The microblogging site Twitter has emerged from a nice service to one to the biggest players for social networks. With only 140 employees and an estimated revenue of $400,000 in Q3 2009 the Californian company is on rank 12 of the most visited websites all over the world.
The people behind twitter have realized very early that location plays a critical role in their business idea and focused on this topic from the very beginning. In August 2009 there was a post on the official Twitter blog entitled: Location, Location, Location. (Compare the three L’s statement of Michael Goodchild)
ESRI recently announched the 2010map mashup challenge and invites developers to present a map mashup and tell the story behind their mashup. One interesting and creative example is the mapshup by Dave Bouwman – Visualizing Executive Compensation. The story behind this mashup:
Executive Compensation packages are so large that they are hard to comprehend. We gathered compensation data from the New York Times, county income data from the IRS, median household income data from ArcGIS Online and mashed it all together in the ESRI Flex API.
ArcGIS Online has migrated map tiling scheme of their map services to Google Maps and Microsoft Bing Maps well known tiling scheme. All ESRI Map resources can now overlayed and mashed-up with Google Map layers and Bing Map layers, because they use the same coordinate system, map DPI and tile size. Also cached levels of detail match with the Google/Microsoft “Industry Standard”.
For example their new topographic Map looks great and has a lot of details (at least in some parts of the US):
Some Map details from ArcGIS Online
Server URL: http://services.arcgisonline.com
Coordinate system: Web Mercator Auxiliary Sphere (WKID 102100)
Units of measure: Decimal degrees
Global Extent:
Maximum Longitude: Approx. 180
Maximum Latitude: Approx. 85
Minimum Longitude: Approx. -180
Minimum Latitude: Approx. -85
Map DPI: 96
Tile Size of Map Cache: 256 pixels by 256 pixels
Levels of Detail: The number of cached levels of detail varies among map services. The scale levels are calculated, based upon the tile size (256 by 256) and the WGS 1984 Web Mercator coordinate system, such that when tiles are laid out starting at 180W and proceeding eastward, the final tile aligns perfectly (no overlap) with the first tile at the international date line.
These are the standard map scale and cell sizes:
Layer level
Map scale
Cell size
L00
1:591,657,528
1 pixel = 1.40624 Decimal degrees
(Meters at equator:156,543.033928)
L01
1:295,828,764
1 pixel = 0.70312 Decimal degrees
(Meters at equator: 78,271.516964)
L02
1:147,914,382
1 pixel = 0.35156 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 39,135.758482)
L03
1:73,957,191
1 pixel = 0.17578 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 19,567.879241)
L04
1:36,978,595
1 pixel = 0.08789 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 9,783.939620)
L05
1:18,489,298
1 pixel = 0.04395 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 4,891.969810)
L06
1:9,244,649
1 pixel = 0.02197 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 2,445.984905)
L07
1:4,622,324
1 pixel = 0.01099 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 1,222.992453)
L08
1:2,311,162
1 pixel = 0.00549 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 611.496226)
L09
1:1,155,581
1 pixel = 0.00275 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 305.748113)
L10
1:577,791
1 pixel = 0.00137 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 152.874057)
L11
1:288,895
1 pixel = 0.00069 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 76.437028)
L12
1:144,448
1 pixel = 0.00034 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 38.218514)
L13
1:72,224
1 pixel = 0.00017 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 19.109257)
L14
1:36,112
1 pixel = 0.00009 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 9.554629)
L15
1:18,056
1 pixel = 0.00004 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 4.777314)
L16
1:9,028
1 pixel = 0.00002 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 2.388657)
L17
1:4,514
1 pixel = 0.00001 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 1.194329)
L18
1:2,257
1 pixel = 0.000005 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 0.597164)
L19
1:1,128
0.000003 Decimal Degrees
(Meters at equator: 0.298582)
Motivational Video by ESRI, if you don’t know what a mashup or a mapping mashup is or how you can create one. Important is that your mashup has to tell a story:
Create an innovative mashup using ArcGIS Online and Web Mapping APIs for the chance to win one of four cash prizes. Awards will be based on originality, creativity, and analytic process.
To win the first prize you may be more creative and innovative than the simple sample application on their homepage. You can use all client side technologies supported by ESRI and based on the ArcGIS Server REST Interface. This includes the JavaScript APIs, Flex API and Silverlight API. As datasoure ESRI online provides numerous map and image service as well as geoprocessing services.
In order to apply for the Challenge you have to shoot a video of your Mash-up and give a short description about what is innovative in your webmap and how it can be used. The video should be posted on YouTube.
ESRI 2010 Mashup Challenge is now online and you will find all further information about the application process there.
Recently ESRI (Jack Dangermond) announced to change the name for the next release from 9.4 to 10.0. In my opinion there has to be more than already promoted features for this release there have to be another joker which is not announced yet. What do you think? What will be the next big thing in ESRI ArcGIS 10?
