Supporting FOSS4G
Comparison of
OSGeo and LocationTech
Comparison of

OSGeo and LocationTech
Supporting

FOSS4G
Welcome
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Jody Garnett
Technical Lead
jgarnett@boundlessgeo.com
@jodygarnett
Open Source Geospatial Foundation
OSGeo Incubation Chair
GeoTools Project Officer
Eclipse Foundation
LocationTech Project Steering Committee
LocationTech Technology Project
Boundless
Boundless provides geospatial tools and
services for managing data and building
applications.
Open Source Projects
GeoTools
GeoServer
uDig
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GeoGig
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Loca%onTech
LocationTech
“Loca&onTech	is	a	working	group	developing	
advanced	loca&on	aware	technologies.”	
Eclipse	is	a	community	for	individuals	and	
organiza&ons	who	wish	to	collaborate	on	
commercially-friendly	open	source	soAware.	
Not-for-profit,	member	supported	corpora&on.	
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Working Groups
Advanced Geospatial Software
Internet of ThingsLong Term Support Embedded Systems
Vendor neutral
collaboration:
★265+ projects
★~1100 active devs
★205+ members
★9M+ users
★
Scientific Research
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Full Service Foundation
Forge
&
Build
IP
mgmt
Dev
Process
Licensing
Model
Community
Member
Network
Governance
Run by:
Follows Eclipse Development
Processes & IP Management
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LocationTech Members
Strategic
Participating
Guest
Membership
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Strategic

Member
Participant

Member
Committer Guest
Steering Committee X Elected Elected Invited
Architecture Committee X Elected Elected Invited
Marketing Committee X Elected Elected Invited
Collaboration infrastructure X X X X
IP Due diligence X X X X
Code repositories write access - - X -
LTS Build Infrastructure X - - -
LTS binary releases X - - -
Structure
Libraries Applications Processing
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Technology
GeoJinni
GeoMesa
(GeoWave)
Geoff
uDig
Mobile MapTechnology
GeoGig
GeoScript
JTS
libspatialindex
Spatial4j
SFCurve
(Torque)
Excellent: Public Outreach
• Great	public	outreach	and	community	spirit	
• Loca%onTech	Tour:	
• Similar	"reach"	to	FOSS4G	(but	split	up	over	ci%es).		
• Any	spa%al	projects	are	welcome.	
• Now	entering	its	third	year	
• Easy	collabora%on	(OGC,	OSGeo,	etc...	)
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6 cities
By the numbers
★ 723 registrations
★ 640+ attendees
★ 56 speakers
★ Videos on YouTube
★ Positive feedback
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Tour 2013
3 continents
http://tour.locationtech.org
★ Sponsorship:

$2K members

$4.5K non-members
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Tour 2014
13 cities
http://tour.locationtech.org
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Tour 2015
Excellent: Eclipse Staff
• Experienced	in	introducing	teams	to	open	source	
• In	posi%on	to	take	on	"thankless"	tasks		
• Trademark	check	
• IP	Check	
• Step	up	as	mentor	
• Special	thanks	to	Andrew,	Sharon	and	Mike
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Caution: New to Eclipse
• Loca%onTech	is	new	to	the	Eclipse	Founda%on	
• Not	always	sure	how	the	infrastructure	works	yet

(use	of	"portal"	for	commiPer	nomina%on)	
• While	each	project	has	a	couple	of	mentors,

we	have	ended	up	relying	on	eclipse	staff	for	direc%on	
• Incuba%on	process	is	a	lot	of	work	
• IP	Team	available	to	do	the	hard	part

(but	you	need	to	submit	code	and	dependencies)	
• Introducing	Eclipse	to	a	new	industry	
• GIS	standards	like	EPSG	require	an	introduc%on
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Trouble
• With	so	many	new	projects	
• Ask	projects	to	depend	on	the	same	version	
• Form	an	incuba%on	queue	
• Incuba%ng	a	moving	target	
• Dependencies	change	before	review	is	finished	
• Plan	for	rejected	dependencies	
• Replace	or	rewrite?
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OSGeo
Open Source Geospatial Foundation
OSGeo
Mission: Support the collaborative
development of open source
geospatial software, and promote
its widespread use.
• Non-Profit,
• Vendor Neutral
• International
• Open Education, Open Data
Members
• Board
• 9 individuals - elected by charter members
• Charter Members
• 280 individuals - more nominated yearly
• Members
• volunteer organization - everyone welcome
OSGeo for New Projects
• OSGeo Foundation offers new spatial projects

• A community of your peers

• People who understand you!

