User talk:Ravivundavalli

SRTM University Nanded June 2012
It was my pleasure to accompany Prof Venkatesh Raghavan to SRTM University Nanded (29th June 2012), for show casing FOSS GIS. The Head of earth Science Department and Prof Krishnamachari arranged a well attended session of lectures and hands on practice. Prof Venkatesh Raghavan Showcased 'Mapmint' a webgis tool based on FOSS4G tools with a live example of Rajkot (Gujarat India) Urban GIS. A hands on exercise using OpenJUMP completed the event with enthusiastic students and researchers acquainting with the userfriendly GUI of OpenJUMP.

Our visit to Saraswathi temple, BASARA A.P and Gurudwara at Nanded were vey memorable.

photos https://plus.google.com/photos/114935751871526846208/albums/5762625472852735105/5762625793259035170

Rajahmundry GIS May 2012
Prof Venkatesh Raghavan, of Osaka university Japan, has spent 19 to 21st May at Rajahmundry, as a guest to Adi Kavi Nannaya University taking up a project to add more content and web-enable Rajahmundry GIS, funded by Department of Science and Technology (DST) and Rajahmundry Municipal Corporation (MCR). Interacted with Honourable Member of Parliament Vundavalli Aruna Kumar, who initiated Rajahmundry GIS project in 2007 the basis for present endeavour. Discussion about the power of FOSS GIS for transparent administration and Citizens grievance redressal was very interesting for all attendees.

Prof Swamy and researchers Sharma and Ajay showcased collection and collation of latest data, including intutive ways like georeferrencing street electric poles for location and crime mapping in particular.

Lok Pal Bill, and Citizens Grievance Redressal Mechanism (March 2012)
Mass movements seeking transparent administration are sweeping right across many parts of the world, and India is no exception. Free and Open Source GIS that can be translated to Indian languages and customised to specific needs can really help such an endeavor. Both the houses of Indian Parliament have constituted committees to for 'Lok Pal and Citizens Grievance Redressal Mechanism'.

How Free and Open Source GIS can be of Help

Grievances can be recorded digitally using Geographic Information System (GIS). This provides a way of recording and visualising the grievance along with the adjoining information on a digital map enabling a quick analysis and redressal. Free and Open Souce GIS can be used for this with the screens (front ends) translated to regional languages, making it accessible to urban and rural areas with equal ease. Copy of the grievance can be provided along with a map/ image. This approach can help in quick redressal of cases as an analysis can be done using spatial relation. Cost of the system is almost free except for the cost of the computers needed and training of personnel, which OSGeo India can plan and provide on a relatively low budget.

The adage "A picture is worth a thousand words" refers to the notion that a complex idea can be conveyed with just a single still image. It also aptly characterizes one of the main goals of visualization, namely making it possible to absorb large amounts of data quickly.

Location Based Service (LBS) and Citizens Charter:

What is LBS and how it helps in identifying or pin-pointing grievance with a location, such that other related issues can be understood. Location Based Service is “any service or application that extends spatial information processing,or GIS capabilities, to end users via the Internet and/or wireless network”.

How Grievance redressal is helped by LBS and GIS:

Receiving Grievance: Typically a Grievance is recorded as a note or a memo submitted to the authority concerned. With GIS as an additional information, the location of the grievance, is pinpointed on the concerned Digital Map, and a print of the memo along with the portion of digital map is given as a receipt.

Collation of information of grievances:

The grievances are collated on the GIS to support analysis and suggest posible remedies and redressal. Data base of grievances collected earlier and redressal there on are also visible on screen in the GIS. Ex: A grievance about the spread of gastroentitis in an area and action taken. Incidense of the decease when shown on GIS shows the related data like, sewage, waste disposal and hospitals. The concerned departments of the governament can also view the GIS for quick action. The internet enabled GIS can make the grievance visible to all the departments of the governament at various levels,for a quick action there on.

Open Source WEB-GIS capacity building Workshop (22 to 26th Feb 2011)
This workshop with a -5- day duration was organised by OSGeo India in collaboration with Adi Kavi Nannaya University (AKNU), Rajahmundry in Andhra Pradesh South India.

The 1st two days were for an introduction to Open Source GIS including Open Jump and Database GIS PostGIS. Two days were used for OpenGeo Suite, with the last day for rendering layers of interest for the participants. OpenJUMP exercise, included, acquaintance through a mock exercise locating a Nuclear Powerplant, digitisation of a raster map attribution, and rendering a suitable cartographic output using Inkscape. PostGIS exercise included the same mock exercise used for OpenJUMP in a database GIS format, where a few SQL queries and give the result thus creating an impression on the power of PostGIS. Making a PostGIS database table, importing comma delimited files, projecting Long Lat data into a choice of projections was also explained. The GIS data of the city of Rajahmundry was used for the exercise. OpenGeo suite was explained through all it's components, Geoserver, Geostyler, Geoexplorer and Open Layers using GIS data of the city of Rajahmundry. An account of using Udig for editing webserved GIS data was also touched upon.

