly generated further debates on which area one leaves and its attachment to a specific football club.
The new release of FME 2011 is just about to be released. Hot of the press, Roger Aikema from FME has kindly sent me some early news on this new version. I thought I would share this with you too.
A few of the highlights from today’s FME 2011 release will include:
You can expect more details from Dale Lutz on their blog at around 10am PST (and a press release at about the same time).
Once more FME demonstrates the major move of the geospatial industry toward the cloud. As a matter of fact FME announced support for all the major cloud platforms available; including: Windows Azure, Google Spreadsheet, etc
As reported by the BBC, here is a new initiative of using the Wiki Map OpenStreetMap.
Kibera in Nairobi, Kenya, widely known as Africa’s largest slum, remains a blank spot on the map. Without basic knowledge of the geography and resources of Kibera it is impossible to have an informed discussion on how to improve the lives of residents. This November, young Kiberans create the first public digital map of their own community.
More Info can be found on their web site: http://mapkibera.org/.
Starting on 17th January, Esri has openned the Esri Technical Certification Program examinations.
The program recognizes people skilled in desktop, developer, and enterprise use of Esri technology. Certifications are currently being offered for
Note that eight more certifications will be added to the program later this year and into 2012.
To learn more or register for a certification examination, listen to ESRI podcast. Exams are offered in English and are available at 5,000 locations in 165 countries. ESRI announced that the Certification exams cost $225 USD.
GetMapping has just released a new service to request the OS MasterMap data through a WFS (Web feature Service).
The Open Geospatial Consortium Web Feature Service Interface Standard (WFS) provides an interface allowing requests for geographical features across the web using platform-independent calls. One can think of geographical features as the “source code” behind a map, whereas the WMS interface or online mapping portals like Google Maps return only an image, which end-users cannot edit or spatially analyze. The XML-based GML furnishes the default payload-encoding for transporting the geographic features, but other formats like shapefiles can also serve for transport. In early 2006, the OGC members approved the OpenGIS GML Simple Features Profile. This profile is designed to both increase interoperability between WFS servers and to improve the ease of implementation of the WFS standard.
Ordnance Survey was already delivering MasterMap through a WMS (Web Mapping Service). This was delivered through their professional service OS On demand. WFS is very useful for gaining access to the features and intelligence built into highly detailed vector mapping such as OS MasterMap.
This will certainly remove a major headache for many orgnaisation who until then had to internally manage thsi large and complex dataset. Full details of the new is available on the GetMapping site
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