• Great cross project code sprints
• Assistance in building community

• Marketting and Outreach

• Incubation to help with Open Development
How OSGeo Protects
• Foundation offer limited protection:
• Incubation review provides an opportunity to

publicly state your code is in the clear.
• OSGeo has healthy body of prior art
• This is an area of collaboration with other foundations:
• Our focus is on fostering spatial software and promoting use
• We are not a strict “IP” machine
Spatial Experts
• OSGeo has a range of mapping experts
• Helpful, engaging and educational
• Great for collaboration on tough problems
• Developers can help translate “expert” advice
Participation
• OSGeo participation is free
• Sign up to an email list or committee and get involved
• Charter members are nominated yearly
• Board members are voted on by Charter members
Sponsors
Excellent: Public Outreach
• Great public outreach and community spirit
• Any spatial projects are welcome (no need to join)
• Easy collaborate (OGC, LocationTech, etc... )
World wide Events
• FOSDEM 2015

Brussels, Belgium
• 2015 OSGeo Code Sprint

Philadelphia, U.S.A.
• FOSS4G-NA 2015

Burlingame, USA
• FOSSGIS 2015

Münster, Germany
• FOSSASIA 2015

Singapore
• 9as jornadas de SIG Libre

Girona, Spain
• European Geoscience Union 

Vienna, Austria
• Open Source GIS Seminar

Helsinki, Finland
• Bolsena Hacking Event 2015

Bolsena, Italy
• OTB Users Meeting and Hackfest,

Toulouse, France
• Annual Portuguese QGIS user meeting,

Covilhã (Serra da Estrela), Portugal
• FOSS4G India 2015

June 8-10, Dehradun, India
• FOSS4G-Europe 2015,

Como, Italy
• Local Chapter Founding Meeting

Finland
• FOSS4G Seoul 2015

Seoul, Korea
• 11th International gvSIG Conference,

Valencia, Spain
FOSS4G
Excellent: Community Building
Excellent: Flexibility
• Flexible and Responsive to Project needs
• Migrating from hosted svn to github
• Public communication and transparency
Caution
• OSGeo is so helpful to projects
• ... that there is not much incentive to join!
• Projects entering incubation
• Get an immediate brand recognition boost ...

and have little motivation to finish
• Public communication is not suitable for all occasions
Trouble
• Great for established open source projects but ...
• No clear guidance on how to start doing open-source
• Projects waiting years to get in

