Georepublic Blog

2012年もよろしくお願いします。

Mon, 02 Jan 2012 16:21:00 +0000

皆様、新年あけましておめでとうございます。関です。

少し出遅れた感がありますが、昨年の活動のご報告と、今年の豊富を書かせていただきたいと思います。

OpenStreetMap に明け暮れた一年

昨年は、3月6日（震災の5日前だったのですね）にヤフー社で開催したGeolocation Conference でのコーディネーターをさせていただき、その際に OpenStreetMap の創始者であるSteve Coast 氏に出会うことができました。ヤフーのアルプス時代の地図をOSMへ提供するというニュースをその場で発表できることができ、嬉しかったです。また、Google の Geo Developer Adovocate である Mano Marks や Steve Coast、Hurricane Coast 、ヤフー村田さんとのパネルディスカッションも大変刺激になるものでした。OpenStreetMap はその直後に発生した震災に対しての Crisis Mapping などでも大活躍しています。また、9月には OpenStreetMap の国際カンファレンスである、State of the Map (SotM) にも参加しました。過去参加したどんなカンファレンスよりもホットでクレイジーなコミュニティがあり、とても刺激的でした。そして、なんと今年はそのSotMが東京で開催されることに決定いたしました。今から楽しみでしかたありません。

sinsai.info と Hack For Japan

3月11日の地震発生直後に OpenStreetMap Foundation Japan の東さんが立ち上げた震災情報収集プラットフォーム、sinsai.info を引き継ぐ形で総責任者を担当させていただきました。並行して、ハッカソンを通じて震災復興を手助けするチームである、Hack For Japan にもスタッフとして参加。sinsia.info を始めて1ヶ月経った頃のブログをTechWave さんに掲載させていただきましたので、sinsai.info については次のリンクをご覧ください。TechWave：sinsai.info を1ヶ月やってきて思うこと【関治之】

sinsai.info をやらせていただいたおかげで、大変多くの素敵な方々と出会うことができました。被災地にも何度か足を運ばせていただき、被災者やボランティアの方々と意見交換をさせていただきました。毎回とても勉強させていただいています。賞をいただいたり、新聞に掲載していただいたりというのもありがたいですが、一番嬉しかったのはやはり実際の被災者の方々やボランティア活動をしている方々から、「役に立った」「助かった」という言葉をいただけた時でした。テクノロジーが社会的課題を解決するのにどう役に立つのか？ということについて、楽天テクノロジーカンファレンスにて発表させていただいた資料が以下です。

Is Technology Making World Better? &amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;div style="padding:5px 0 12px" mce_style="padding:5px 0 12px"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;View more &amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.slideshare.net/" mce_href="http://www.slideshare.net/" target="_blank"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;presentations&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt; from &amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.slideshare.net/hal_sk" mce_href="http://www.slideshare.net/hal_sk" target="_blank"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Hal Seki&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/div&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/div&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;

活動を続けていくなかで自分の力不足を感じたこともたくさんありましたし、参加していただいたボランティアの方々に配慮がうまく行き届かなかったこともありました。支えていただいた皆様、本当にありがとうございました。

今後も、両方の活動を続けていくつもりです。

オンデマンドバスシステム

本業の方では、これまで研究開発してきた OpenVRP を活用して、オンデマンドバスの運行管理システムを開発させていただきました。NDソフトウェアさんがフロントに立ち、「スマートデマンドシステム」として、いくつかの地域で運行しているオンデマンドバスの管理システムとしてご利用いただいています。ルート最適化については今会社が一番力をいれているシステムですので、今後もOpenVRPを始めとして、モビリティ関連のシステム開発を行なっていきたいと思います。

スマートフォンアプリケーション開発

スマートフォン向けのアプリケーション開発も大変多く引き合いをいただきました。地図を使ったAndroidアプリケーション、iPhone アプリケーションを中心に、多数のアプリケーションを制作させていただきました。
受託中心ですのでここに掲載できないものが多いのですが、ノウハウもだいぶ溜まってきております。ジオ系のアプリケーション開発の案件がありましたら是非ご連絡ください。