10 suggestion what might come are (these respresent some of the most requested features for ArcGIS):
support for Mac OS X (because of the X in the logo) [chance: 20%]
Full rewrite of ArcObject, which made them native 64bit components. Full x64 support for all components (Engine, Desktop, Server) [change: 40%]
full 3D GIS system (integrated volumetric geographical objects for all components) [chance: 90%]
new approach to serve mobile GIS for new mobile Platforms like Android, iPhone OS and Blackberry. [chance: 75%]
intuitive integration of “cloud” computing (e.g. Toolboxes can be naively published on the web and integrated from the web – from desktop to server) [chance: 60%]
significant performance improvements (especially reading and writing large amounts of data both for filegeodatabases (fGDBs) as well as for SDE databases) [chance: 50%]
close all bugs of features in the current release [change: 1%]
several extensions are integrated in the main product (change of the licensing policy) [chance: 5%]
ArcGIS is becoming a spatial-temporal GIS [change: 90%]
major improvement of the ArcGIS Server REST interface (API will support native Geodatabase writing access) [chance: 80%]
Beta 2 will still be called 9.4. The final release will be mid to late Q2 2010.
ESRI is well known for providing professional GIS solutions from desktop to server. But they always struggling with mobile GIS. For a long time ArcPad was ESRI’s reference application when it comes to mobile GIS. ArcPAD tries to be the baby ArcGIS for mobile devices, with very limited functionality and cumbersome user interface. Of course mobile devices are very limited in their funktionality few years ago and the Windows Mobile platform is a still a hassle, but ESRI has difficulties finding their strategy for mobile GIS solutions both for expert and the broader community.
With their new ArcGIS server platform and REST based APIs ESRI also realized a technology for mobile use. It is easy to embed maps and layers in different environments including mobile phones, PDAs, tablet PCs etc. The following video shows a more professional way to use ArcGIS mobile and in the second part of the movie a demo is given on the iPhone where Base Maps from an ArcGIS Server are visualized within an iPhone App.
The demonstrations of new options for mobile workforces are based on ArcGIS Mobile 9.4, and will be available soon.
Now the questions is will this strategy become successful?
In my opinion ESRI has now a huge potential to gain ground in the mobile GIS world, also for a wide user group. Essential in my opinion will be the continuous development and extension of their ArcGIS Server APIs. For example it is expected to have direct Geodatabase read/write access with the JavaScript API in version 2.0, coming with ArcGIS 9.4. On the other side it is important to have easy to use client software for all major mobile platforms, including iPhone OS, Android, Blackberry, PalmOS and Windows Mobile. ESRI should provide “demonstrative” applications for different use cases ranging from experts (or data collectors) to “traditional” Google Maps users. It will be very important to open up building blocks for application building on mobile Platforms (very important Android and iPhone OS) so that developers could design and implement their own applications based on ArcGIS mobile. It should designed like ArcObjects building blocks on the Desktop and Server.
If ESRI can take this challenge for 2010 the GIS market leader will also play an important role in the mobile GIS sector.
A quick preview of the upcoming ArcGIS Explorer 900 release from ESRI. This version will include the ribbon interface, which is known from Office 2007. On the ESRI homepage ist can be read that this version will be available Q2 2009 right after the release of version 9.3.1. I think we will see the new version during the developer summit 2009 (March 23-26).
Following new features are expected for ArcGIS Explorer 900:
New User Experience — ribbon interface.
Integrated 2D and 3D Display—allowing users to choose their display mode.
Presentation Tools
Easy to Configure and Customize—New tools provide an easy way to tailor applications to a specific audience or to specific needs.
Do not require programming
Multiple configurations can be authored and managed centrally
Software development kit (SDK) lets developers build custom tools and add-ins to extend ArcGIS Explorer’s capabilities
Virtual Earth Services—Continually updated basemaps and layers from ArcGIS Online.
Includes Virtual Earth imagery, streets, and hybrid layers.
Available as a subscription-based service to standalone ArcGIS Explorer users. However, if you are an ArcGIS Desktop (ArcInfo, ArcEditor, ArcView) user, you can use the same Virtual Earth content for free in ArcGIS Explorer that you use in ArcGIS Desktop.
Internationalization—Support for multiple languages in both the ArcGIS Explorer user interface and in the online Help.
ArcGIS Online Sharing—Search for, discover, and use additional content.
Improved Data Support—Includes:
Full support for the new layer packages that can be created using ArcGIS Desktop 9.3.1. Layer packages enable ArcGIS Explorer users to leverage ArcGIS Desktop cartography.
Improved support for KML/KMZ files, including support for regionated KML.
In 2009 ESRI holds their 4th developer summit in Palm Springs, CA. Between March 23-26 various sessions covering the whole product line of ArcGIS will be covered. Of course news about the version 9.3.1 will be demonstrated and an outlook on 9.4 will be given. The keynote session will be held by David Chappell, principal of Chappell & Associates in San Francisco, California.
One of the most promoted session is the ArcGIS Silverlight API, which will compliment the JavaScript API and the Flex API.
Jim Barry, EDN’s program manager, provides an outline of the DevSummit and defines each component of the event -> watch the following video.
Maybe you can rember the G-I-Yes! song. This song was released on the GIS day 2007. Also this year there is a GIS day song is called: Map Of The World As We Know It:
The German company Geofabrik is specialized to neogeography and open geospatial data. Now they provide the download of OpenStreetMaps as daily updated shapefiles.
The data on their server are regional hierarchical structured. All shapefiles are based on OpenStreetmap-raw data. This XML-based file format dist described in the OpenStreetMap-Wiki at OSM Protocol Version 0.5.
But not all layers of the available OSM data is converted special layers can be requested as additional service.
