Category: Thoughts

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Thoughts

Because the world is not flat..

A rather geeky first post for the New Year,  but that’s no bad thing.

So the launch of an interesting if niche extension to the Google Maps javascript api, you can read Thor’s blog post here, but as of today you can now use a new library of functions as an addition to the javascript api to carry out spherical geometry calculations.

The world is no longer flat !

This has for a long time been a blind-spot, as with many api’s a flat euclidean coordinate system was used, which is OK for most applications covering relatively small areas or not requiring coordinate geometry calculations. Now with the new library extending the v3 API it is possible to use functions based on spherical geometry (assuming a sphere of  radius 6378137m) giving more accurate area, distance, heading and general coordinate geometry functions.

For most users of Google Maps and the API this will not be relevant however, for the geo-geeks this is hardcore..

When represented on a projected map, the difference between the “flat” rhumb (red) and the spheric geometry based great circle lines (purple)  are clear, but also misleading as the actual difference is less than a thousand kilometres between London and San Francisco and the rhumb line is actually longer !

So next time you take out the G-V you can at last accurately estimate fuel load (only joking !!)

It’s also of note that this new functionality is being delivered as an extension library which needs to be loaded in addition to the core v3 api, thereby making sure the core v3 api remains as small as possible for potential mobile use.

Written and submitted from the Googleplex, California (37.421N, 122.087W)
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Thoughts

Addresses fixed.. so what happened to open data..

Remember just over a year ago, when it was announced that much of the UK’s geographic information was to be made available free at the point of use, seems a long time ago does it not ? but a year on it’s hard to judge the real impact. Clearly this was the right thing to do, I had argued for such an approach for years, but I can’t help having a nagging feeling this may all have been too little too late.

To be clear Ordnance Survey has done a excellent job, promoting their free data-sets, and have built a robust mechanism to provide access to their excellent free products, and even better have used their new freedoms to innovate using this data in particular pioneering geographic linked data.

Behind the OS opendata announcements of last year was the unresolved issue of providing greater access to geocoded address information, in simple terms the mechanism which turns your house number and postcode, something everybody knows, into a OS grid co-ordinate or more commonly now latitude and longitude which very few people know. This makes geocoded address data one of the most useful parts of government data, and was clearly an important missing part of the whole opendata story.

The reason the issue was unresolved was a bitter battle between three parts of government, the Royal Mail, Ordnance Survey and the Local Government developers of the National Land and Property Gazetteer (NLPG), each of which had a commercial interest in developing different address data products.

Last week Bob Neill,Parliamentary Under Secretary of State, at the Dept. of Communities and Local Government announced the creation of a single national address gazetteer database to be made available free of charge within government via the new PSMA but commercially licensed to everybody else.

The Geoplace database represents a take-over of the NLPG by the OS and the nationalisation of Intelligent Addressing Ltd the company that was developing NLPG on behalf of Local Government, bet you did not expect that from this government 🙂  So at last we will have one national address register for England, Wales and potentially Scotland (Not Northern Ireland it seems), but despite this clear progress there is an obvious question..

Should such a core nationally important data-set to not be part of the governments opendata project ?

Written and submitted from the Royal Geographical Society (51.501N, 0.175W)

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Thoughts

A modern story of the networks effect

I had not picked up on this video from the recent London O’Reilly Ignite talks before, but it captures the zeitgeist of the web brilliantly. Tom Scott perfectly demonstrates why social networks are both exciting and scary at the same time, and once again proves the value of a strong narrative in making your point.

Enjoy..

Written and submitted from home (51.425N, 0.331W)

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Thoughts

My Think2011 presentation

Hopefully the first Google annual event in Amsterdam, my topic was the trend towards egocentric maps and LBS apps.

Written and submitted from the BA Lounge, Schiphol (52.309N, 4.775E)

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Android Thoughts

Cultural differences..

This one very rare tweet from Andy Rubin, lead on the Android Programme at Google in 140 characters perfectly embodies the open and geeky culture at Google. This is of course not always initially a great advantage when building consumer facing products, for my non geeks readers

“mkdir android ; cd android ; repo init -u git://android.git.kernel.org/platform/manifest.git ; repo sync ; make”

means you can download the source code that is android from the Internet and build your own version without asking google..

If you are missing the context, this tweet appears to me in response to comments made by Steve Jobs of Apple yesterday,  but so far in the history of IT Open always beats Closed…

Written and submitted from the Google Offices, London (51.495N, 0.146W)
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Data Policy Thoughts

The Open Government Licence

Last week in addition to the new more open OS licesning, another in many ways more fundamental new license was introduced with little fanfare, but I would argue it’s impact if widely adopted could be far more important.

The new UK Open Government licence (OGL) developed by the National Archives, is a robust licence developed using Creative Commons like language for the specific purpose of distributing Government data. The OGL will be the become the default licence for UK Crown copyright, replacing the current Click-Use system and the data.gov.uk terms and conditions, and will therefore create a simple and consistent framework for the reuse of Public Sector Information.

The Key elements of the license are that a user may,

  • copy, publish, distribute and transmit the Infomation;
  • adapt the Information;
  • exploit the Information commercially for example, by combining it with other Information, or by including it in your own product or application.