人々の実生活を豊かにする為のサービス開発を

今年も、位置情報を通じて、人々の実生活を豊かにする為のサービス開発を行なっていきます。

・今後の活動の基盤となる、地域貢献に役立つような自社サービスを作る

位置情報とスマートフォン、ソーシャルネットワークを使って、地域貢献に役立つような自社サービスを計画しています。インターネット上で完結するのではなく、人々の生活に影響を与えるようなサービスを作りたいというのがそもそも会社を始めたきっかけですので、原点に帰ってサービス開発を行います。

・OpenVRP を改良し、インターネット上の様々なサービスと車輌運行が繋がるシステムを開発する

OpenVRPを使ったスマートデマンドシステムを実際にリリースできたのは重要な一歩ですが、まだ既存のデマンドバスの運行管理システムの域を超えていません。単なる効率化ではなく、そのシステムでないとできないことを目指したいです。バスの運行ルートの自動最適化や、移動中や移動前の情報提供などの部分も含めて情報提供できるような、より良い交通システムを作っていきたいと思っています。今年はそれに向けてOpenVRPをより発展させていきます。

・テクノロジーと社会的課題を繋げる為の枠組みを作る

「次に備える」という意味でも、sinsai.info は今後、防災に関する活動を積極的に行う予定です。また、Hack For Japan でハッカソンを何度かやらせていただき、特定のテーマにそったハッカソンというのはとても効果的だと感じました。技術者が、社会的課題にうまくアプローチできるような仕組みをつくれれば、世の中を少しづつ変えることができると感じています。海外では Random Hacks of Kindness というハッカソンの取り組みもあります。こういったサイトなども参考にして、何かしらの枠組みを作っていきます。

・OpenStreetMap の発展に貢献する

今年の State of the Map Tokyo の運営チームにも入らせて頂きました。ヤフーデータのインポートも少しづつ進んでおり、ビジネス面でも利用ができる可能性が高まって来ました。9月のSotMカンファレンス実施までに、日本のコミュニティや地図データを、より発展させておけるよう頑張ります。

昨年も、たくさんの人に助けて頂きました。素晴らしい人達に巡りあえて、感謝しています。本年も、よろしくお願いいたします。

第8回ジオメディアサミットを1月23日に開催する予定です。もしお時間ありましたら、そちらでお会いしましょう！

第8回ジオメディアサミット | 詳細、申込み

sinsai.info についての記事をTechWaveに寄稿しました。

Mon, 25 Apr 2011 16:18:51 +0000

関です。

3/11 日に発生した震災以降、http://sinsai.info/ という、復興支援の為の震災情報集約サイトをボランティアで運営しております。

先日、TechWave さんに詳しい内容を寄稿いたしましたので、ご興味のある方はご覧ください。

sinsai.info を1ヶ月やってきて思うこと【関治之】 : TechWave

http://techwave.jp/archives/51650191.html

sinsai.info を1ヶ月やってきて思うこと【関治之】 : TechWave

http://techwave.jp/archives/51650191.html

また、

「クラウド型技術」が大震災に呼応する【前編】 ――災害情報を瞬時に共有する「sinsai.info」の力｜逆境から生まれるイノベーション｜ダイヤモンド・オンライン

や、

「社会を変えるソフトウェア」ウィキリークスとウシャヒディの隠れた共通点 ――「クラウド型技術」が大震災に呼応する【後編】｜逆境から生まれるイノベーション｜ダイヤモンド・オンライン

などでも紹介いただいております。

先週はWhere2.0 へ行っていたのですが、 Ushahidi の Director である Patrick Meier のプレゼンテーションでも、 sinsai.info を紹介いただきました。

&amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;gt;sinsai.info では、寄せられた情報の承認作業を行うモデレータや開発者、翻訳者などのボランティアを募集しております。震災復興の為の活動を検討されている方は、是非御連絡ください。&amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.sinsai.info/ushahidi/page/index/" mce_href="http://www.sinsai.info/ushahidi/page/index/"&amp;amp;gt;sinsai.infoの募集ページ&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt;より、ボランティア登録が可能です。&amp;amp;lt;br/&amp;amp;gt;よろしくお願いいたします。&amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;gt;

sinsai.info では、寄せられた情報の承認作業を行うモデレータや開発者、翻訳者などのボランティアを募集しております。震災復興の為の活動を検討されている方は、是非御連絡ください。sinsai.infoの募集ページより、ボランティア登録が可能です。
よろしくお願いいたします。

PostGIS and pgRouting template

Mon, 07 Feb 2011 06:34:33 +0000

When creating a new database in PostgreSQL using the standard template, PostGIS and pgRouting functions and tables are missing of course. You can add these functions and tables one by one, but doing this every time for every single database is annoying work.

The solution: make some template(s) containing funtions an tables from PostGIS and pgRouting and create a new database with them.

Template for PostGIS

First we create a template for PostGIS. Thanks to Shoaib from Nomad Labs!

createdb -U postgres -E UTF8 -T template0 template_postgis
createlang -U postgres -d template_postgis plpgsql

psql --quiet -U postgres -d template_postgis -f [path/to/postgresql]/contrib/postgis.sql
psql --quiet -U postgres -d template_postgis -f [path/to/postgresql]/contrib/spatial_ref_sys.sql
psql --quiet -U postgres -d template_postgis -f [path/to/postgresql]/contrib/postgis_comments.sql

psql -U postgres -d template_postgis -c "GRANT ALL ON geometry_columns TO PUBLIC;"
psql -U postgres -d template_postgis -c "GRANT ALL ON geography_columns TO PUBLIC;"
psql -U postgres -d template_postgis -c "GRANT ALL ON spatial_ref_sys TO PUBLIC;"

psql -U postgres -d template_postgis -c "VACUUM FULL;"
psql -U postgres -d template_postgis -c "VACUUM FREEZE;"

psql -U postgres -d postgres -c "UPDATE pg_database SET datistemplate='true' WHERE datname='template_postgis';"
psql -U postgres -d postgres -c "UPDATE pg_database SET datallowconn='false' WHERE datname='template_postgis';"

Template for pgRouting

Taking the PostGIS template we made before, we create a template containing pgRouting functions in the same way:

sudo -u postgres createdb -E UTF8 -T template_postgis template_routing

sudo -u postgres psql --quiet -d template_routing -f $ROUTING_SQL_PATH/routing_core.sql

sudo -u postgres psql --quiet -d template_routing -f $ROUTING_SQL_PATH/routing_core_wrappers.sql

sudo -u postgres psql --quiet -d template_routing -f $ROUTING_SQL_PATH/routing_topology.sql

sudo -u postgres psql --quiet -d template_routing -f $ROUTING_SQL_PATH/routing_tsp.sql

sudo -u postgres psql --quiet -d template_routing -f $ROUTING_SQL_PATH/routing_tsp_wrappers.sql

sudo -u postgres psql --quiet -d template_routing -f $ROUTING_SQL_PATH/routing_dd.sql

sudo -u postgres psql --quiet -d template_routing -f $ROUTING_SQL_PATH/routing_dd_wrappers.sql

sudo -u postgres psql --quiet -d template_routing -f $ROUTING_SQL_PATH/routing_darp.sql

sudo -u postgres psql --quiet -d template_routing -f $ROUTING_SQL_PATH/matching.sql

sudo -u postgres psql -d template_routing -c "VACUUM FULL;"

sudo -u postgres psql -d template_routing -c "VACUUM FREEZE;"

sudo -u postgres psql -d postgres -c "UPDATE pg_database SET datistemplate='true' WHERE datname='template_routing';"

sudo -u postgres psql -d postgres -c "UPDATE pg_database SET datallowconn='false' WHERE datname='template_routing';"

