I've been working on the Open GISspec for web mapping for a little less than a year now. We've come up with a simple spec that lets you construct a URL with a map request in it. The spec describes the format of the URL and how map servers should behave when they receive one of these.
If you build a campus map server that conforms to this spec, then later on, you can build HTML pages that can request campus maps superimposed on satellite photos or other neat data.
The first place to look is at the spec. Revision 1.0 is due out "any day now" so don't get hung up on the details. Then look at what some people are doing with the spec.
Here's a sample HTML client that talks to a Web Map Server which itself then knows about a dozen or so other Web Map Servers. (What we call a "cascading map server").
Take out the nospam from my email if you want to ask more questions... (By the way, I'm also a big OpenMap fan - I open-sourced it while at BBN...)
Interestingly, the TIGER data forms the basis for a *lot* of data being sold by big companies. Most street level data of the US is derived from TIGER and then cleaned up/enhanced by those companies.
There was a thread on comp.infosystems.gis a while ago about starting a free data movement. And don't foget, somewhere in the past there was (don't know if it still exists) an "Open Content" movement.
There's a nifty worldwide data set called VMAP (formerly Digital Chart of the World) on 4 CDs available from the USGS.
But back at the ranch, there are some Open Source (tm) mapping systems, none of which handle TIGER as far as I know. In fact, OpenMap(tm) is one that we released just before Christmas. I'd invite the OS community to dive in and write an OpenMap LayerBean that handles TIGER data. OpenMap does handle VMAP but there's always room for improvement...
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Take a look at http://www.asciimation.co.nz/
'Nuf said.
I've been working on the Open GIS spec for web mapping for a little less than a year now. We've come up with a simple spec that lets you construct a URL with a map request in it. The spec describes the format of the URL and how map servers should behave when they receive one of these.
If you build a campus map server that conforms to this spec, then later on, you can build HTML pages that can request campus maps superimposed on satellite photos or other neat data.
The first place to look is at the spec. Revision 1.0 is due out "any day now" so don't get hung up on the details. Then look at what some people are doing with the spec.
Here's a sample HTML client that talks to a Web Map Server which itself then knows about a dozen or so other Web Map Servers. (What we call a "cascading map server").
Take out the nospam from my email if you want to ask more questions... (By the way, I'm also a big OpenMap fan - I open-sourced it while at BBN...)
Check out OpenMap(tm) (http://openmap.bbn.com) from BBN. It's all Java and Open Source(tm).
Then there's OpenMap(tm) from BBN. We released it last month.
VMAP from the USGS is about $100. (I.e. distribution cost. You can give it away once you buy it).
Interestingly, the TIGER data forms the basis for a *lot* of data being sold by big companies. Most street level data of the US is derived from TIGER and then cleaned up/enhanced by those companies.
There was a thread on comp.infosystems.gis a while ago about starting a free data movement. And don't foget, somewhere in the past there was (don't know if it still exists) an "Open Content" movement.
There's a nifty worldwide data set called VMAP (formerly Digital Chart of the World) on 4 CDs available from the USGS.
But back at the ranch, there are some Open Source (tm) mapping systems, none of which handle TIGER as far as I know. In fact, OpenMap(tm) is one that we released just before Christmas. I'd invite the OS community to dive in and write an OpenMap LayerBean that handles TIGER data. OpenMap does handle VMAP but there's always room for improvement...