Have you seen this new social mapping application… Mapisimo… tagline “Who On Earth”? Users can “buy” 2 places – each being about the size of 4 tennis courts. Then you can shout out, add a photo or ?? on your “property”. I’m still waiting on my email to activate the account.. perhaps then I can figure out exactly why I would want to use yet another social networking app! See http://www.mapisimo.com/
Archives for August 16, 2007
Autodesk at 25 Years, the Autodesk Timeline and some of my favorite AutoCAD moments
It’s been 25 years since AutoCAD was first demonstrated at COMDEX in Las Vegas. To celebrate 25 years of digital design innovation, Autodesk has launched a website along with an interesting timeline.
I received this interesting bit of AutoCAD history… Did you know that 25 years ago John Walker & 16 employees started Autodesk, with the sole goal of creating a CAD application for under $1,000? In 25 years that tiny company has grown to over 5,000 employees in 33 countries, with product offerings spanning a variety of industries, from architecture to civil engineering to computer animated graphics. Over the years AutoCAD, the company’s flagship product, has been joined by an ever-growing family of products that leverage the trusted platform’s capabilities to address the specific needs of a variety of designers, including AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Electrical and most recently AutoCAD P&ID, to name a few.
Some cool milestones:
1984 – revenues top 1 million
1985 – Autodesk goes public (ADSK)
1990 – Glenn Letham starts using AuoCAD r9 for pipeline mapping project (remember the dot prompt?) – OK – I slipped this one in!
1992 – Carol Bartz named CEO (you gotta love a woman CEO who will freely drop an “F-bomb” when you least expect it!)
2005 – ADSK scores an Academy Award
2006 – Carl Bass named President and CEO
2007 – Autodesk now reports 8 million licensed users worldwide
See www.autodesk.com/autocad25

– using AutoCAD in my first GIS related internship to map the natural gas pipelines in Victoria, BC
– seeing John Cleese at Autodesk U in Vegas, 2003
– the Autodesk Miramar hospitality event in San Diego (GITA)
– having one-on one’s with Lynn Allen, Carl Bass, Chris Bradshaw, Carol Bartz, and other ADSK execs.
– the Mapguide open source launch in Orlando
– Autodesk realize your ideas tour in Vancouver and meeting Guy Kawasaki
– a cool Autodedesk intro event in Atlanta – the travelling road shows are awesome!
– DWF (say no more!)
– the Pre-season ball game in Tampa with open bar complete with 24 oz. beer cups…
oh those wonderful emails
oh Lord.. more of those wonderful emails! Ever wonder what kind of email us media folks get inundated with? Here’s just a sampling of an email I just received – I get a ton of these!
Dear Sir,
Give me some details for GIS job in India.
thans
Ok man… I’ll get right on that for ya! Actually, I have no idea which job you are talking about (is it on our GIsuser job board?) I also have no need to actually hire someone for a position in India since we have no office there etc… good luck though
A little help on GPS tagging photos from the Nokia N95
A little help from any Nokia N95 users out there?? I’ve been dabbling a bit with the N95 trying to get geolocation elements associated with photos… sureley this has to be the most desired feature of this phone! Apparently Shozu does indeed support this functionality, however, I can’t seem to get GPS coordinates written to the EXIF associated with images. Does Shozu do this to anyone’s knowledge?? I’ve tried getting a gPS fix, then snapping images, however, no GPS coords seem to be getting tagged to the image. Can anyone shed a bit of light on this for me? I found this statement on the Shozu forum… “I’ve added putting the GPS data into the EXIF of JPEGs as a possible future feature for ShoZu” so I have to assume that its not currently doable. ” Source: Forum post titled “Nokia N95 – GPS Support?”
Kudos to Stefan over at Ogle earth blog for a great write-up on his experiences tagging his photos from a recent mountain trek. He goes to great lengths describing how he tags his images, uploads to flickr, then streams to Google earth.
A little help on Geotagging N95 photos with GPS info in EXIF
A little help from any Nokia N95 users out there?? I’ve been dabbling a bit with the N95 trying to get geolocation elements associated with photos… sureley this has to be the most desired feature of this phone! Apparently Shozu does indeed support this functionality, however, I can’t seem to get GPS coordinates written to the EXIF associated with images. Does Shozu do this to anyone’s knowledge?? I’ve tried getting a gPS fix, then snapping images, however, no GPS coords seem to be getting tagged to the image. Can anyone shed a bit of light on this for me? I found this statement on the Shozu forum… “I’ve added putting the GPS data into the EXIF of JPEGs as a possible future feature for ShoZu” so I have to assume that its not currently doable. ” Source: Forum post titled “Nokia N95 – GPS Support?”
Kudos to Stefan over at Ogle earth blog for a great write-up on his experiences tagging his photos from a recent mountain trek. He goes to great lengths describing how he tags his images, uploads to flickr, then streams to Google earth.
ArcGIS Explorer updated with Build 410 – Includes Enhanced Resource Center
This comes from the ArcGIS Explorer downloads page – ArcGIS Explorer has detected that a newer version (Build 410) of software is now available. From the AGX blog, Among the new features in Build 410 is the revamped ArcGIS Explorer Resource Center. The Resource Center now includes a Contents tab that provides easy access to both maps and layers. See http://blogs.esri.com/Info/blogs/arcgisexplorerblog/Default.aspx
At the heart of this release is the Resource Center where users can locate free stuff, collaborate with others and more… http://resources.esri.com/arcgisexplorer/
Latest features include:
New Resource Center
A new ArcGIS Explorer Resource Center has been published, offering direct access to individual ArcGIS Online Layers as well as Maps. The Resource Center also includes a new Share tab. This tab provides access to an ArcGIS Explorer Community Showcase site which allows you to view and share screen captures, maps, layers, results, and tasks.
Get Driving Directions Task
When using the Get Driving Directions task, when you toggle the Regions setting between Europe and the United States, and Canada, the text boxes for From Here and To Here are cleared, making the entry of new locations easier.
Route Source Data Shown
Previous versions indicated that the route source information was available for North America; this has been renamed to United States and Canada to reflect the route source data more accurately.
Import File Now Supports 3D
When importing a text file or CSV file, you can now specify an elevation field in the Import File dialog.
Decimal Seconds Added
Support for decimal seconds in the status bar and the GoTo Location dialog has been added.
Easier Access to Manage Layers
You can access the Manage Layers dialog box by right-clicking any layer. Manage Layers gives you the ability to reorder or remove layers, or clear the layer cache.
Navigation Enhancements
Navigation with ArcGIS Explorer has been enhanced in the following ways.