createdb -U postgres -E UTF8 -T template_postgis template_routing

psql -U postgres --quiet -d template_routing -f /usr/share/pgrouting/routing_core.sql
psql -U postgres --quiet -d template_routing -f /usr/share/pgrouting/routing_core_wrappers.sql
psql -U postgres --quiet -d template_routing -f /usr/share/pgrouting/routing_topology.sql
psql -U postgres --quiet -d template_routing -f /usr/share/pgrouting/routing_tsp.sql
psql -U postgres --quiet -d template_routing -f /usr/share/pgrouting/routing_tsp_wrappers.sql
psql -U postgres --quiet -d template_routing -f /usr/share/pgrouting/routing_dd.sql
psql -U postgres --quiet -d template_routing -f /usr/share/pgrouting/routing_dd_wrappers.sql

psql -U postgres -d template_routing -c "VACUUM FULL;"
psql -U postgres -d template_routing -c "VACUUM FREEZE;"

psql -U postgres -d postgres -c "UPDATE pg_database SET datistemplate='true' WHERE datname='template_routing';"
psql -U postgres -d postgres -c "UPDATE pg_database SET datallowconn='false' WHERE datname='template_routing';"

Create pgRouting database

Now we can create a pgRouting database like this and all required functions are already there:

createdb -U postgres -E UTF8 -T template_routing my_routing_db

Building pgRouting Ubuntu packages with git-buildpackage

Mon, 29 Nov 2010 12:06:07 +0000

Recently pgRouting released version 1.05 and migrated its repository to Git and GitHub. Furthermore Ubuntu released version 10.10 "Maverick Meerkat" in October, so it was about time to build new packages for pgRouting and upload them to the Georepublic pgRouting PPA on Launchpad.

Instead of building packages the straight-forward way as with previous releases I wanted to make use of Git from now on. There are plenty of resources available in internet how to get started, and it doesn't seem to be very difficult. But in the end I run into several problems, because I wanted to ...

use the same pgRouting repository (master branch), but keep the building packages part independent in separate branches
import the latest package available from pgRouting PPA and also import the tarball of version 1.05

Well, the major issue was not related to Git at all but to some unresolved issue with a patch of the latest Ubuntu packages. It took quite some time to figure this out.
Because most of what one needs for making Debian packages has been written many times already, first read here if you need more complete tutorials:

All of those resources were pretty useful.

Her some more pgRouting specific commands and custom scripts:

Custom build scripts

~/.gbp.conf

[DEFAULT]
builder = ~/Repository/Ubuntu/bin/git-pbuilder.sh
cleaner = fakeroot debian/rules clean
pristine-tar = True
upstream-branch=upstream
debian-branch=debian

[git-buildpackage]
export-dir = ~/Repository/Ubuntu/build-area/
tarball-dir = ~/Repository/Ubuntu/tarballs/
sign-tags = True

[git-dch]
git-log=--no-merges

~/Repository/Ubuntu/bin/git-pbuilder 1.17 script (with custom build paths) from http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/software/scripts/
~/.pbuilderrc (with custom build paths) as in https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PbuilderHowto#Multiple pbuilders

# Enable
BASEPATH="/var/cache/pbuilder/base-$NAME.cow/"

# Add OTHERMIRROR pgRouting PPA
elif $(echo ${UBUNTU_SUITES[@]} | grep -q $DIST); then
    # Ubuntu configuration
    MIRRORSITE="http://$UBUNTU_MIRROR/ubuntu/"
    COMPONENTS="main restricted universe multiverse"
    DEBOOTSTRAPOPTS=("${DEBOOTSTRAPOPTS[@]}" "--keyring=/usr/share/keyrings/ubuntu-archive-keyring.gpg")
    #OTHERMIRROR="$OTHERMIRROR | deb file:///var/cache/archive $DIST/"
    OTHERMIRROR="$OTHERMIRROR | deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/georepublic/pgrouting/ubuntu $DIST main"
else

Create (update) build environmet

DIST=maverick ARCH=i386 git-buildpackage create

DIST=maverick ARCH=i386 git-buildpackage update

Clone Git repository and add branches

git clone git@github.com:pgRouting/pgrouting.git
cd pgrouting

Create empty branches "debian" and "upstream"

git symbolic-ref HEAD refs/heads/upstream
git rm --cached -r .
rm -fr *
git commit --allow-empty -m "Initialized upstream branch."

git symbolic-ref HEAD refs/heads/debian
git rm --cached -r .
rm -fr *
git commit --allow-empty -m "Initialized debian branch."

