Cloud Computing

The movement of software applications, services and data to a cloud computing platform has been ongoing for the past few years. The result is a seismic shift in how geospatial technology is acquired and managed. These resources will help you navigate through the nebulous arena of "the cloud."

The evolution of GIS on the Web has, until recently, been limited by traditional Web mapping technologies. The increase in GIS requirements in the Web and mobile world has necessitated the development of a new breed of map engine. This article, by Dino Ravnić, the co-founder and CEO of GIS Cloud, Ltd., provides an overview of existing mapping technologies and the reasons why he decided to build a unique vector mapping engine in an effort to give the Web a full featured GIS.

Dino Ravnić is the co-founder and CEO of GIS Cloud, Ltd, and he is passionate about the present and future of GIS in the cloud. When asked to send us a picture of something he enjoys doing (fishing? hunting? ballroom dancing?), he gave us one of him working on GIS cloud capabilities for GPS.

Socium, a subsidiary of 1Spatial, is launching an online data validation service in the United States on February1st. Directions Magazine interviewed Abbie Beckford, customer relations and marketing manager at Socium, to learn the details of the offering.

James Cutler, CEO of emapsite, a geospatial data provider in the UK, discusses how selling data online has evolved over the last 10 years to accommodate new licensing agreements and data delivery platforms. He forthrightly expresses the opinion that “open data” is a promise yet to be fulfilled.

Exeucitve Editor Adena Schutzberg picked out the top "Directions on the News" podcasts from the last six months. If you missed them the first time around - here's an opportunity to catch up!

Executive Editor Adena Schutzberg picked out the top All Points Blog posts and "Worth a Click" items from the last six months. If you missed them the first time around - here's an opportunity to catch up!

Editor in Chief Joe Francica picked out the top articles from the Directions Magazine archives. The criteria was a balance between "editor's choice" articles, and those that were most popular according to our reader statistics. If you missed them the first time around - here's an opportunity to catch up!

Directions Magazine’s Editor in Chief Joe Francica and Executive Editor Adena Schutzberg batted around .500 on their predictions for 2011. Can they keep up the pace for 2012 and do their bold predictions offer insights into the trends that will shape the geospatial marketplace next year?

Directions Magazine conducted a survey to snapshot the current thinking among several solution providers (Esri, Ubisense,eSpatial, Accela, ERDAS) about geospatial cloud computing. We wanted to know if cloud computing is now considered a commodity and what additional differentiators potential users are looking for before buying solutions.