The last Blog entry looked at Open Office, as a means of saving public sector cash. Since then, scarcely a day has gone by when the Coalition Government has not threatened more cuts, or abolished another body or another raft of Labour legislation. Right now Anti Social Behaviour Legislation is looking very vulnerable, and doubtless that will raise questions over the need for ASB units in Local Authorities.
My next money-saving idea, is a very serious one, and one we will definitely be implementing. As a result of the media profile which Google and Microsoft enjoy, most people will imagine that these are the only two mapping systems on the web, and that they are both free and there for our entertainment. Actually, none of these statements are true. There are other options, and nothing multi-national corporates do will be free, or even cheap, and if they are fun to use - which they are - this is part of the marketing lure. Bing and Google are looking to create advertising revenue from their products, so we all pay in all the products and services we buy, if we or others use online maps to find them. Where there is no advertising opportunity, both companies want to make a hefty charge, and, surprise surprise, the same hefty charge.
By contrast "OpenStreetMap" is an internet mapping system entirely built by volunteers in the tradition of Wikipedia. They are adding more detail all the time. The Open Street Map Foundation is not-for-profit. It ploughed a lot of its very small resources into helping out in Gaza and Haiti, where lack of maps (due to lack of commercial potential) hampers the aid process. I had the opportunity to attend their annual conference "State of the Map" in Girona, Spain and caught some of the infectious enthusiasm of the people who have built a great product from nothing in just four years.
I came back full of enthusiasm to see if we could use it in Caseworks, and today, my developer, Krish produced a brilliant conversion of our former facilty.
Login to their website and look at your own home area: http://www.openstreetmap.org/
This is an example of the open street map generated from the Case Screen
And the popup...
But readers, will be wondering if being free means it is rubbish. Absolutely not. The dedication of volunteers has guaranteed an immense amount of valuable details. I thought I would compare an area I know well, Alexandra Park in North London.
You decide!
This is Open Street Map
This is Google ............................................................And this is Virtual Earth
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