Import .dsc file(s) and/or release tarball files

git checkout debian
git-import-dscs ~/Repository/Ubuntu/pgrouting/*.dsc
git-import-orig ~/Repository/Ubuntu/pgrouting/pgrouting-1.05.tar.gz

Build and sign packages and upload them to Launchpad

Build and set tag

git-dch --release
git-commit -m "Changelog commit message" .
DIST=maverick ARCH=amd64 git-buildpackage --git-tag

Sign and build "source.changes" file for upload to Launchpad

DIST=maverick ARCH=amd64 git-buildpackage --git-builder="debuild -S -sa"
dput ppa:georepublic/pgrouting ~/Repository/Ubuntu/build-area/pgrouting_1.05-1~maverick1_source.changes

Other useful Git commands

Push branches and tags to remote repository

git push origin upstream
git push origin debian
git push origin pristine-tar
git push origin --tags

Delete remote branches and tags

git push origin :upstream
git push origin :debian
git push origin :pristine-tar
git push origin :debian/1.04-ppa11
git push origin :upstream/1.04

Make remote branches locally available

git branch -a
git branch pristine-tar remotes/origin/pristine-tar
git branch debian remotes/origin/debian
git branch upstream remotes/origin/upstream

pgRouting Project News

Mon, 22 Nov 2010 05:25:51 +0000

It has been a long way but finally we made it:
I'm glad to be able to announce the new pgRouting website, that also comes with a lot of other changes and news! I hope the migration doesn’t produce a lot of confusion but makes it easier to participate in the project and make development faster and better!

Here the changes in detail:

New Website and URL

pgRouting got a new website and URL. So update your bookmarks to http://www.pgrouting.org

The website is built with Sphinx and hosted on GitHub: .

Old content from the previous TRAC wiki has been reviewed, and if it was seen as useful and not completely outdated, it was copied to the new site.

If you want to make changes to the website, contribute content or make corrections, feel free to fork the repository and submit pull requests. Or send an email to and we will give you commit rights to the repository.

New Source Repository

The source repositories moved to GitHub: https://github.com/pgRouting/

There you can find repositories for pgRouting library itself as well as source code of the project website, osm2pgrouting, the workshop and others.

pgRouting repositories are public, but write access is limited. Send an email to project@pgrouting.org if you want to make changes to the website or if you want to contribute to the project.

We hope Git makes it easier to participate in the project and make development faster and collaboration better!

More information: http://www.pgrouting.org/development.html

New Mailing Lists and Forum

For some time already there are two mailing lists for pgRouting, hosted on OSGeo mailing list server:

User mailing list: http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/pgrouting-users
Developer mailing list: http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/pgrouting-dev

The discussion forum is not available anymore for posting questions and we recommend http://gis.stackexchange.com instead (we kept a cached copy as a reference). Find all questions tagged with "pgrouting" under http://gis.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/pgrouting

More information: http://www.pgrouting.org/support.html

New Release 1.05

There has been no new release of pgRouting library for a long time, though several bugs have been fixed in the meanwhile.

Release 1.05 doesn't contain any new features but is a bugfix release and a tag at the time of the migration to GitHub.

More information: http://www.pgrouting.org/download.html

New Fund-Raising

Maybe you have used pgRouting for your research project or for some commercial application or something else. Or maybe you’re planning to use pgRouting for your next project.

If you would like to support the pgRouting not only through community activity, but also provide some financial support, then feel free to make some donation.

More information: http://www.pgrouting.org/donate.html

Hoping you enjoy the new website and pgRouting!

If you have further questions or if you're looking for commercial support for pgRouting, feel free to contact Georepublic.

Georepublic at FOSS4G 2010 Japan in Tokyo and Osaka

Sat, 30 Oct 2010 07:41:51 +0000

2010 is also Georepublic's first year at the local FOSS4G conference in Japan. The 2-days conference + 1 day workshop will take place October 31st to November 2nd in Tokyo and November 5th, 6th and 8th (workshops) in Osaka.

