Europe

= Europe =

Welcome to the wiki page of the Europe OSGeo chapter. Date of birth: 20-07-2017 Place of Birth: FOSS4G 2017 Europe - Paris more coordinates: OPEN SOURCE GEOSPATIAL - EUROPE OSGeo - Europe BIC ARSPBE22 BE47 9731 8951 3580 organisation registered with the refnr:BE 0689915666

ToDo list

 * Decide about the legal structure: Done: (BOF FOSS4G Paris)
 * Recognize the formation of the osgeo european chapter: Done: (F2F meeting Board OSGeo - Boston)
 * publish the Bylaws (status: signed the papers / send for publication) (Done: FOSS4G Paris 2017)
 * Create activity calender (status: 2discuss December 15 2017) (In progress / Discussed on FOSS4G 2018 - Guimaraes)
 * Set up priorities and goals for 2017/2018 (status: 2discuss December 15 2017) (In progress / Discussed on FOSS4G 2018 - Guimaraes)
 * Write meeting report of the meeting October 5 2016 (Maria - Vasile - Dirk): obsolete - did not happen

Introduction
FOSS4G Europe is rooted in the FOSS4G Central and Eastern Europe conference series, back in 2012. The latter evolved in 2014 as the first edition of FOSS4G Europe in Bremen. The conference is now becoming the main european FOSS4G event, gathering people and OSGeo local chapters from all over Europe and beyond.

Since the conference in Bremen, thoughts and ideas where exchanged to organise OSGeo more on a European basis. The Industry group was started, a platform of people supporting the idea arose, but there was no real initiative for action.

This year we (OSGeoEU) have the ambition to organise a legal entity OSGEO-EU to create a stronger software group in Europe to defend the rights of open source from the perspective of the Geo-ecosystem.

In preparation for this official expression of interest, a couple of meetings have already taken place. a physical BOF @FOSS4G 2014 in Bremen, some mails, a BOF @FOSS4G 2015 in Como and some one physical meetings.

Why should OSGeo have a European local chapter

 * Europe has specific needs in terms adoption rate of open source software.
 * An important initiative called 'INSPIRE' needs specific localised attention.
 * OSGeo Europe act as a sparring partner and representation (Single point of contact) for the European institutions in Brussels on behalve OSGeo, the other committees, local chapters and projects. Giving the existing local chapters a voice in Brussels.
 * Europe also has specific business ecosystem.
 * more than 99% of all the European businesses are SME's
 * software industry in Europe is as big as the software industry in the US, but the driving forces are more divided
 * FLOSS can be used as an opportunity to create a strong industry leadership in Europe
 * OSGeo.EU can play a supporting role in this process

Mission and objectives
After discussion amongst the active local chapter members we come to the following list of mission objectives:


 * Community-building and networking around specific European themes


 * support the European OSGeo members using FOSS4G software, help them to organise and bring into contact with governmental agencies and research institutes. Help them with European funded projects.


 * encourage interoperability in European projects


 * support European open standards and European directives such as INSPIRE


 * provide support for the use of OSGeo software in education via European curriculum development, outreach, and capacity building


 * to encourage communication between the different European local chapters


 * to encourage different communities to work together where relevant


 * Organisation of events


 * Networking with other typically European organisations and groups (notably OSM, JRC, ESA, European projects, FIWARE, EUROGI, SMESpire, ... )


 * Being logical parter to European Commission to discuss about open source software for geospatial and open geospatial data

General Meetings

 * AM FOSS4G2019 Bucharest

List of initial members
The European OSGeo Chapter has the support of the following initial founding members (alphabetic?? - first name):


 * Dirk Frigne - President OSGeo Europe - Board member OSGeo Europe
 * Vasile Crăciunescu - board member
 * Jáchym Čepický - Secretary OSGeo Europe - Board member OSGeo Europe
 * Stephan Meißl - charter member
 * Till Adams - charter member - Board member OSGeo Europe
 * Marc Vloemans - Charter member - Treasurer OSGeo Europe
 * Markus Neteler - Charter member
 * Jorge Gustavo Rocha - Charter member
 * Alexander Bruy - Charter member
 * Oliver May - Charter member
 * María Arias de Reyna - Charter member - President OSGeo - Board member OSGeo Europe
 * Angelos Tzotsos - Board member
 * Jeff McKenna - President Emeritus OSGeo
 * Ian Turton - charter member - Board member OSGeo Europe
 * Jorge Sanz - Charter member
 * Gérald Fenoy - Charter member
 * Ari Jolma - Charter member
 * Kari Salovaara - Charter member - - Board member OSGeo Europe
 * Milena Nowotarska Milena Nowotarska - Charter member
 * Massimiliano Cannata - Charter member
 * Nicolas Bozon - Charter member
 * Maria Brovelli - Board member
 * Silvia Franceschi - Charter member
 * Andrea Antonello - Charter member
 * Milan Antonovic - Charter member
 * Mirko Cardoso - Charter member
 * Marco Lechner - charter member
 * Helmut Kudrnovsky - charter member
 * Steven Feldman - Charter member
 * Torsten Friebe - Charter member
 * Peter Löwe - Charter member
 * Arnulf Christl
 * Robert Szczepanek - Charter member
 * Nikos Alexandris - Charter member

Some early stuff
Local_Chapter_EU_History History

SMESpire

 * Goal: look if SMESPire is a good platform to organise the European FOSS Geo-ICT industry
 * action: contact Giacomo Martirano / action: Dirk Frigne - ongoing

FIWare

 * []
 * action: investigate if structural relationship can be of interest for OSGeo.

new entry

 * reference to the event
 * register your name if you will participate

Tradeshows and events
OSGeo will be present at following events:

FOSS4G Europe 2018

 * FOSS4G Europe Guimarães, Portugal, from July 17 to 19th, 2018.


