Philadelphia

Philadephia Local Chapter
The Philadelphia chapter of OSGeo is based on the user group around metropolitan Philadelphia.

The Philadelphia chapter is a proposed chapter of OSGeo, seeking out a critical mass of users prior to formal Chapter incorporation.

History
Started: November, 2008 at Chapter House coffee shop.

Mission
The OSGeo Philadelphia Chapter strives to provide support for local users of Open Source Geospatial software, and to promote the goals and projects of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation. The Chapter is focused on the Philadelphia metropolitan region of the United States. The group plans to host meetings providing networking, support and educational opportunities to the local members.

Continuing Goals

 * Advocate for the use of Open Source GIS at regional and state levels
 * Help act as a breeding ground for new projects
 * Serve as starting point/meetup resource for geospatial software discussions.

Near Term Goals

 * Set up mailing list
 * IRC room, meeting time
 * Identify mailing list audience and get to them
 * Come up with list of goals for group? Maybe a basic context for user list (list of topics/guidelines).

Initial User Base
Commercial:
 * http://www.wwwcomm.com/

Software User Groups:
 * http://phillyjug.jsync.com/ - Java UG
 * http://www.phillyalt.net/ - .NET UP
 * http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/PhillyPug/ - Python UG
 * http://phflex.org/ - Flex UG
 * http://philadelphia.pm.org/ - Pearlmongers
 * http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/pearstalk/ - Php UG
 * http://ubuntupennsylvania.org/ - Ubuntu UG

Other OS Users:
 * Drupal
 * DotNetNuke
 * Plone
 * Mambo/Joomla

Other Professional Organizations:
 * Urban Planning
 * Architecture
 * Geography
 * Open Data
 * Conservation
 * Environmental
 * Recreation
 * Campaigning

Social Networks:
 * LinkedIn
 * Facebook page?
 * Meetup.com?

Other Lists:
 * PANMA
 * Make:Philly
 * Hacktory

Membership
2 total.

Contact Information
Mailing list:
 * TBD

IRC:
 * #osgeo-phl (irc://irc.freenode.net/osgeo-phl)

Founders:
 * Michael McLarnon: mmclar [at] gmail [dot] com
 * David Zwarg