More details in Japanese can be found on the OSGeo Japan website:

Tokyo FOSS4G 2010

Osaka FOSS4G 2010

Georepublic will continue the tradition of pgRouting workshops. In collaboration with Orkney we will offer the latest workshop, so if you're interested in routing with OpenStreetMap data, want to gain some experience with PostgreSQL and PostGIS, don't forget to sign up and bring your laptop! For people living in Tokyo the workshop will take place November 2nd in the afternoon, for people around Osaka come in the early evening of October 8th.

Aside the workshop Georepublic will present OpenVRP project and a pgRouting Lightning Talk.
When you're going to attend one or even both events, say hello and talk to us! We're looking forward to seeing you there!

gvSIG Association and Georepublic signed agreement of collaboration

Mon, 25 Oct 2010 05:44:53 +0000

gvSIG Association and Georepublic (Germany & Japan) signed agreement of collaboration, which goals are to spread the use of gvSIG and other geomatic software and to boost the software industry, specially for the small and the medium-sized enterprises, under the premises of collaboration and the shared knowledge.

About gvSIG Association

The "Association for the promotion of FOSS4G and the development of gvSIG", gvSIG Association, aims the sustainability of gvSIG project and the development of FOSS4G solutions.

Around democratic values and values of solidarity of the open source software the gvSIG Association promotes the development of a new business model based on cooperation and shared knowledge. Part of the benefits from these bussines activities will back into the gvSIG project.

The "Association for the promotion of FOSS4G and the development of gvSIG", gvSIG Association, aims the sustainability of gvSIG project and the development of FOSS4G solutions.

About Georepublic

Georepublic specializes in the development and marketing of IT solutions in the field of geographical information systems, (GIS) logistics and business intelligence based on open source software projects. One key activity is the support of the open source project pgRouting. This makes Georepublic to a designated specialists in web-based routing in general and its implementation in particular.

Read official announcement on gvSIG news page.

Georepublic is member of SilverStripe Developer Network

Wed, 20 Oct 2010 05:07:13 +0000

Georepublic uses the SilverStripe CMS for its own company website as well as for several projects. We can say that SilverStripe is our favorite content management system, because it gives us the freedom to efficiently build custom websites with enough flexibility for various needs.

SilverStripe CMS is easy for both developers and content authors to work with:

Edit content with ease
Build it simple or build it complex
Design freedom
Get your workflow in order
Integrate well with open technologies

Georepublic joined the SilverStripe Developer Network to show our support for this open source project. If you need professional help to build your own CMS, feel free to contact us.

Intergeo 2010 Review

Thu, 14 Oct 2010 06:20:59 +0000

Until this year I didn't have the opportunity to attend an Intergeo 2010 fair, but I had heard about it since my university days. Staying in Germany at the time of the exhibition I got involved with OSGeo Park, organized by FOSSGIS e.V., the German representative of OSGeo Foundation and OpenStreetMap.

OSGeo projects as well as commercial service providers shared a wide exhibition area, which was planned and organized mainly through mailing list and wiki. During the three days GIS fair a quite impressive number of ongoing presentations were held at OSGeo Park, and most of the time the presentation theater was filled with visitors, who could pick some free coffee and cookies at the OSGeo bar and listen to FOSS4G related topics.

We (Lars Lingner, Astrid Emde and me) tried to get a localized German version of the latest OSGeo LiveDVD ready for Intergeo, but underestimated the time required by the DVD recording company, so we finally handed out the FOSS4G version.

Together with a few hundred leftover LiveDVD's from the previous FOSSGIS conference, more than 1000 DVD's were handed out to visitors of the OSGeo Park.

During the three days I had many interesting talks with visitors of the OSGeo Park about OSGeo software in general and PostGIS/pgRouting and OpenVRP in particular. It was great to have been there!

I want to thank everyone, who made the OSGeo Park at Intergeo happen. Hope to be able to attend again in 2011!

More photos on Flickr.