The training included installation of all the software.

The Participants included teachers researchers and professionals of Geoinformatics, Computer Science, Maths and Life Sciences.

This is the first capacity building workshop of it's kind by OSGeo India and the notes and material prepared make the basis for future endeavours.

The resource persons included Subhakar a researcher of AKNU, Santosh Gaikwad, Achari from SACON Hyderabad and myself.

The workshop was inaugurated by Vice Chancelor of the university. The validiction, was attended by Aruna Kumar Hounarable Member of Parliament who funded the first ever project in Open Source GIS for the city of Rajahmundry. Swarna Subba Rao, Surveyor General, Survey of India distributed certificates to the participants. Prof K.S.Rajan, of OSGeo India gave a good account of OSGeo and how millions can be saved by shifting to Open Source Software.

Prof Bhargava registrar, Prof Verma and Prof Swamy of AKNU spoke eloquently about the event.

All the participants expressed their desire to put to use skills learned.

Some photographs of the events may be viewed from the following link. https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=vundavalli.photos&target=ALBUM&id=5586014932405930801&authkey=Gv1sRgCLbn0vjKtKqP9QE&feat=email

OSGeo India at Geospatial World Forum (GWF), Hyderabad, India January 18 - 21,2011
The Geospatial World Forum is a mega jamboree with the, 'Who's Who' of Information Technology (IT), India's Remote Sensing (RS)Industry, socialising with leading business companies of the GIS.

OSGeo's Open Source Initiatives (19th Jan) Just to see how Open Source GIS is received, have Googled, 'GWF 2011 Hyderabad' and found that the 1st five show, 'India: Mission GIS for billions of people can be achieved with Open Source..'. On The 61st Republic Day of India, am blogging, to show the world that 'India needs FOSS GIS for transparent administration and Indic translation for a sustainable GIS'. http://www.pressreleasepoint.com/open-source-initiatives-so-far-gwf-2011

Arnulf attired in a white tie and suite, quipped that,as a manager, in this event, he is wearing clothes as other managers, and that he is more comfortable in a T-Shirt. He also took a break from the Session he chaired, 'Open Source Initiatives', to attend a Seminar 'Spatial Data Infrastructure', to presnt, 'ESDIN - Best Practice European SDI Network'. A bulletin by 'GIS Developement', can be seen in the link below. http://picasaweb.google.com/vundavalli.photos/OSGeoGWF19Jan201102?authkey=Gv1sRgCKKQr8ax4Zq6RQ

Arnulf's presentation about INSPIRE gave the inspiration for FOSS GIS, in the session. Dr Shiv Kumar, CEO NSDI, Chairing the session participated in the active discussion, with a query (hazard summing up for brevity), 'Is Open Source GIS, Dependable / Powerful enough for an SDI', to which Arnulf answered, 'Yes it is.. for sure and INSPIRE depends on it'. But for this inadvertent planning error to send a Session's Chairman tip-toeing in and out of another Session, by the organisers, we wouldn't have an audience that uses proprietary Software, and received a proven message/example of an alternative.

'OSGeo's Open Source Initiatives', session(Jan 19th 14 to 1800 Hrs) continued with -8- presentations in a packed house. Two presentations from Indian space Research organisation by Dr Diwakar and Dr Harish Karnatak, three from academia by Dr Raghavan, Dr Rai and Dr Rajan, one by environmental agency SACON by Dr Prasad, one from a Commercial company k-Cube by Kuamaran and lastly by a full time OSGeo Evangelist my self. The audience included Mr Swarna Subba Rao, Surveyor General, Survey of India, Dr Moorthi, Director General, Geological Survey of India, and Dr Ayyasami, Deputy Director General G.S.I, Hyderabad, Kiran Chandra of Free Software Moment India (FSMI), Prf Swamy of AKN Univ, Prf Krishnamachari SRTM Univ, and scores FOSS GIS users, academics, professionals. OSGeo international was representated by Arnulf, Prf Maria, Charter member, and Prf Giuseppina Vacca (Italy Sardinia). Prf Suchith Anand of Nottingham University (OGIS event U.K) was present for the Open Source Initiatives seminar. http://picasaweb.google.com/vundavalli.photos/OpenSourceInitiativesOSGeoGWF19Jan2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCKjcnYqe2YjdTQ

WEB-GIS: Prf Maria, Politecnico di Milano, Italy prsented 'A Voxel 3D tool for WEB Visualisation of environmental variables'( using FOSS GIS). Heard that it was well received, and very interesting.