There is a attribution clause which requires reference back to the OGL website where it’s possible.

This is a great step forward, we just now need to continue to push public sector bodies to release their information, as one more of the perceived barriers has been removed.

Written and submitted from the T3 BA Lounge (51.469N, 0.460W)
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Ordnance Survey Thoughts

Well done OS ! derived rules clarified..

I could be snarky and say better late than never, however the guidelines and new licenses today published by Ordnance Survey are a really positive step forward.

As requested by many, myself included, the OS in their documents have tried to explain with examples what is now possible to create and then distribute in terms of new geospatial data.

This should solve the problem for many potential users of Google Maps, for example, who have been frightened off from using this great free resource  by previously aggressive if unclear guidelines.

Some key aspects..

  • As expected there are no restrictions on deriving or displaying data based on OS Opendata datasets.
  • Data collected by independent means (GPS, field survey) and then verified in relation to OS data is free of OS restrictions
  • The real innovation “Free to use” terms, means that organisations licensing data for business use, are able to infer the position or create new data without restrictions as long as the new data is not a direct copy of an existing feature in the OS product.

These  aspects of the new license/guidelines are illustrated with some rather cheesy but useful case studies.

There are however some more grey areas, which may still cause concern to some, around addressing (oh no !! the humanity) the creation of address centroids is seen as copying features!

I wonder a what level of abstraction this no longer the case, is a point representing a street range ok ? A neighbourhood ?

I fundamentally disagree with the example that a school catchment area is OS derived data, what intellectual effort has the OS contributed to it’s creation ?

Still overall this is a massive step forward and the OS should be congratulated on it’s effort in communicating their position clearly.

This is clearly one of the biggest news stories of the last few months for the UK, I can’t help but wonder while the announcements were not made in the public forum of the AGI conference.. Maybe this is the Macworld moment for Ordnance Survey ?

Written and submitted from home (51.425N, 0.331W)

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Google Earth Thoughts

Build your own Liquid Galaxy..

Just beside my office in London is what is known as a “Liquid Galaxy”, a network of computers running big LCD screens giving  you a true panoramic Google Earth experience.
Almost everyone who sees a Liquid Galaxy makes the off hand comment, how do I get one.  Until now we have said, “well is a custom version of Google Earth”, “you need loads of space screens”, “sorry it’s not really possible”..

Today however, we can say sure here are the instructions… check out the Quick Start page.

This it must be said is still quite a challenge, but you don’t have to have eight big LCD screens; a liquid galaxy  set up scales from just  two to dozens of screens.


So if you are looking for a DIY challenge and have the space… get building !

Written and submitted from home (51.425N, 0.331W)Written and submitted from home (51.425N, 0.331W)

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AGI Thoughts

A tale of two days in Stratford-upon-Avon

This evening I find myself in Dublin, Ireland looking at my glass of Kilkennys and reflecting on the past two days and the W3G and AGI Geocommunity events in Stratford upon Avon.

Is this glass half full or half empty, is the UK GI industry on the way up, or doomed to go the way of the CD-ROM encyclopedias ?

Depending on your attendance of the conferences in Stratford your answer to this question would be different. Attendees of the  W3G unconference on Tuesday would have experienced considerable energy, lively debate and optimism around the use of open data, free and open software and the potential of “neogeography” ( yes I know is just a label, but you all know what it means) There is huge potential to extend the use of geospatial information  in the UK efficiently and cheaply using the web platforms of today, and for people to create businesses around this new ecosystem.

This optimism survived all the way until about 11am today at the AGI Geocommunity conference and included the excellent upbeat presentation by Andy Hudson-Smith one of the few real innovators in the UK GI industry at the moment. ESRI UK’s presentation really turned optimism into despair once again introducing the tired old whinge that GIS should be a strategic necessity and central to how government works, but it is largely ignored by the powers that be…

Rather than learn the lessons of the last five years and concentrate on creating simple technological solutions that mean real user requirements quickly and cheaply, ESRI put the blame squarely on the GIS industry for not communicating the benefits of GIS and concentrating too much on complex technology.

Maybe somebody should buy Richard Waite, ESRI UK’s MD, a mirror ?

Talk about a contrast, the difference between the two days was extraordinary, and why  two separate days?

Last year the geomob stream brought much of the energy and frankly new people to the AGI event, this year most of the neogeo’s went home before the AGI conference started. This was a mistake, the future of the GI industry, if it is to have a future, is with the poeple who attended the w3g conference, the sooner the AGI realise this fundamental shift in the industry the better.

BTW when was the last time you attended a conference where you were told to Tweet responsibly and to be careful walking using your mobile device ? seriously..

Written and submitted from the Grand Canal Hotel, Dublin (53.338N, 6.237W)

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Thoughts

Argleton it’s back !!

Great fun programme on BBC Radio 4 as part of the Punt PI show this Saturday, how did the mysterious non-village of Argleton appear on Google maps and in your satnav…

Like the sound of an Argleton Pie !

Was it a mistake or a conspiracy?  you decide tin foil hats at the ready…

Written and submitted from home (51.425N, 0.331W)