第6回ジオメディアサミットでOpenVRPの紹介をしてきました

Sat, 25 Sep 2010 01:19:50 +0000

9月20日に行われた、第6回ジオメディアサミット in G空間EXPO のライトニングトーク枠にて、OpenVRP に関するプレゼンテーションをさせていただきました。

5分間という短い間でしたが、OpenVRP の目的と、概要をお伝えできたと思います。
プレゼンテーションの補足として、いくつかの点を述べさせていたただきます。

DARP Solver

DARP (Dial-a-ride problem) とは、「出発地から目的地まで移動するための乗車リクエスト及び降車リクエストを持つ複数のユーザからの要望に対して、それを満たす配送ルートを計算する」という問題です。
OpenVRPプロジェクトでは、PostgreSQL/PostGIS 用の最短経路探索ライブラリである pgRouting に DARPを解くアルゴリズム( DARP Solver )を実装しています。

DARP Solver イメージ図

SQL インターフェースが利用可能

DARP Solver は PostGIS の拡張ライブラリになっていますので、例えば下記のようなSQL文で経路を計算することが可能です。

SELECT b.*, a.id, a.order_id, vehicle_id, pick_up,
    to_char(at,'YYYY-MM-DD HH24:MI:SS'::text) AS at
    FROM darp(
     'SELECT * FROM darp_orders
                      WHERE depot_id IN (0,5)',
     'SELECT * FROM darp_vehicles
                      WHERE depot_id = 5',
     'SELECT * FROM distances' ) a
  LEFT JOIN (
     SELECT * FROM darp_report
                  WHERE depot_id IN (0,5)) AS b
      ON (a.order_id = b.id);

OpenVRP Engine

上の DARP Solver の機能をRESTfulなWebAPI経由でアクセスするようにラッピングしたものが OpenVRP Engine です。車両情報、オーダー情報、拠点情報を入力し、トリップ情報（ルートとスケジュールが示されたもの）を出力することができます。出力は、JSON形式やKML形式など、複数の形式で取り出すことができます。

OpenVRP Engine 概要

OpenVRPユースケース

OpenVRPを使うユースケースとして、オンデマンドバスや配送サービス、送迎サービス、シェアドタクシー、カーシェアリングなどが考えられます。興味のある方がおりましたら、是非コンタクトページよりご連絡ください。

OpenVRP ユースケース

当日利用したスライドはこちらにあります。

https://docs.google.com/present/view?id=d5cjtn5_111dgz6vwhb

OpenVRP は現在開発中で、ソースコードは、近日リリース予定です。詳細について知りたい方は、 OpenVRP Project website をご確認いただくか、 contact us にてお問い合わせください。OpenVRPのTwitterアカウントをフォローしていただくと、最新情報を知ることができます。 http://twitter.com/openvrp

FOSS4G 2010 Review

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 16:21:12 +0000

FOSS4G 2010 was a great event and the people of Georepublic spent a pleasant time in Barcelona. We stayed in an apartment in downtown Barcelona close to Plaça Catalunya and enjoyed the conference as well as the evening program.

Photo: FOSS4G venue in Barcelona

The brand-new pgRouting workshop had a large audience and it was a pleasure to present this year with Frederic Junod from Camptocamp. Thanks a lot to the organizers of the workshop days, especially to Oscar Fonts, who did a really great job!
The workshop is now available on the OSGeo LiveDVD as well as an easy to install package for Ubuntu users. Just add the Georepublic Launchpad Repository and you will automatically retrieve the latest updates.

The pgRouting presentation room was packed with people and if you have missed the presentation or couldn't watch the slides, then take a look at the previous post.
Great news for the pgRouting community! At the "Code Sprint" day the PostGIS team met and talked about the future of PostGIS. If the PostGIS and pgRouting PSC agree, then pgRouting will become part of PostGIS.
We saw many presentations mentioning pgRouting, a couple of posters in the poster session presented projects with pgRouting. We're happy to see that such a small project is useful for many people around the world and attracts so much attention.

Photo: LiveDVD code sprinting

Also at the code sprint day a group of Germans and Japanese (photo) started with localization of the OSGeo LiveDVD. Even if we just had a few hours of work, it was a perfect start and we could set the base for supporting multiple languages for future releases. Thank you to everyone who helped to get this started!