Jan 19th Evening 'Icebreaker': Dr Rajan OSGeo India's treasurer arranged a party in a decent joint round the corner from his IIIT Hyderabad. There was fun and socialising between the international representatives of OSGeo.

Jan 20th Fore noon at IIIT Hyderabad: Dr Rajan arranged an interaction with his FOSS GIS researchers. Many of us also used the occasion to present ourselves and work initiatives. For Maria and Vacca the luncheon was special, with young students squatting on suitably designed tables. http://picasaweb.google.com/vundavalli.photos/IIITHyderabad20Jan2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCJeBlujx9s3U1wE

Jan 20th Developers Forum: It was a pleasure to watch FOSS GIS tools and their customisation being presented on 'Spatial Cloud Computing', Prabuddha Ghosh, Customizability of FOSS GIS, S.M.Moorthi and 'Java plugin for Geoserver', B.Dhanapal. COTS'= Commercial Off The Shelf software, is used to describe various software, and I explained at length that FOSS GIS = COTS and Proprietory GIS = COTS but FOSS GIS -NOT EQUAL TO- COTS. You can make a living selling and providing services for FOSS GIS.''' http://picasaweb.google.com/vundavalli.photos/GWF20Jan2011DevelopersForum?authkey=Gv1sRgCMqT_aufotmRgAE

Jan 21st Geospatial Science Forum: Prf Venkatesh Raghavan, gave a very well received presentation 'ZOO' his pet project that can even accept FORTAN code (Oh FORTRAN-4 nostalgia). He started explaining WPS to a rapt audience as 'Why Pay for Software', breaking them into laughter.

Open Street Maps (OSM) at GWF: It was the third lecture at the Geospatial Science Forum, by Dr Alexander Zipf, who eloquently introduced OSM and the path it is breaking, going 3D etc. He said 'At Least in Europe', explaining OSM's popularity in Europe, for various developments and use. I have communicated to Zipf, that OSGeo India has a grand design for using OSM, and a session for FSMI is going to be initiated in the after noon By Prf H.S.Rai. http://picasaweb.google.com/vundavalli.photos/GWF21stJan2011GeospatialScienceForum?authkey=Gv1sRgCKHQhNfwidWIvwE

Jan 21st After noon ' Location Intelligence and Emerging Trends: Prf Giuseppina Vacca, presented LBS with Open Source Software, through a well illustrated presentation focusing on tourist information.

Exhibition: The Stall of Assam and Jarhkhand, states that are using Open Source Tools, and GRASS GIS, were of great interest. GARIIASI is the FOSS GIS software they initiated. Hope such novel attempts will multiply in future making GIS sustainable, for various states of India. http://picasaweb.google.com/vundavalli.photos/JSACGRASSPostGIS?authkey=Gv1sRgCPfmtrHCkO-dswE

Open Stree Maps for FSMI: Prf H.S.Rai, acquainted -6- enthusiasts of FSMI in using OSM for developing maps for Hyderabad. The focus will be for Water supply, Toilets and Tourism initially. This will provide a tool for administrators to help planning in backward and slum areas of the city. http://picasaweb.google.com/vundavalli.photos/OSGeoInitiatingFSMForOSM?authkey=Gv1sRgCM_L4oaMj9C0UA

Feed back to GWF organisers: OSGeo gave a telivised feed back to GWF. We find the event very nicely coordinated, with exceptional hospitality and good food. We are thankful to the organisers for allowing OSGeo India members and admirers alike for the Jan 19th OSGeo event, without any registration. The exhibition was well organised and stalls full of viewers hearing explanations intently. http://picasaweb.google.com/vundavalli.photos/FeedBackVideoGWF21Jan2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCOKg87jjioaEfw

Arnulf's INSPIRE presentation at FOSS4G2010 http://2010.foss4g.org/presentations_show.php?id=3387

Geological Survey of India's impressive STALL: Felt at home visiting the GSI's stall, displaying GSI's progress in their portal. Director General, GSI, Dr Sundara Moorthy, Deputy Director General, Dr Ayyasami, received Surveyor General, Sri Swarna Subba Rao. P.Vijay Kumar, Director Geodata, and P.K.Sinha explained to Surveyor General, the progress GSI has made in it's web-portal and the ported spatial data. Venkatesh Raghavan also met his old friends at The GSI's stall. The STALL with it's impressive displays and an on-line computer displaying GSI's portal was a 'Crowd puller', and it was very satisying the way GSI is progressing under very able and dedicated guidance. http://picasaweb.google.com/vundavalli.photos/GSIatWGF2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCKLotavsgLbzSg

CRITICIZER WELCOME pl login creating a Username and password and dissect this blog.

