Yesterday was the 21st anniversary of 9/11. I tend to let that day go by without comment. My recollections of the day itself add nothing as I was 50 miles outside of DC at the time. Even that far away, the roads were filled with panicked people and the phone networks were crashing, but I…
Tag: geospatial
Simple Isochrone Analysis in QGIS
With my MBA program behind me, one of my goals has been to shake the rust off my coding and GIS skills. For this post, I thought I would start simply, just to make sure I remembered how to find my way around QGIS. We recently purchased a plug-in hybrid. It has a 17-mile range…
SaaS, IPaaS, and Interoperability
I started this blog back in 2006 during a time when I wasn’t doing much geospatial work at all. I was working on building a human resources system for a federal government customer who was falling under the then-new and now-defunct National Security Personnel System. Because it was new and sufficiently different from the GS…
Geography, Geospatial, and GIS
I was participating in a Clubhouse discussion today when someone asked the about the distinction between GIS and geospatial. Since Clubhouse is audio-only, I am paraphrasing by contribution to that particular discussion here. I think the boundaries and definitions of these concepts are pretty blurry and I am reticent to create hard distinctions between them….
Return on Non-Investment
Yesterday evening, I had the pleasure of participating in a panel discussion on Clubhouse, hosted by Todd Barr and Jordan Cullen, and including Will Cadell of SparkGeo. Clubhouse seems to be a really convenient venue for setting up such a forum with low barriers to entry, so that was enjoyable. The topic of the discussion…
Data Is Hard
Where I work, we have developed a nuanced philosophy to describe the niceties of collecting data, managing it, validating it, and preparing it for use: “Data is hard.” This was brought to light in a very public manner by the vandalism that was displayed on basemaps produced by Mapbox. The responses by Mapbox and their…
A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to a Calendar
The call for maps for the 2017 GeoHipster calendar has closed and review is underway. I haven’t begun collating the responses yet, so I have no idea how it will turn out, but I can say that, for me, the process so far has been personally rewarding. I was not involved in the making of…
Maryland Council on Open Data
Back in May, I had the honor of being appointed to the newly established Maryland Council on Open Data. The Council had its inaugural meeting in Baltimore yesterday and was heavily attended, including attendance by Governor Martin O’Malley. I’ll discuss his remarks to the group later. As the first meeting of a new group, it…
JS.GEO 2014 Locked in Solid
A while back, I posted about about the 2014 edition of JS.GEO. After that post, things got a little fluid, but I’m happy to finally be able to provide an update. According to JS.GEO Organizer Chris Helm, the event is “locked in solid.” The event has a web site, a location, and a date. Tickets…
DC DevSummit in Works for 2014 Esri Federal GIS Conference
I got word today that Esri is planning a one-day [Developer Summit] in conjunction with the 2014 Federal GIS Conference. It appears that the DevSummit will happen on the Wednesday immediately following the Fed Conference (which runs on the Monday and Tuesday) and will be focused on the issues and challenges that are unique to…