(stuck on volunteers willing to "mentor")
Incubation Comparison
OSGeo Application
• Straight forward application
• name, project, license, copyright, etc...
• how many users, types of users?
• 1-6 year response time? Update PyPWS is in!
Project Proposal
• Straight	forward	applica%on	
• background,	scope,	license,	legal	issues	..	
• why	here,	project	scheduling,	future	work	
• TM	Check	
• Quick	response	%me
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OSGeo Incubation
• License:Any OSI Approved License, doc license
• Community: "Active and healthy"
• Source Code: please perform a manual check
• Dependencies: provide a list along with license
• List copyright holders / or collect contribution agreement
• Process: version control, issue tracker, docs, releases
• Governance: decide in public and how to take part
pycsw review
LocationTech Incubation
• License:	EPL,	MIT,	BSD,	Apache	
• Trademark:	checked	and	assigned	to	founda%on	
• Source	code:	checked	by	IP	team	(each	release)	
• Dependencies:	source	code	checked	by	IP	team	
• Contributors:	listed	on	portal,	contributor	license	
• Process:	
• opening	up	to	use	of	github,	external	issue	trackers	
• common	processes	automated	on	portal	
• Governance:	
• clear	lines	of	communica%on,	oZen	automated
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IP Review
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Result is Bugzilla Ticket
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LocationTech Incubation
facts, figures and feedback
uDig
• February	2013	
• uDig	project	"crea%on	review"	
• March	2013	
• Code	Review	started	
• July	2013	
• Code	Review	issues	resolved	
• Feb	2015	
• GitHub	Repository	created	(ini%al	checkin)	
• Ongoing	
• SubmiPed	52	IP	%ckets	(out	of	172)
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uDig Feedback
• We	are	enthusias%c	(yay	Eclipse	RCP!)	
• We	also	started	early	
• Glad	arrangements	made	for	github	hos%ng	
• Got	stuck	on	two	key	issues	
• vecmath	-	replaced	up	stream	in	GeoTools	14.0	
• EPSG	-	open	data	license	from	1974	
• JAI	-	oh	crap	
• Next?	
• Wai%ng	for	other	projects	go	through	dependencies	
• Sefng	up	a	replacement	for	JAI	is	next
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GeoMesa
• October	2013	
• GeoMesa	project	"crea%on	review"	
• November	2013	
• Code	Review	started	of	(GeoMesa	codebase)	
• 2014	
• GitHub	Repository	created	(ini%al	checkin)	
• Ongoing	
• Dependency	Review	
• SubmiPed	125	IP	%ckets
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GeoGig
• Applied	September	2013	-	March	2014	
• proceeded	with	TM	check,	submifng	code	
• June	2014	-	September	2014	
• ini%al	crea%on	(ie	code	review	accepted)	
• project	renamed,	migra%on	to	loca%ontech	github	
• February	2015	-	September	2015	
• dependencies	submiPed	
• rewri%ng	local	storage	(rejected	BDB	dependency)
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GeoGig Feedback
• A	few	glitches	
• vecmath	(not	open	source)	
• name	change	(tm	check)	
• We	are	ready:	
• A	1.0	product	wai%ng	to	release
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OSGeo Incubation
facts, figures and feedback
GeoTools
• 2006
• GeoTools enters incubation, Initial Code Review (Jody)
• 2007
• Asked OSGeo to hold copyright
• 2008
• Second code review (Adrian)
• Graduation, with 13 known issues (better than unknown!)
GeoTools Feedback
• Removed ArcSDE Jars (distribution terms)
• Removed Oracle JDBC driver (distribution terms)
• Confirmed distribution of derivative EPSG database (hsql)
• Headers: GeoTools PMC --> OSGeo Foundation
• Where test case data originated from?
• Questions about a few specific headers
GeoServer
• 2009
• GeoServer enters incubation
• Prompt initial code review
• Nov 2012 - foss4g.au sprint
• issues resolved two weeks later
• March 2013
• graduation
GeoServer Feedback
• Initial interest driven by marketing, no follow up for the work
• Hard to justify participation to employer
• Workparty of foss4g-au volunteers,

issues resolved two weeks later
• Fixed a number of issues from license conflicts to sample data
OSGeo Incubation Update!
• gvSIG (2007)
• MetaCRS (2008)
• Opticks (2012)
• ZOO-Project (2012)
• rasdaman (2013)
• OTB (2013)
• istSOS (2015)
• PyWPS (2015)

• Geo-meteo(2009)
• OSM DistributedTile Update System (2010)
• MapProxy (2012)
• GisClient (2012)
OSGeo Applicants
OSGeo "Labs"
• Geoinformatica
• pgRouting
• PAGC
• MapProxy
• pycsw
• The SurveyOS KMLToolkit
• SlitherGrid
So what is the plan
Working together for better for the good of all
Looking Ahead
• OSGeo and LocationTech share a similar mandate

to promote open source spatial technologies
• The organizations complement each other

(and are attracting different participants)
• Projects can happily belong to both
• There is lots of work to do ... lets go!
Contact OSGeo
Help welcome

new projects!

volunteer today
http://www.osgeo.org/incubator
http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/incubator
Contact
info@locationtech.org
@locationtech
We are growing fast & need
your ideas & participation
http://locationtech.org
and click LEARN MORE
Contact	Loca%onTech
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Question and Answer
Q & A
• Q: How long does it take to submit a dependency for review?

A: It depends:

5 mins if everything is straightforward or

15 mins for the worst case.
• Q:Why would a dependency be rejected

A: If it is not open source, or if the development team made a
mistake, also license must be commercially friendly.
Q&A
• Q: How much does it cost to join LocationTech

A: It depends:

Participation as a committer is free.

Organizations can join as members, costs outlined in charter
based on size of company, and level of involvement.
• Q: But how much does it cost?

A: Small 10 person organization costs $2000 to join as a
participant member.

A: OSGeo is a member for free as an invited guest.


Foundation Comparison