Presentation given as part of the EDINA Digimap GeoForum 2013 on Thursday 20th June 2013 at the Congress Centre, London.

1. Open & ‘Free’ Geo
Software & Data
June 20th 2013
Geoforum 2013

2. Overview
• Why bother with Open?
• OpenSource, Free, Freemium Software
– Desktop
– Cloud based
– Webmaps
• OpenSource Data, Open Data, Freemium Data
– Quality
– Accessibility

3. Why Bother?
• Quality
– Much improved
• No Restrictions
– Off campus, commercial use, web publishing
• Demand
– Industry has noticed
• Cost
– Free*

4. OpenSource, Free, Freemium?
• OpenSource
– Free to download, use and develop
– Code or raw data is available to update or augment
• Free
– Free to download and use
– Code or source material is not available
• Freemium
– Free to download
– Extra functionality or content is not free

5. Desktop GIS

6. Desktop GIS
• OpenSource
– Quantum GIS (QGIS)
• http://www.qgis.org/
– gvSIG
• http://www.gvsig.org/
• Free*
– AutoCAD Map 3D (*for academic use)
• http://students.autodesk.com/
• Freemium
– ArcGIS Explorer Desktop
• http://www.esri.com/software/arcgis/explorer

7. Quantum GIS: www.qgis.org
• Its Free
• Works on a Mac!
• Huge user community
– Online forums are very active
– Many people developing plugins and addons
• Version 2 will see parity in functionality and
ease of use with ArcGIS
• Becoming more widely used in industry
– Students with skills in QGIS will be in demand

8. Quantum GIS: www.qgis.org (2)
• Integrates well with Spatial Databases
– Postgres, MYSQL, ODBC, Esri, etc.
• Ordnance Survey are now producing
styling for their data
– Style Layer Descriptor (SLD) Files work in
most OpenSource GIS software
– www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/oswebsite/su
pport/products/styled-layer-
descriptors/index.html

9. Honourable mentions
• gvSIG: http://www.gvsig.org/web/
– Excellent foreign Language support
– There is a mobile version
• uDig: http://udig.refractions.net/
– Very easy to use but limited in its functionality
– It has not been updated for a while
• GRASS: http://grass.osgeo.org/
– Very powerful
– Very difficult to use
– Powerful tools available as a plugin for QGIS

10. Cloud Based GIS

11. Cloud Based GIS
• Accessed via the web
• For data visualisation and sharing
• ArcGIS Online: http://www.arcgis.com
– Freemium
• Google Earth: http://earthengine.google.org/
– More a Desktop GIS but storage is cloud based
– Freemium

12. Cloud Based GIS
Warning!
Ordnance Survey do not allow their licensed
data to be put into Esri or Google’s cloud
storage.

13. ArcGIS Online: http://www.arcgis.com
• Create maps online
– Add lots of data from ESRI Microsoft OS
– Upload your own data
– Share your maps
• Free Service
– All maps created are open for anyone to view
• Paid Service
– Included in the top level CHEST deal
– Keep maps private or share to small groups

14. ArcGIS Online: http://www.arcgis.com

15. Google Earth: http://earth.google.co.uk/
• Create maps online
– Add lots of data from Google
– Upload your own data
– Share your maps
• Free Service
– Google gets access to all the data you upload
• Paid Service: Google Earth Enterprise
– Host the data on your own server, OK for OS data
– Some analysis tools are available

16. Web Maps

17. Web Mapping
• Display your maps online rather than perform
analysis
• Some will allow editing and data creation
– MapBox (Freemium service built on Leaflet)
– Leaflet
– OpenLayers
– MapServer

18. Leaflet: http://leafletjs.com/
• Easy to use
• Very light weight
• Not very flexible
– Only uses Web Mercator projection
– Only uses GeoJSON or Native layers

19. Leaflet: http://leafletjs.com/

20. Leaflet: http://leafletjs.com/

21. OpenLayers: http://openlayers.org/
• Very Powerful
– Accepts a wide range of formats and data sources
• OpenSource with a large user community
– Lots of online help, someone will have encountered
and solved most situations
• Not so easy to use
– Must specify many options rather than rely on
defaults

22. OpenLayers: http://openlayers.org/

23. OpenLayers: http://openlayers.org/

24. Data
• Quality
• Accessibility

25. OpenSource, OpenData, Freemium Dataservices
• OpenSource Data
– Free to download, upload your edits
• OpenData
– Data created by organisations and individuals
– No restrictions on use*
• *You will need to credit the creator though!
• Freemium Data Services
– Free to use up to a point
– Charges for high usage

26. Data
• OpenSource Data
– OpenStreetMap
• Open Data
– OS OpenData
– BGS OpenGeoscience
– ShareGeo Open
• Freemium Data Services
– Google
– Bing

27. OpenSource Data

28. •Poor Quality?
•Patchy Coverage?
•Inconsistent?
•Inaccurate?
…Yes, but…
OpenStreetMap: www.openstreetmap.org/

29. OpenStreetMap: www.openstreetmap.org/

30. OpenStreetMap: www.openstreetmap.org/

31. OpenStreetMap: www.openstreetmap.org/

32. OpenStreetMap: www.openstreetmap.org/

33. •Poor Quality?
•Patchy Coverage?
•Inconsistent?
•Inaccurate?
OpenStreetMap: www.openstreetmap.org/

34. Open Data

35. OS OpenData: http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/oswebsite/products/os-opendata.html
• OS OpenData
– OS VectorMap District, 1:50 000 Scale Gazetteer, 1:250 000
Scale Colour Raster, Boundary-Line, Code-Point Open, Land-
Form PANORAMA, Meridian 2, Miniscale, OS Locator, OS
Terrain 50, Strategi, OS Street View
• 8 of the 14 views in Digimap Roam use open
data
• Data Download makes OS OpenData easy.
• OpenStream pipes it direct into your web app
or GIS

36. OpenGeosience: www.bgs.ac.uk/opengeoscience/
• Smallest Scale data available for download:
– 1:625,000 Scale
• Larger Scale data in online viewers and as a
WMS
– Geology of Britain, Boreholes, Hydrogeology,
Earthquakes etc.
• Geology Roam adds in the OS backdrop maps
• Geology Download
– Provides the large scale data you need ready for
analysis

37. ShareGeo Open: www.sharegeo.ac.uk
• A collection of 214 Open Datasets
– International (most for the UK)
• Contains:
– Datasets found by Geoservices Support
– Datasets created by the Geospatial community
– Very diverse topics:
• Census data
• Bird count maps
• Aluminium production
• Please contribute your data!

38. Open Data Services

39. Geospatial data: it isn’t just all about maps
• Most data has an element that is
geospatial or can be georeferenced
– Postcode, Place name, Location Stamp, IP Address
• Unlock Places
– can put a point or a polygon to virtually any data that
has a spatial element
– Global coverage (better in the UK)
• Unlock Text
– can dig out references from plain text

40. More Information:
• OSGeo: www.osgeo.org
– FOSS4G Conference
• http://2013.foss4g.org/
– Grass, Quantum GIS and PostGIS
• GoGeo: http://www.gogeo.ac.uk
– Lists most major free software resources:
• http://bit.ly/11J4tVg