Korean Chapter Report 2012

OSGeo Korean Language Chapter Activity Report 2012

• Period covered by report: Jan-Dec 2012
• Contact name: Sanghee Shin(endofcap at gmail.com)
• The OSGeo Korean Language Chapter was formed as an unofficial chapter in Feb 2008 and changed its status to an official OSGeo Local Chapter in March 2009. The OSGeo Korean Language Chapter had 249 members as of Dec 31st, 2012.

Key Accomplishments

• Events
  • FOSS4G Korea 2012 : The second annual OSGeo Korean Language Chapter conference.
    • Date: October 12th, 2012
    • Venue: COEX, Seoul
    • Organizer: OSGeo Korean Language Chapter
    • Keynote Speakers : Dr. Paolo Cavallini, Dr. Taeyul Kim, Mr. Kosuke Asahi
    • The event was highly successful with around 90 ~ 110 participants. 3 keynote speeches and 8 presentations were delivered by great and smart people there and followed by Soju Party near Samsung station!!

• Trainings
  • 2 times 'Open Source GIS Winter School' was held in February, 2012 in cooperation with KSIS(Korean Spatial Information Society). Although it was paid training program, it attracted huge number of people more than we expected.
  • 1 time 'Open Source GIS Education Program' funded by MLTM(Ministry of Land, Transportation and Maritime Affairs) was held in August, 2012. It was full time 5 days training program covering open source GIS general, QGIS, PostGIS, GeoServer and OpenLayers.

• Developments
  • Mr. Kyungtae Doh, one of Korean chapter member, started to develop Node.js based MapServer
  • Mr. Minpa Lee, one of Korean chapter member, released uDig plugin called GXT that increased the analysis functions in uDig drastically. http://www.onspatial.com/2013/01/gxt-toolbox-for-udig.html

• Regular Meetings
  • 2 times regular meetings
  • Date: February and August, 2012
  • Place: Seoul
  • These meetings were followed by Open Source GIS schools held in Ewha Womans university supported by Ministry of Land, Transport and Marine Affairs.
  • Our members shared knowledge & experiences around open source GIS in the regular meetings. Also we discussed the future activities of OSGeo Korean Language Chapter.

• Localizations & Translations
  • Korean chapter carried out several localization & translations
  • QGIS menu, messages and manual were translated in Korean. You can download PDF version of QGIS Korean manual here: http://www.qgis.org/en/documentation/manuals.html
  • Hardcopy of QGIS Korean manual was published.
  • Started to translate PostGIS, GeoServer and OpenLayers materials in Korean

• Projects
  • Korean chapter has been fully or partially involved in several open source related projects.
  • KOPSS(Korea Planning Support System) Open API Project funded by KRIHS(Korean Research Institute of Human Settlement)
  • "Open source software vs Private software: understanding and strategic approach" funded by KRIHS(Korean Research Institute of Human Settlement)
  • "A Research on Open Source Based GeoSpatial Technology Development Strategy" funded by KRIHS(Korean Research Institute of Human Settlement)
  • Online open source GIS education program project funded by NECGIS(National Education Center for GIS)

• Outreach Activities
  • Korean chapter has conducted several outreach activities including lecture, seminar and exchange programs.
  • Outreach Lectures : LH Corp, KRIHS, KCSC(Korea Cadastral Survey Corp), GeoSpatial Asia Forum, MND(Ministry of National Defense), Gyungbook National University and others.
  • Exchange Program : Dispatched 2 delegates to Osaka, Japan to give keynote speech at FOSS4G 2012 Osaka

Areas for Improvement

• Still, too much dependency on too small key members. More active members should be involved.
• Korean chapter is not still legal entity, therefore there are several limitations to do our activities. We need to change our status to legal entity in near future.
• Need to expand activities to international scale. Our chapter has very talented members however their activities are somewhat isolated here in Korea.
• We need to seek stable revenue source to run our chapter. Our chapter financial is highly dependent on limited donation sources.

Opportunities to Help

• We definitely need some speakers for FOSS4G Korea 2013. If anyone wants to vist Korea and deliver some precious speeches, please contact us anytime.
• We hope more open source GIS related event could be held here in Korea or in Asia region.

Outlook for 2013

• We may see very prosperous year in 2013. As awareness of open source GIS has increased rapidly here in Korea, many organizations got to know the importance of open source GIS software and desire to cooperate with our chapter.
• In 2013, we may attract more members to our chapter and could run our chapter in more systematic way. We hope that 2013 is the year that OSGeo Korean Chapter has started flourishing.
• We'll explore the possibility of hosing FOSS4G 2015 in Korea with other GIS related society like KSIS(Korean Spatial Information Society).