18 March 2008

Jack Dangermond on the future of GIS

This is pretty dated, but I am a little behind in my reading. In the January issue of Government Technology, Jack Dangermond talked about the future of GIS. On first read there are many interesting points, in particular is how he defines products like GoogleEarth as just being about geospatial visualization. Here is one of the questions:

Q: Is the Web-based model the future for GIS apps?

A: There's no question that the Web, Web services, and service-oriented architecture (SOA) provide a new pattern for implementing GIS systems -- just like desktop and multi-user server patterns. The central focus of the Web environment is a GIS server, such as ArcGIS Server. Increasingly this platform will be used to serve data, analytic models and maps for others to use on the Web. The server will also be the platform for supporting integration of GIS knowledge into enterprise systems.

My forecast is that as society becomes familiar with looking at things through geospatial visualization, they will be increasingly interested in services that go beyond simple maps and images. GIS servers managed by public and private GIS organizations will be used to provide these kinds of complementing services.

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