[Gvsig_english] gvSIG is a viable robust alternative to commercially available GIS packages

[Francisco José Peñarrubia]

Hi Simon.

First of all, thanks a lot for this e-mail!! :-)
This release has been very complicated and we are glad the hard work is 
useful finally.

We know we still have a long way in front of us, and not only about 
developing but also about making community. We are sure you (and many 
others) are helping us, for sure.

About your table list, there are some points I think right now is 
possible to do with 1.9 + Sextante. For example: Projections on the fly 
(vector data), Conversion from polygon to polyline (Sextante) and some 
others maybe easy to add in the future.
I think it could be a good idea to put this list (an analysis in some 
blog, OSGeo article, etc. It will be useful as marketing ( ;-) ) and 
also to have this list in mind in order to complete it.

Once again, thanks for this e-mail, and also to other people that is 
helping this project to grow and grow (and sorry for our mistakes... 
specially in English translations ( ;-) )   and bugs ( :-(  )).

Fran

PS: Have a look to Sextante presentation in gvSIG meeting next week. I 
think it could be interesting for your list....



Simon Cropper (Botanicus Australia Pty Ltd) escribió:
> Hi Everyone,
>
> I suppose this is preaching to the converted but I think it is worth 
> getting positive feedback about your product, rather than "What about 
> this?" or "Do you know about this bug".
>
> I am a environmental consultant. Every job requires the acquisition and 
> creation of geospatial data, simple geospatial analysis and the 
> preparation of maps. Every job has variations on the theme with clients 
> providing information in various datums and formats. Output is 
> relatively constant with maps being used as JPGs in reports or supplied 
> as shapefiles to the client. OK, this gives you some background to my 
> situation and needs.
>
> Originally I used ArcView, but have over the last year been searching 
> for a reliable and robust alternative. I have tried QGIS, Grass, Kosmo, 
> OpenJUMP, JUMP, llwis, OpenEV, etc to carry out what I needed. I tried 
> early versions of gvSIG but found some basic requirements were not meet. 
> Beta versions of 1.9 looked OK but they were unstable with regular 
> crashes making it difficult to justify the time to learn the program.
>
> Now that the stable version of 1.9 has been made available I have 
> started using it in production. My belief is that the only way to verify 
> if some thing is going to work is feed it real data and try to do real 
> things with it. You will have noticed I have been regularly posting to 
> the list server as I (a) explore the interface and try and understand 
> how things are done, and (b) as I have uncovered various little glitches.
>
> OK, my initial feedback after working with the program for several weeks 
> is...
> 1) the transition from ArcView to gvSIG was seamless with most functions 
> being found in similar locations. I had a similar experience when 
> trialling Kosmo, but not with any of the other packages mentioned.
> 2) gvSIG uses ECW, Shape, DWG, DXF -- all file formats I regularly 
> encounter.
> 3) gvSIG can convert from AGD66 geo/AMG55 to GDA94 geo/MGA55 -- 
> something I need to do regularly. I did note however that the gvSIG 
> files created varied slightly from files reprojected in ArvView. I will 
> need to do some testing of both systems to verify that the output is 
> comparable.
> 4) gvSIG could handle quite a lot of data, files, annotations, etc. The 
> only time I noticed the system slowing down was in producing a map. Slow 
> but it did not crash.
> 5) I have only had gvSIG crash a couple of times. These instances appear 
> to be related to small bugs. In comparison with ArcView this is quite 
> good - for some largish projects ArcView would crash 3-4 times a day 
> (bad memory management). It is worth noting that I was using ArcView 3.1 
> which is currently not still supported and is struggling to keep up with 
> Operating System changes (XP service packs, Vista).
> 6) I am keen to eventually migrate from Windows XP to Ubuntu or Debian, 
> so am keen to ensure the system I use is suitable for these operating 
> systems. gvSIG does, so this is great.
> 7) I am still keen to see the map production facility improved. 
> especially the output. I found I got a much better output file by 
> capturing the screen and manipulating in GIMP, than use of any of the 
> output options. I have not printed directly to a printer so can't 
> comment on the ability to gvSIG to render a map properly. My needs are 
> primarily generation of a file than can be imported into OpenOffice Writer.
> 8) Coupled with Sextante, gvSIG captures most of the tasks that I have 
