North River Geographic Systems Inc

Geospatial Problem Solving

NRGS

The 12 days of XYMas

First off this might be the 13 Days of XYMas.

Inspired by Nyall Dawson’s 24 days of QGIS (which you should check out on twitter) I’ve decided to do a 12 days of “Tools” or “GIS” or “GEO” or something – but 12 things I dabble in and enjoy and relate to my life in Geo and at least one or two of my life outside of geo. I’ve been on a bit off on the whole blogging thing as of late. I start a post and never finish it. I may finish it and then go “What’s the point” and it never gets published. So this will be a bit Therapeutic also.

In starting off it was pointed out:

I really wanted to have fun with this so it instead of the boring Xmas I decided to make it XYMas. To which:

https://twitter.com/atanas/status/1202952348135497729

 

I mostly know what I’m going to cover – and this might end up being a little of “Year End” housekeeping also. So come in for the “Holy Crap” and Stick around for GDAL, PDAL, SQL, QGIS, Canoes, and Life.

Anyway – till the next post……

12 years?

Some posts are way harder to write than others. That’s how I know I’m thinking too much on the subject matter. Thinking too much has given me writers block up to a degree for the last few weeks. I redid this one three times.

I started getting Linkedin Messages last week that were “Congrats on the Anniversary”. So I’ve been “working” at North River Geographic Systems for 12 years now. Technically  It was late April that I finally filed all the paperwork to start a business 12 years ago. I know – what’s a month? It had been a running fantasy since 2001 and it morphed and changed as life happened. So in 2006 I pulled the trigger and in 2008/2009 I transitioned to this being a full time thing.

I was trying to think of a way to sum up the last 12 years. I was trying to think of milestones or noteworthy things that’s I’ve done. Every year about March I start thinking about where I was 12 years ago and where I am now. I was trying to think of one giant phrase to sum up owning a business in 2018.

I’m never bored.

There. Done.

I didn’t have a great plan starting out. Back in 2006 it was enough to own some ESRI Software and look for work. In the By 2012/2013 I ended up leaving the ESRI Business Partners program and started focusing on Open Source. Towards the end of those “middle years” I ended up shifting focus to just about 90% open source. As of right now I’m 100% open source, dealing with data, and have customers calling me as opposed to me having to track them down. You know what – I cranked up a copy of ArcGIS 10.6 last week at a clients office and enjoyed that (weird right).

I’m happy. Mostly. It’s taken me a long time to get to that point. Happy will cover stuff at work and stuff not at work. I’ve adopted more of a “live and let live” attitude about everything. There are things I do well. There are things I don’t do well. I hope it’s all reflected accurately on the website so people know when/why to call me (which reminds me I need to update some stuff on the website). I hope I don’t run down what makes you happy. It may not make me happy but that’s fine. Just don’t hurt anyone in the process. I’ve been pulling back more and more from social media. I don’t want to know everything about you. Just that you are happy or you need help. That’s all.

For a good long while I just sorta existed from month to month. If you’re services oriented (like I am), services can come and go at the drop of a hat. As of right now I’m busy. I’m not looking at starving next month. Hopefully it continues. There is some merit to “spatial is special” still. I know it’s fun for us to scream and go “GEO IS EASY EVERYONE IS DOING IT” but they aren’t. I started in geo accidentally 26 years ago. The software changes but the science remains the same.

Anyway – I thank you all for the good thoughts. Thank you for enjoying my lunatic ramblings up here. There are more coming as life on this end continues.

 

 

 

T&M NTE By NRGS

What? Teenage Mutant Ninja What?

As a small company you’re always trying to increase services but not over commit yourself. I’ve done that way too much. A lot of people call me for advice. Some people call and when I mention “Hey – why don’t you pay us…….” the conversation drops and I hear nothing. I get a ton of phone calls about Open Source GIS and Commercial GIS and I provide answers and the people move forward and hopefully do good things.