Training Workshop on 'Open Source Geospatial Tools Centre for Space Science and Technology Education in Asia and the Pasific (CSSTEP)Affliated to the United Nations January 12 - 14,2011
This well attended event catered to students from various countries of Asia. Among various Open Source GIS tools, Dr Narendra Prasad (SACON) explained web-GIS initiatives on Wet Lands, GRASS GIS was by Uttam Kumar, IISC Bangalore, OpenJUMP was acquainted by me and Prf K.S.Rajan of IIIT Hyderabad, PostGIS Open Layers and Geoserver by Dr Harish Karnatak and Santosh Gaikwad Map Windows by Dr Hanumantha Rao, NRSC Hyderabad and Geonetwork (Metadata Catalogue)by Dr Sameer Saran, IIRS. The training was totally hands-on and installation of Software was part of the training for sustainability.

Maj Gen Dr Shiv Kumar, NSDI graced the Inauguration of the workshop, while Mr Swarna Subba Rao, Surveyor General, Survey of India and Dr Negi, Director Forest Research Institute gave the certificates during Validiction.

Dr P.S.Roy, The representative of OSGeo India who is also Dean of IIRS heading CSSTEP maticulously planned the event giving leadership. Dr Minakshi Kumar made all the necessary arrangements to make the event a grand success.

On a personal note I found all the students enjoying the workshop, and two vietnamese in particular who braved bad weather and hail, on a holiday to spend much of it learning Mineral Prognostication using OpenJUMP and PostGIS.

Photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=vundavalli.photos&target=ALBUM&id=5565683603403253169&authkey=Gv1sRgCPyWhprhlYjzXg&invite=CJmO5rAD&feat=email http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=101759183641389752232&target=ALBUM&id=5568650157897883153&authkey=Gv1sRgCKqz3pjG1ue9Vg&feat=email

WINTERIM program Univ of Iowa and Gandhi Gram Rural Univ Dec 2010/Jan 2011
The program started at Madurai from 31st Dec 2010, through an interaction with 'Envirocare', an award winning Organisation of repute dealing with pollution study / control / remedies.

From 4th Jan 2011 to 8th Jan 2011, the students of Iowa university were acquainted with Open Source GIS. GIS data sets were digitised pertaining to Dindigul District of Tamilnadu, including Soil, Roads and Settlements, such that students can use the data to plot their locales / areas of interest and benefit after environmental studies. OpenJUMP was used for Vector GIS while ILWIS was used for 3-D visualisation, using SRTM data of Dindigul district. Inkscape was the CAD introduced. Some photos can be seen from the following link.

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=vundavalli.photos&target=ALBUM&id=5565341682711608753&authkey=Gv1sRgCJCIutH8z4ScpwE&invite=CLLSzsUL&feat=email

Department of Geinformatics Gandhi Gram Rural University (GGRU). 15th December 2010
The ease with which GIS can be achieved using FOSS GIS was demonstrated. Phylosophy and priniciples of OSGeo was explained in this well attended event. The students were advised not to help piracy but only use Licensed software. Presentation of FOSS4G2010 were shown to give them the depth of FOSS GIS's ability. Prof Mani HOD presided over the event, with Prof T.T.Renganathan of Department of Agriculture giving the finishing lines. Some photos of the event and GGRU are below. http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=vundavalli.photos&target=ALBUM&id=5551539781968717105&authkey=Gv1sRgCM-08aW14ty7vgE&feat=email

This visit of mine to GGRU was in connection with, 'WINTERIM program University of Iowa and Gandhi Gram Rural University Dec 2010/ Jan 2011'. Could get lot of information for preparing base maps of Dindigul District, to prepare for Open Source GIS initiative.

Department of Geography Andhra University. 27th January 2010
A lecture come demonstration was held for the students and faculty of The Geography department of Andhra University, Visakhapatnam, explaining the aims of OSGeo and FOSS GIS software propagated. The ease with which GIS can be achieved using FOSS GIS was demonstrated on screen through a simple exercise. Phylosophy and priniciples of OSGeo International were explained in this well attended event arranged by Dr.Suneetha,HOD. Photos of the event are in the following link http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=ravivundavalli&target=ALBUM&id=5439534974830419105&authkey=Gv1sRgCJyAiZ39ttiK0AE&feat=email

http://www.andhrauniversity.info/science/geography/index.html

Department of Geography Mysore University. 18th November 2009
'Demistifying GIS, through FOSS GIS', a demonstration was held for the students and faculty of The Geography department. 'Locating a nuclear power plant in India, querying a set of data of Geology, drainage, indian boundary and state capitals, was demonstrated using OpenJump. The ease with which GIS can be achieved using FOSS GIS was demonstrated. Phylosophy and priniciples of OSGeo International was explained in this well attended event. http://www.uni-mysore.ac.in/geography/