 * topic talks - volunteers
 * contact: Dirk Frigne

Since FOSS4G Bonn we introduced 'Topic' talks to bring certain topics into the picture. We want to continue this interesting forum on the next FOSS4G Europe conference.

We already addressed some interesting topics during some previous mail communication[1]: These topics only become final if we can add a name of a volunteer behind them who want to address this topic during a topic talk. The list may be appended, changed, etc... Feel free to put your name behind a topic or suggest someone we should ask.

Past Events

 * For our records: European Events where OSGeo was represented

ISPRS
ISPRS 2016
 * contact: Jachym

FOSSDEM
FOSSDEM 2016
 * contact: Johanvdw

GWF2016
GWF 2016
 * contact: Dirk Frigne

FOSS4G 2016
FOSS4G 2016 Bonn
 * OSGeo Europe local chapter BoF https://www.flickr.com/photos/stevenfeldman/29294641505/in/pool-foss4g/
 * contact: Marc Vloemans

FOSS4G 2017
FOSS4G 2017 Paris
 * topic talks - volunteers
 * contact: Dirk Frigne
 * TT01 An overview of the best Free and Open Source Software for Geospatial
 * TT02 OSGeo-Live for INSPIRE
 * TT03 Sustainability of OSGeo projects
 * TT04 FOSS4G-Europe welcomes new volunteers to the OSGeo community
 * TT05 The future of SDI
 * TT06 Economics of FOSS4G - "Sustainability of OSGeo projects"

INSPIRE 2017 Kehl / Strasbourg
INSPIRE Conference 2017 Kehl / Strasbourg

Goal is to promote OSGeo during the conference. One of the actions is a presentation of the OSGeo-Live environment, also ready for INSPIRE.

following OSGeo members are attending:
 * Dirk Frigne - 4 - 8 sept 2017
 * Add your name here if you attend

DI4R / Brussels
Digital Infrastructures for Research

Goal is to promote OSGeo during the conference by poster presentation.

following OSGeo members are attending:
 * Peter Löwe - 30 Nov - 1 Dec 2017
 * Add your name here if you attend

EGU GA 2018 / Vienna
European Geoscience Union General Assembly

A OSGeo Townhall (evening event) is being conducted (a permanent fixture at the conference since 2014).

Open Source themed PICO session in the Earth and Space Science Informatics Division

following OSGeo members are attending:
 * Peter Löwe
 * Add your name here if you attend

Mailing list

 * OSGeo Europe (subscribe) (search)

IRC Chat

 * IRC-channel: #osgeo-europe channel on freenode.net
 * how to connect: choose your favorite IRC client, or go directly through browser with webchat

Meeting 24 May 2016
Till Adams (Fossgis) Marc Vloemans (Chair Marketing committee) Dirk Frigne (Vice President OSGeo) Pieter De Graef (Charter member) Gert-Jan van der Weijden (OSGeo.nl) Johan Van de Wauw (OSGeo.be)
 * workshop on the initial wiki page - discussion mission and goals
 * change the status from draft to final
 * decide for formal proposal to the next board meeting
 * attendees:

BoF 24 Aug 2016

 * bof at FOSS4G 2016 2016_08_24

BoF 19 Jul 2017

 * bof at FOSS4G-Europe 2017_07_19

Next Board Meeting 30 April 2018 17:00 CET
Apparently nobody showed up for the meeting. Holiday season? I 've got an appology from Marc Vloemans, but no reaction from the other board members. I will reschedule the meeting so more people of the board can attend...

Funding 2000 Euro of seed money granted.This is sufficient to pay the startup bills for registering The OSGeo Europe organisation. We should schedule a point on the next board meeting to think how we can generate income to make a sustainable organisation possible without cannibalising on local chapters or current sponsors. If we want to organise topic talks on the next FOSS4G conference in Portugal, we will have to start with a programme, and advertise the content. (As indicated by Markus and Till). We need volunteers to organise the topics. Who will volunteer?
 * OSGeo Europe - Funding
 * FOSS4G Europe - topic talks

There was a meeting with Till Adams and Dirk Frigne with Annekatrien, who is working as a consultant for the copernicus project. The goal is to set up a plan how we can create a working relationship between the European commision and OSGEo. Dirk will followup with Annekatrien how we can proceed.
 * Meeting Copernicus project

A next meeting with people from the OSGeo Europe Local chapter board will be scheduled asap.
 * other topics?

Meeting 15 December 2017

 * Kickoffmeeting 2017_12_15 16:00 CET