How long before the Google Earth/Google Map people start talking about integration between those products and the new Google IM client? Too bad ESRI didn’t already have GeoChat up and running, then people could use it as an example, unfortunately we only have that one lone blog entry to show what it is capable of. Expect the press to focus on Google Talk over the next few weeks and how it will integrate into their products (oh and how ESRI missed the boat).
I wonder why ESRI picked the MSN client to run GeoChat on and not Jabber? You’d think an open protocol such as Jabber would be easier to work with than a “closed” protocol such as Messenger (disclaimer: I have no idea what I’m talking about).
Update - Google Talk is now available. You can add me (my Gmail address is below my picture on the right side of the blog), but I’m sure my work blocks the Jabber port with our firewall. You can always add my MSN Messenger contact which is on my about page.
2 responses so far ↓
1
Charles Siegel
// Dec 14, 2005 at 2:54 pm
Note that TGIS Technologies was showing a geocollaboration prototype called GeoChat on Windows computers way back at the turn of the century (uh, 2000). Ours was not P2P — it was client-server instead. It provided a shared, georeferenced map view as well as a chat box. This prototype became the basis of a product we began in a Canadian GeoConnections project (see the website in the registry box above or search on “GeoConference). That project produced the version 1.0 of our GeoConference product, which we have continued to advance since then (working on v1.2).
Our take on real-time geocollaboration is somewhat different than ESRI’s. Our system is meant to support an internet meeting. Users get together in a conference session, and in the session, the map view is shared and synchronized (in every aspect: layers in view, display characteristics, scale and extent). We feel that this is a requirement for holding a meeting.
The user is aware of the presence and activity of others through a roster. But beyond that, the software is meant to support a great deal of direct interaction (as opposed to an interaction through geodata). Each user has a map pointer that all the other in the meeting can see (all of the pointers can be active at once = no control passing) and the georeferenced annotations (point, line and polygon), which any user can add, can be edited by anyone.
As it works out, our users oftern talk to each other on the telephone while they conference — and the logged chat ends up being used to record observations, findings, etc.
2 GeoChat for ArcGIS Explorer at James Fee GIS Blog // Dec 14, 2006 at 1:36 pm
[...] GeoChat for ArcMap has been out for a while and just got updated for ArcGIS 9.2. Hot on the heels of that release comes GeoChat for ArcGIS Explorer. I speculated that it might make sense for Google to add such functionality to Google Earth, but here comes ESRI and GeoChat first to the table. Richie has some great screenshots of GeoChat running on his blog and you can download it here. Now users in different locations can collaborate using a digital globe application. The possibilities are endless here, all you need in a jabber account and ArcGIS Explorer (well .NET 2.0, but don’t we all have that? ). [...]
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