Open Source GIS in India: Present Scenario Indian Institute of Science(IIS), Bangalore 16th November 2009
The OSGeo-India participated in the following event of CiSTUP jointly with KSCST at IIS. About the institutions browse here. http://www.iisc.ernet.in/ http://cistup.iisc.ernet.in/ http://kscst.org.in/

The participants were from various departments of IIS and Centre for Ecological studies in Particular. IIS Bangalore is a Tier-1 mirror for GRASS, and is one of the pioneers in FOSS GIS development in India. GRDSS, a flavour of GRASS GIS with routines added for using Indian satellite image formats, is more than 9 years old They not only keep GRDSS updated as GRASS is updated, but also add numerous other functions.

After an initial introduction to OSGeo and it's phylosophy, projects taken up using FOSS GIS were presented. An account of GIS datasets generated for Rajahmundry and the WEB-GIS of the same with Telugu (an Indian language)front end was demonstrated. Using Googlemaps in WEB-GIS for Wet-Lands of Kerala was also demonstrated at length.

Development of GRDSS and it's future was presented by it's principal developers Prf Ramachandra and Mr Uttam Kumar of CES, IIS. The ease with which FOSS GIS is learned and implemented for village administration was demonstrated by Jaisen who was from a humble village background. Jaisen who was a village Clerk, joined in a course of environmental science and then learned to use GRASS for village administration. A presentation from CES IIS, also demonstrated how research on wetlands around the city of Bangalore, and urban sprawl was done using FOSS GIS with MODIS, ASTER and SRTM Free data. Seismological study and microzonation of the city of Bangalore was presented with illustrative maps which are due for convertion into GIS.

Private entrepreneurs like K-Cube, http://www.kcubeconsulting.com/ who run their business using FOSS GIS have participated and also indicated their aims and hope. A discussion on how best FOSS GIS can be implemented and lessons learned completed the event. Some photos of the event: http://picasaweb.google.co.in/lh/sredir?uname=ravivundavalli&target=ALBUM&id=5406858286864853713&authkey=Gv1sRgCPmOyv39tr7WCA&invite=COOc168H&feat=email

The Indian GIS scene -- Hype and reality
In the late nineties and early in the present millenum Geographic Information System saw a boom in the Indian market with millions spent on acquiring proprietory GIS software, hardware and digitisation of existing paper maps. Many universities started offering courses exclusively in geoinformatics as a seperate subject. Most of the metro cities have embarked on GIS projects to initiate use of GIS in administration. Many Journals specialising in Mapping and GIS also flowered and forcasted an exponential growth in GIS as public utility.

In reality, presently GIS is more used by the academia than by administrators. Many of the governamental agencies are unable to spend for upgrading proprietory GIS software and also lack trained human resource.

So the prevailing scenario is one which shows the need of sustainable GIS. There are many situations which are true to India unlike the developed world.

FOSS GIS to fight corruption: The maxim 'Knowledge is power' is very true in grass route administration. The district administration for example is most important in India. The very able administrators at the top, have to depend on lower level officials for actually running the administrative machine. The lower level officials have all the ground knowledge and any public distribution of funds etc is directly dependant on their efficiency. A corrupt low level official can make a mokery of the most novel of welfare measures. This is where FOSS GIS can help. Among the many possibilities with FOSS GIS, it can be translated to indian languages and customised.

How FOSS GIS can help: District level administrative GIS with all the requisite information can do the trick. Being in their own language, the citizens can in fact correct erroneous data. With this the top administrator can monitor the situation, and so are the benificiaries who can actually see any scheme functioning on a computer screen.

Examples: 1. Ration cards: In India ration cards distribution is vital for giving welfare for the poor. Georeferencing each ration card holder can show their actual spread in various localities such that anamolies can be corrected. If all the ration card addresses are georeferenced, it can be a boon to the administrator thus reducing chances of bogus ration cards and corruption.

2. Water bodies: The water bodies like lakes and ponds etc are desilted every year spending tax payers money. In fact many ponds have become cultivated lands and just do not exist any more. This can be seen by the latest imagery and even better visualised by seeing periodical images showing change. Quite a lot of research material is generated on this but very little of it is for helping administrators, as the test cases mostly canvas use of costly Proprietory GIS.

How Open Source GIS can help Citizens rights: The state of Andhra Pradesh pioneers in E-Seva which is a Governament to Citizen (G2C) concept. E-Seva centres are spread in all the towns and can add GIS terminals using Open Source GIS. Citizens can lodge complaints showing on the map (GIS) sites that require attention from Sanitation to road maintenance etc.