So – with all of that I’m starting the “Time and Materials Not to Exceed Contract”. There are a few who already have it. Essentially what NRGS is trying to do is give you support but not kill your budget. The support contract is for X amount of time at X amount of hours. If we go over we contact you to proceed or to stand down until next months hours begin. The beauty of this – If we don’t work you don’t pay us. Perhaps you need help in April and Not May. Pay for April. You pay nothing in May. At the end of the year we haven’t gone over the agreed amount. We may not have done anything for your organization (and we don’t want that to be the case either).

  • So if you’re pre-paying for support and are running out of hours…
  • You need help with your GIS and not sure what to do…..
  • You are listening to sales people tell you what you should buy and don’t know if they are telling you the truth…

That’s what we are here for – to help, to guide, to get you moving on a better path.

Northeast Florida GIS Users Group – May 15th 2014

So I’m headed to Florida…….Here is the announcement. Stop in if you can.

Please join us at our upcoming NEFGIS User Group Meeting!!

Lunch will be provided compliments of our sponsor, Navigation Electronics, Inc. www.neigps.com

Please RSVP if you plan on coming so that we can ensure there is enough food.
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1YeRwGe7XvdH6KJlOKgb1m0NQTjac4rpX0nu8bIYaZn8/viewform

This is an open invitation and we encourage you to Forward to a Friend.
 
NEFGIS User Group Meeting – Location provided by St Johns County Utility Dept

Thursday May 15th – 11:30 am to 1:30 pm
St Johns County Utility Department
1205 State Road 16
St. Augustine, FL 32084
29.9154829, -81.3730766
MAP
 
11:30am – 12:15pm
Lunch and Socialization

12:15pm – 12:30pm
NEFGIS Announcements and a word from our lunch sponsor.

12:30pm – 1pm
Addressing in the US Virgin Islands
Randy Hale, GISP
North River Geographic Systems – https://www.northrivergeographic.com

Randal Hale is the owner of North River Geographic Systems (NRGS). NRGS provides geospatial services to public and private organizations with an emphasis on data/process over software. He worked for several years for the Federal Gov’t before retiring to work full time at NRGS. He’s on the board for Georgia URISA and Mid South ASPRS. He also has a 3.5 lb toothless Siamese cat.

1pm – 1:30pm
Intro to GISCorps
Allen Ibaugh, AICP, GISP
Data Transfer Solutions - www.dtsgis.com

Allen Ibaugh is the CEO of DTS, a technology business focused on developing and deploying GIS, multimedia (video/software/graphics), and web-based solutions for government and private industry, particularly in the transportation marketplace.  Mr. Ibaugh is the current President of URISA and is on the core committee of GISCorps. GISCorps provides volunteer services to support humanitarian relief, emergency response, health and education, local capacity building, and community development, as well as volunteer expertise in critical technology to non-profit and governmental organizations that are unable to acquire it on their own. 

In an effort to properly represent NEFGIS, please UPDATE YOUR PROFILE.
 

The NEFGIS  Group invites you to be a member of our group
NEFGIS LinkedIn Page

Regards,
NEFGIS

Intro to OpenStreetMap Workshop at GISPro

Sorry for the bit of silence from the Blog…Been rather busy.

GISPro – I’ve lucked up this year and am actually making two conferences. FOSS4GNA and GISPro2013 . GISPro is a pretty good conference. If you haven’t been make a point to go – I call it the more human backbone to GIS. It’s the people that make it fun – it’s the people that make this one fun. There are quite a few noteworthy folk that will be there. There will be food and drink and stories.

I will be teaching a new workshop – Introduction to OpenStreetMap. I and Carol Kraemer wrote it a few months back (we’re still adjusting it). We tried to keep this relevant to all of us who deal with Geographic Information Systems from day to day – but have 0 clue on how or why OpenStreetMap works. We’ll cover quite a bit (and it’s only 8 hours so hold onto your seat).

  1. History
  2. Licensing
  3. Geometry
  4. Tagging
  5. Editing
  6. Rendering the Map
  7. Download Data
  8. Benefits of OSM

We’re even going to attempt to go out and map something during Chapter 8…or like every last chapter of every class I’ve taught leave early (and since it’s GISPro find a bar and have a drink).

So if you’re at GISpro – Track us down – come over and say Hi. Come listen to boring stories of North River Geographic Systems, Inc and the cool stuff that we have done and will do.