I get people asking me all the time how ArcGIS Explorer will do against Google Earth or NASA World Wind. For now one can’t speak because it is still in closed beta, but I will address one part that people have been asking me about. The ArcGIS Explorer Community. Right now the only community online is the ArcGIS Explorer website, which really isn’t a community at all (though I guess you could count the Beta Web forums as community). The AGX team told me at the UC that they plan to have a community site up and running and that this current website is really just a plug until AGX is released to the public. As Jeff Atwood says, “It’s clear that community support can make or break a product.” I hope that ESRI will let the AGX team run with their community, rather than force it into existing community platforms that really don’t lend themselves to community at all (though astute readers will point out that the big GE community is just a forum).
I do think in the end the community is just about as important as the product itself (if not more so). A mediocure product can be made much better with great community support and putting a middle man between users and developers can cause as many problems as it can resolve.
5 responses so far ↓
1
its cots
// Oct 23, 2006 at 12:28 pm
I totally disagree. Maybe “the community makes the app” is true for a community developed application, but the justification for a COTS product is that the brains and financial backing of the vendor, which supposedly exceed what is ever possible in a community developed app is behind the application and supports it. ArcScripts and similar sites are nice, but if a COTS product provides simply a framework, and the good will of the community is required to actually make it work and thrive — what is it you are buying?
2
David Davis
// Oct 23, 2006 at 1:01 pm
Disagree? GE is a perfect example of a COTS product made better by a great community.
3
its cots
// Oct 24, 2006 at 1:52 pm
that’s like saying microsoft word is a great COTS product made better by all the Word Documents out there.
In my post I was referring to community development of software features that make a mediocre product, such as arcview, usable and useful. If the point of this discussion is that community generated content is key to the success of arc explorer, then its possible this product is 5 years late and the vendor is like $50billion short.
4
Lefty
// Oct 24, 2006 at 2:28 pm
I can say it is 5 years late and 50 billion short. I was part of the beta and AGX is slow as ass and can’t handle even simple KMLs very well. That and AGS is so damn slow, deadly combination.
5
anon
// Oct 24, 2006 at 2:39 pm
Lefty, are you saying that ESRI shouldn’t have bothered with AGX?
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