> done over the last 15 years. Table 1 shows my checklist of things I 
> commonly do and whether I have figured out if gvSIG does them. Any help 
> filling in the blanks would be appreciated. I will update my post with a 
> completed table if I receive any feedback.
> 9) I have not been able to find any good tutorials on how to use the 
> command box when editing a shapefile or the JPython Console. These 
> features look very promising but without some sort of tutorial, examples 
> or manuals it is impossible to evaluate these facilities. This was the 
> old aspect that ESRI has over the open source communities -- they have a 
> quite large and easily navigated script library which allows for people 
> to contribute scribes for manipulation of spatial data and extensions 
> that can be downloaded.
>
> All in all what I am trying to say is gvSIG is fantastic. Everyday I 
> learn about some new feature and I can't stop smiling. I think that 
> finally I can legitimately say I have found an open source GIS system 
> that has surpassed ArcView 3. Considering the plethora of open source 
> packages available it has been frustrating that no one package bundled 
> the core elements required by users like myself into one place. gvSIG 
> has now done this and included a range of other features to boot. I am 
> very pleased and want to congratulate the developers and the Generalitat 
> Valenciana on a fantastic product. I look forward to being part of this 
> dynamic open source community, and helping further the development of 
> this product.
>
>
> Table 1. Things I need a GIS system to do. If people can provide comment 
> on any of the functions flagged with '?', I would appreciate it.
>
> *Broad Category* 	*Function* 	*gvSIG 1.9
> *
> PLATFORM 	Familiar program structure 	YES 
> PLATFORM 	Intuative structure 	YES
> PLATFORM 	Linux Compatible 	YES
> PLATFORM 	Project file to retain previous settings 	YES
> PLATFORM 	Windows compatible 	YES
> SUPPORT 	Able to be extended through scripts 	YES
> SUPPORT 	Active script library 	NO
> SUPPORT 	Manual 	YES 
> SUPPORT 	Forums 	YES
> LEXICON 	SHP Support 	YES 
> LEXICON 	CAD Support 	YES
> LEXICON 	DGN support 	? 
> LEXICON 	DXF Support 	YES
> LEXICON 	ECW Support 	YES
> LEXICON 	JPEG Support 	YES
> LEXICON 	MapInfo Support 	?
> LEXICON 	MrSID Support 	 APPARENTLY  
> LEXICON 	GDA94 Support 	YES 
> LEXICON 	AGD66 Support 	 YES
> VECTOR 	Features in shapefile - add, edit, delete 	 YES
> VECTOR 	Points Images/fonts, scaleable 	 YES
> VECTOR 	Polygon Area, Cleaning tools, centroids 	 YES
> VECTOR 	Projections on the fly 	 NO
> VECTOR 	Shapefile - add, edit, delete 	 YES
> VECTOR 	Warp line files 	 ?
> RASTER 	Change header data in supported image types (georeference) 	 YES
> RASTER 	Use or convert TAB world files 	 ?
> CONVERSION 	Cut-and-paste sections of aerial photographs and retain 
> georeferencing 	 YES
> CONVERSION 	Graphics to Shape, Shape to Graphic 	 NO
> CONVERSION 	Polygon to Polyline 	 ?
> CONVERSION 	Polyline to Line 	 ?
> CONVERSION 	Reproject AGD66 --> GDA94 	 YES
> ANALYSIS 	Address location along polyline 	 ?
> ANALYSIS 	Buffer Features - field, value 	 YES
> ANALYSIS 	Explode complex polygon files 	 ?
> ANALYSIS 	Get coordinates for vertices 	 ?
> ANALYSIS 	Identify features within distance 	 ?
> ANALYSIS 	Image pattern analysis to extract vegetation types 	 ?
> ANALYSIS 	Insert northing, easting, latitude and longitude 	 YES
> ANALYSIS 	Get distance between objects 	? 
> ANALYSIS 	Intersect Lines 	?
> ANALYSIS 	Line length 	 YES
> ANALYSIS 	Line or polygon intersect
> 	YES 
> ANALYSIS 	Nearest Feature 	Sextante? 
> ANALYSIS 	Nearest Neighbour Analysis
> 	Sextante?
> ANALYSIS 	Update areas, perimeters, hectares and length 	 YES
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Map production facility 	 YES
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Ability to create or import legend symbology 	 YES
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Legends complex - based on more than one field 	 NO
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Export maps JPG 	 NO
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Export maps WMF 	 NO
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Export maps SVG 	 NO
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Gradicules and measured Grids 	 YES
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Gradicules - dynamic 	 YES
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Labels - add, edit, delete 	 YES
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Legend categories - unique value, graduated colour or 
> single 	 YES
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Legends Auto Label 	 YES
> CARTOGRAPGHY 	Text - add, edit, delete 	 YES
>
>
>
>