GIS is nothing new but what can be new, is its extensive use for civil administration. Only Open Source GIS can provide extensive use of GIS by administrators cutting down costs. In India GIS initiative is in the hands of academia giving it an aura of high and costly technology. This scene can change for the better with proliferation and mass usage of Free and Open Source GIS.

OSGeo India has done a project for the town of Rajahmundry (presented in FOSS4G2008 http://conference.osgeo.org/index.php/foss4g/2008/paper/view/30/116) involving local students for collecting and analysing data. Now the second phase of this very project will tune it for actual usage and benifit of society, by focusing on themes like, sanitation, water supply, roads and civic ameneties. Hopefully this example will be emulated for societal benifit.

Project GISDA for Pune City: http://pcmcgisda.org.in/technology This is a shining example to emulate in other parts of India. This project uses Open Source software for public administration.

OSGeo-UK : A begining
Open Source Geospatial and The OSGeo Foundation Talk by: Jo Cook, of Oxford Archaeology, 22nd Jan 2009

It is a very nice occasion that a few weeks old OSGeo-UK, has started with a, 'curtain raiser' initiative. The talk covered the OSGeo's aims and goals, along with several other allied topics, like "Overview of the open source geospatial stack and the key packages within it". The material is available at http://www.archaeogeek.com/talks/bcs_talk_jcook_notes.pdf. But for a lack of OS of her choice on the laptop at BCS, Jo could have demonstrated gvSIG using ,openmoko phone, with flexible keyboard, for mobile GIS. Jo, mentioned that there are about 50, members in the OSGeo-UK. There was a mention of the very first conference on 22nd June 2009 at Nottingham (http://cgs.nottingham.ac.uk/~osgis/os_call_showcases.html). The talk also included lighter moments with a mention of, Open Source Beer project 'http://www.opensourcebeerproject.com/', a news to me. The talk ended with a lively discussion. I asked about status of free availability of Geospatial data in the UK, and learned that, is still faraway. I was all the time scribbling notes on a piece of paper, which is actually, a map (google-graphic-dump) of the venue, and a route from Covent-Garden, the tube station. I wondered, is this not free spatial data.. where is the glitch.!! The refreshments were so nicely served that, the talk was slightly delayed for the attendees to finish munching.

'You wont get a cent'
The magic landscape of the Table Mountain welcomed the geologist in me, while the Gandhi in the soul kept my eyes open for anything that can relate to the great man's experiences in this land that made a Mahatma out of a simple law practitioner.

Thanks to the mix up of airport pickups, My arrival was memorable. Coming out of the south African immigration, I searched for the FOSS4G2008 sign, and failed to find any. Squinted at all the Signboards held by persons waiting, to receive various persons. But no sign of my Indian name or OSGeo or FOSS4G2008 appeared. With some hesitation I was at the help desk with my suitcases on toe. The Help-Desk lady called the conference's location, but no one answered. It was 6-30 in the eventing and I was advised to take a taxi to reach the venue, which I eventually agreed after I was assured that the taxi accepts dollar payment too. At the International Convention Center I found the event managers very busy and the lady almost accused me that why I missed the pickup. The lady was so confused that she almost opened a door adjoining the counter she was attending, only to quickly close it after finding that it was actually a fire escape door. The taxi driver was advised to take me to The Fountains Hotel after the event managers gave me an approximate taxi fare of 300 rand. The next morning I returned the unspent amount of 30 rand to the same lady but received no courtesy in the form of 'Thank You' etc. I thought may be this is not reason enough in South Africa.

The conference schedule was so busy that days went like minutes. The Grand Gala dinner at Moyo was wonderful, but I wished the male singer made more of those 'Tongue in Palette', clicking sounds which I understood to be part of African Languages. It is amazing that such large bottoms can make all those wonderful dance movements. Making time for seeing the 'Water Front', and other tourist attractions was quite difficult, and on the last day of my Cape Town Stay, I took the red tourist bus up to the foot hill of the 'Table Mountain', but Alas it was too Windy and the cable car was not functioning, to reach the top of the, 'Table Mountain'.

On the last day of the Conference, to make sure that my pick up transport to the airport is intact, I paid a visit to the reception desk of the event managers. The Lady who paid for my Taxi was there, with her usual frown. 'Will you please make sure that I get my transport to the airport, tomorrow, I am in room number such and so..', I said politely in my in dish English. 'You wont get a cent, If you miss your transport', she admonished. Others in the vicinity could feel the tension in the air, but probably were perplexed to see my broad smile.

