Web Mapping Collaboration from Oregon to Minnesota

Beginning in 2001, several Oregon counties began developing an open source web mapping system which would enable the public, business and government organizations to access geographic information in support of government business functions. The system has been very successful, contributing to faster, better, cheaper services. Last year the group decided to re-collaborate to upgrade the now aging system. The participants developed new requirements by documenting business and functional use cases. Using these requirements, the members examined commercial and open source web mapping tools and products based on a series of prototypes and tests. The group has elected to join a consortium based in Minnesota that has already developed a web mapping tool called GeoMoose. GeoMoose is an open source web mapping system based on MapServer, MS4W and OpenLayers open source tools. The group then collaborated with GeoMoose developers to customize the application to better fit the group's business needs. This session will review the groups' efforts to date, discuss our collaborative environment with the Minnesota based GeoMoose organization and demonstrate our new Oregon-based mapping tool.