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Press release
Open Source Geospatial Foundation Created to Strengthen Collaborative
Development of Open Geospatial Technologies
OSGEO to provide an umbrella for community-led GIS and mapping projects
March 06, 2006 - The open source geospatial community today announced
the formation of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation, a not-for-profit
organization whose mission is to support and promote the collaborative
development of open geospatial technologies and data. The foundation was
formed in February to provide financial, organizational and legal
support to the broader open source geospatial community. It will also
serve as an independent legal entity to which community members can
contribute code, funding and other resources, secure in the knowledge
that their contributions will be maintained for public benefit.
On February 4th, OSGEO held its first meeting in Chicago with 25
participants representing 18 groups and over 20 different open source
geospatial projects, and 39 other parties participating via Internet
Relay Chat. At this meeting, the participants took important steps in
forming and organizing a foundation to develop and support open source
geospatial technologies, including defining the foundation's name,
structure and vision. The consensus reached at the Chicago meeting paves
the way to establish a productive, inclusive foundation.
The Chicago meeting also resulted in the appointment of an initial board
of directors that will be responsible for the drafting and execution of
the foundation's charter and bylaws. The initial five directors come
from North America and Europe and represent various open source projects
and technologies. The initial five directors of OSGEO are:
* Arnulf Christl - Mapbender, CCGIS, Germany;
* Chris Holmes - GeoServer/GeoTools, The Open Planning Project, U.S.;
* Gary Lang - MapGuide, Autodesk, U.S.;
* Markus Neteler - GRASS, Istituto Trentino Di Cultura, Italy;
* Frank Warmerdam - GDAL/OGR, Canada.
The foundation expects to appoint four additional directors within the
next several weeks to serve as the full interim board until the next
annual meeting of the foundation membership at FOSS4G this fall.
OSGEO draws governance inspiration from several aspects of the Apache
Foundation, including a membership composed of individuals drawn from
foundation projects who are selected for membership status based on
their active contribution to foundation projects and governance. The
initial membership consists of the five initial board members plus 16
other participants who attended the Chicago organizational meeting. The
foundation added recently further 24 members from the broader open
source geospatial community through a public nomination and election
process to reach 45 voting members.
Initial OSGEO projects are GeoTools, Mapbender, MapBuilder, MapGuide,
MapServer, GDAL/OGR, GRASS, and OSSIM.
The foundation will not require that OSGEO software projects to be
licensed under any one particular open source license, but will require
that all OSGEO software be released under an open source license
approved by the Open Source Initiative (OSI). The long term goal is to
encourage licenses that allow the different foundation projects to work
better together and permit for code exchange among them. The foundation
will implement contribution and intellectual property policies designed
to avoid the inclusion of proprietary or patented code in OSGEO
projects. Foundation projects are focused on interoperability - both
with one another at the library level, and with other proprietary and
open source projects through the use of open standards.
The foundation will also be pursuing goals beyond software development,
such as promoting more open access to government produced spatial data,
which is a major problem outside of North America.
About the Open Source Geospatial Foundation
The Open Source Geospatial Foundation (OSGEO), is a not-for-profit
organization whose mission is to support and promote the collaborative
development of open geospatial technologies and data. The foundation was
formed to provide financial, organizational and legal support to the
broader open source geospatial community. It will also serve as an
independent legal entity to which community members can contribute code,
funding and other resources, secure in the knowledge that their
contributions will be maintained for public benefit.
For more information, write to info@osgeo.org and see http://www.osgeo.org/
Open Source Geospatial Foundation Created to Strengthen Collaborative
Development of Open Geospatial Technologies
OSGEO to provide an umbrella for community-led GIS and mapping projects
March 06, 2006 - The open source geospatial community today announced
the formation of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation, a not-for-profit
organization whose mission is to support and promote the collaborative
development of open geospatial technologies and data. The foundation was
formed in February to provide financial, organizational and legal
support to the broader open source geospatial community. It will also
serve as an independent legal entity to which community members can
contribute code, funding and other resources, secure in the knowledge
that their contributions will be maintained for public benefit.
On February 4th, OSGEO held its first meeting in Chicago with 25
participants representing 18 groups and over 20 different open source
geospatial projects, and 39 other parties participating via Internet
Relay Chat. At this meeting, the participants took important steps in
forming and organizing a foundation to develop and support open source
geospatial technologies, including defining the foundation's name,
structure and vision. The consensus reached at the Chicago meeting paves
the way to establish a productive, inclusive foundation.
The Chicago meeting also resulted in the appointment of an initial board
of directors that will be responsible for the drafting and execution of
the foundation's charter and bylaws. The initial five directors come
from North America and Europe and represent various open source projects
and technologies. The initial five directors of OSGEO are:
* Arnulf Christl - Mapbender, CCGIS, Germany;
* Chris Holmes - GeoServer/GeoTools, The Open Planning Project, U.S.;
* Gary Lang - MapGuide, Autodesk, U.S.;
* Markus Neteler - GRASS, Istituto Trentino Di Cultura, Italy;
* Frank Warmerdam - GDAL/OGR, Canada.
The foundation expects to appoint four additional directors within the
next several weeks to serve as the full interim board until the next
annual meeting of the foundation membership at FOSS4G this fall.
OSGEO draws governance inspiration from several aspects of the Apache
Foundation, including a membership composed of individuals drawn from
foundation projects who are selected for membership status based on
their active contribution to foundation projects and governance. The
initial membership consists of the five initial board members plus 16
other participants who attended the Chicago organizational meeting. The
foundation added recently further 24 members from the broader open
source geospatial community through a public nomination and election
process to reach 45 voting members.
Initial OSGEO projects are GeoTools, Mapbender, MapBuilder, MapGuide,
MapServer, GDAL/OGR, GRASS, and OSSIM.
The foundation will not require that OSGEO software projects to be
licensed under any one particular open source license, but will require
that all OSGEO software be released under an open source license
approved by the Open Source Initiative (OSI). The long term goal is to
encourage licenses that allow the different foundation projects to work
better together and permit for code exchange among them. The foundation
will implement contribution and intellectual property policies designed
to avoid the inclusion of proprietary or patented code in OSGEO
projects. Foundation projects are focused on interoperability - both
with one another at the library level, and with other proprietary and
open source projects through the use of open standards.
The foundation will also be pursuing goals beyond software development,
such as promoting more open access to government produced spatial data,
which is a major problem outside of North America.
About the Open Source Geospatial Foundation
The Open Source Geospatial Foundation (OSGEO), is a not-for-profit
organization whose mission is to support and promote the collaborative
development of open geospatial technologies and data. The foundation was
formed to provide financial, organizational and legal support to the
broader open source geospatial community. It will also serve as an
independent legal entity to which community members can contribute code,
funding and other resources, secure in the knowledge that their
contributions will be maintained for public benefit.
For more information, write to info@osgeo.org and see http://www.osgeo.org/