I thought to my self, ' You made it Ravi, you made it'. That night alone in my room nursing a glass of red-wine, I wondered, what it must have felt like for Gandhi, when he was thrown out of a train in The Then South Africa. http://www.encounter.co.za/article/112.html The next morning I found the OSGeo RSA organizer, Gaven at breakfast. I called Gaven aside and narrated the incident, but laughed it off when he confessed that the same Lady was worse with him. I will remain thankful to those who event-managed FOSS4G2008 for having made my experience so memorable.

Evangelising FOSS GIS:
After being actively involved with FOSS GIS and OSGeo and OSGeo India in particular, I have realised that the much needed proliferation of FOSS GIS and OSGeo software in the developing world (like India) is quite different to the model followed in the developed world. Even the departments like, 'Geological Survey of India', 'NRSA', pioneering in use of GIS in the country, have several (man made) issues which do not exist in the developed world like USA, Italy, Japan and the rest of Europe. For the OSGeo's gospel to be heard in India and Asia you require someone who knows the ground realities. India is already spending billions to GIS enable its gevernance at various levels. But this sure will be a sad storey, as the data products created may not be used due to lack of licenses of Proprietary software. This will create a vaccuum that can be naturally filled by the usage of OSGeo and FOSS GIS softwares. Indian states like Kerala have officially adopted GNU-Linux as the official Operating System, but with mixed success as far as FOSS GIS is concerned. The very 1st workshop for awareness building had a mixed response, due to some issues with the OS. In Kerala software on GNU-Linux is only acceptable. As Co-Chairman for OSGeo India events, have been going around spreading OSGeo, which is most relevant to Indian conditions. Trying my best to introduce FOSS GIS software in various educational institutions. Spread of FOSS GIS software is very beneficial to INDIA which has scarce funding. Lot of funds are spent for generation of geospatial data through Proprietary software, which then wait in vain for mass utilization for the lack of licenses of Proprietary GIS. Even if a few hundreds of Proprietary licenses are made available they cannot reach the nooks and corners of this vast highly populated country. So OSGeo can workout a GIS solution for India saving funds. There is also a catch-22 situation where students are only interested in learning skills that can land them a job, and FOSS GIS jobs can proliferate with availability skilled GIS personell. This can be solved by OSGeo's involvement by providing much needed encouragement to students. Conducting OSGeo Capacity building workshops and introducing FOSS GIS in curricula also will go a long way in realizing OSGeo's aims.OSGeo can also help customization of FOSS GIS through translation into Indian languages (already being done) and to suite various needs like, Urban town-planning, Policing, Sanitation etc, by roping in educational institutions providing possible research grants.

EVENTS of OSGeo India chapter
January 2007: Free and Open Source Software In Science, 4-6 January, 2007, Union Christian College, Alwaye, Kochi In this programme by a educational institution, the participants were introduced to Free and Open Source GIS software, and the organisations that promote them. A dataset prepared for the city of Hyderabad, using freely available satelite imagery along with freely downloadable SRTM data was demonstrated by V.Ravi Kumar, emphasising FOSS GIS. http://www.space-kerala.org/fsc/index.php/Fsc/FreeAndOpenSourceGIS

The 1st OSGeo-India workshop: The very first OSGeo workshop was held at the Map World Forum, Hyderabad 22-25th January 2007. This well attended event was also participated by OSGeo delegates from China, Vietnam and Japan. http://geospatial.blogs.com/geospatial/2007/01/map_world_forum.html http://www.gisdevelopment.net/magazine/years/2007/march/46.htm http://www.osgeo.org/files/journal/final_pdfs/OSGeo_vol1_Events.pdf

February 2007: National Conference on Biodiversity Conservation and Human Well-Being was organized by Department of Zoology, Osmania University and co-sponsored by SACON Deccan Regional Station, Hyderabad. The conference was held at Osmania University during February 8-10, 2007. SACON conducted a workshop on Wetland Informatics. It was aimed to address some of the issues related to spatial information generation, processing and data base design, dissemination and software development. In this workshop SACON presented Wetlands of India's website and it's future with the extensive use of FOSS tools. V.Ravi Kumar, Joint Secretory OSGeo India Chapter presented about the various FOSS4G's GIS software and their use taking the City of Hyderabad as an example. Prof K.S.Rajan, treasurer of OSGeo India chapter also actively participated in the proceedings. P.K.Sinha and A.V.Satya Kumar demonstrated FOSS GIS by showing OpenJUMP and it's userfriendly capabilities in performing vector GIS tasks like onscreen digitization of raster images to shape file with attribution.

March-2007: National Convention On Free Software, 3rd - 4th of March 2007, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh included a session on 'Geospatial data'. Dr K.S.Rajan, and V.Ravi Kumar of OSGeo-India chapter, presented 'OSGeo phylosophy', and Open Source GIS alternatives respectively, which was attended by Free Software Foundation (FSF) enthusisasts from around the country. http://www.swecha.org/node/29 Society of Geoinformatics Engineering at Anna University, Chennai, conducted a two-day Geohorizon 2007 symposium (16-17 march 2007). There were four participants from OSGeo India chapter two on each day. Sri Neeraj Deekshith of Autodesk India and Santosh Gaekwad of SACON Hyderabad, presented use of Open Source Geospatial software in their organisations. Mr V.Ravi Kumar, and Mrs Mahalakshmi Narayanan presented 'Open Source GIS Galore', and 'Open Source GIS for web-services' respectively. Santosh Gaikwad presented the use of GeoSever for internet mapping of Wetlands of india. He delievered the SACON's experience while studying GeoServer- a open source server for Web-GIS. Use of Udig and GeoServer for publishing vector or raster maps onto web by storing the spatial data into PostGIS was demonstrated. http://societyofgeoinformaticsengineers.blogspot.com/index.html

May 2007: On 11th May 2007 one day OSGeo-India workshop was held at, 'GIS Development', Noida (Delhi) with participants from the Indian geospatial community. They represented organizations like National Remote Sensing Agency, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (CDAC), Tata Consultancy Servicesv (TCS), MapInfo, Adroitec, GIS Consortium, Eicher, 5Map, Infosys, Autodesk, National Institute of Health and Family Welfare, and Bharti Vidyapeeth's Institute of Computer Applications and Management (BVICAM). The workshop was opened by OSGeo-India representative Dr P.S.Roy, with an opening remark that,"GIS has emerged as an important technology tool. GIS initiatives need to be upscaled in terms of outreach and this is where OSGeo comes into play." One of the most important objective, from an Indian context, is to convert the free GIS tools like GRASS and MapServer in vernacular languages to form a large interest group. Dr. Roy also elaborated upon some of the noteworthy initiatives taken by organizations in India in the open source domain. V.Ravi kumar, who is a founder member of OSGeo India, spoke about various FOSS GIS like GRASS, Quantum GIS, UDIG, Open Jump available today. The demonstration on 'Locating a Nuclear Power Plant', using Open Jump, was not only interesting but also testified how FOSS GIS can be equally useful as Proprietary GIS softwares. Ravi Kumar also talked in length about utility of FOSS GIS in India. The most pertinent point raised by him was that FOSS GIS is cost effective and can, therefore, become popular in a developing country like India. It can also provide employment through promotion of Village Cadastral GIS where all that one spends on, is a branded computer (available for less than Rs.20,000), as no cost is incurred on the software because it is, free and open. Sridhar Saraswati of Autodesk India, also gave a presentation, which answered a vital question- why is Autodesk supporting free and open source softwares? The reason is that firstly, Autodesk wants a broader adoption of Internet mapping technology and secondly, FOSS would create higher demand for related products. It would also be beneficial for the customers as the frequency of software releases will increase, cost of ownership will come down and there will be more innovation and support for standards. Satyajit Rath from CDAC, Noida presenyted 'CDAC's Initiatives on Open Source GIS'. 'Geospatial Convergence with Open Source' was presented by Amit Jain, of Infosys. The workshop came to an end with the closing remarks by Dr. P.S Roy. He expressed hope that "Proprietary softwares should invest in open source to make it a win-win situation for all." http://www.gisdevelopment.net/magazine/global/2007/june/48.htm

June 2007: The OSGeo-India chapter has conducted it's 1st Capacity building 3 day workshop from 26th to 28th June 2007 at Salim Ali Centre For Ornithology & Natural History (SACON) Hyderabad. The workshop was attended by -18- participants from NIC, NRSA, IIIT, Spec Systems, Army and Survey of India. All the participants were conversant with Proprietary GIS software and were eager to acquaint with FOSS alternatives. The 1st day included demonstration and hands-on practice with OpenJUMP GIS and map composition through Inkscape. The 2nd day was devoted to ILWIS GIS through raster analysis and generation of stereo pair and 3D visualization. The 3rd day was for using GRASS GIS for network analysis and creation of 3D visualisation and fly-bi. The participants were shown how one can join the OSGeo as a member and help spread the awareness. The resource persons were from Geological Survey of India.

July 2007: A two hour lecture come demonstration of 'Open Source GIS GALORE', was presented by V.Ravi Kumar of OSGeo India, for the students of Geoinformatics post graduation course Nannaya University, Rajahmundry on 3rd July 2007. GRASS GIS and OpenJUMP were demonstrated using sample data. The students who could interact well in the question and answer session were presented GRASS6.2 Live CDs.

Link to photos of the above events http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=cjns10h3.batchqkn&x=0&y=o6f4mq