Georepublic was glad to be able to present "OpenVRP" in the poster session. Despite the project is in the very beginning, we could gather many new ideas through discussions with the FOSS4G community. We hope to be able to present you more in the near future. Stay tuned!

Photo: David Dye, an artist from Florida, and Rina from Georepublic at the party in the Black Sheep

Georepublic enjoyed to see again many "old" friends and meet many new people for the first time. The parties after the conference were fun as every year. FOSS4G conferences are always a great event and a highlight of the year! We're looking forward very much to the next FOSS4G conference in Denver. See you again in 2011!

pgRouting presentation of FOSS4G in Barcelona online

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 09:57:53 +0000

If you missed "Shortest Path Search for Real Road Networks with pgRouting" presentation or if you want to watch it again, here are the slides of our presentation at FOSS4G 2010 in Barcelona:

Georepublic presenting at FOSS4G in Barcelona

Sat, 07 Aug 2010 10:00:00 +0000

This year's OSGeo main event, the FOSS4G 2010 in Barcelona, is just one month ahead and blogs are filling up with articles of people being excited to attend the conference.

Georepublic will be there for the first time and this is not a big surprise, because the company is less than one year old. Nevertheless Georepublic will have 100% of their team attending the conference! I think that's worth to mention. And even if you won't find us on the sponsors list yet, we contributed many hours in projects like pgRouting and OSGeo Live DVD.

Georepublic already starts with a workshop on Tuesday morning. Together with Frederic from Camptocamp we made this year's pgRouting workshop even better with pretty manual and GeoExt sample application. Our workshop is already fully booked for many weeks and it made us very happy and proud to see that it was the most popular one.

Here a list of where you can meet us at the conference:

Workshop: FOSS4G routing with pgRouting tools, OpenStreetMap road data and GeoExt
Presentation: Shortest path search for real road networks with pgRouting
Poster session: Solving the dial-a-ride problem with pgRouting

We will be around the venue during the conference, listening to presentations and talking with other developers. Not to forget the "night program" in the pubs of Barcelona. Come and say "hi" if you see us.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=tvCCrxsN0yYUop--VI2xmbA&single=true&gid=0&output=html

Семинар «Внедрение СПО на предприятиях»

Tue, 23 Mar 2010 06:07:35 +0000

Силами Georepublic (то есть меня в данном случае), АНО «Сибирский институт повышения квалификации» (Росатом) и местного Линукс-сообщества с 16 по 18 марта в Новосибирске был проведен семинар «Внедрение СПО на предприятиях».

Несмотря на небольшую аудиторию (в семинаре приняло участие около 15 человек), через анонимные анкеты, заполненные слушателями, были получены весьма положительные отзывы.

Основной моей задачей была систематизация знаний и представлений участников об СПО, где-то даже развеяние сложившихся мифов и стереотипов. И эту задачу я, как мне кажется, выполнил.

Но самое главное то, что люди встретились лицом к лицу, увидели, что их проблемы и потребности во многом схожи, начали кооперироваться, устанавливать горизонтальные связи.

Хочется надеяться, что такие семинары станут регулярными и будут привлекать все больше и больше участников.

Я хочу поблагодарить всех, принявших участие в семинаре, а так же тех, кто обеспечил его проведение.

Google Summer of Code 2010 with pgRouting

Tue, 23 Mar 2010 03:30:04 +0000

OSGeo has been accepted as mentoring organization for the Google Summer of Code 2010 program. This program provides funding for students to work on open source projects under the support of experienced mentors. The projects participating through OSGeo include GDAL, GRASS, Mapbender, Quantum GIS, uDig, OpenJUMP, deegree, OSSIM, MapWindow, but also pgRouting is on-board through the OpenRouter initiative.

Students interested in participating can find more information on OSGeo project ideas at: http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Google_Summer_of_Code_2010_Ideas

If you're interested in a pgRouting related project, take a look at the OpenRouter 2010 SoC deas page: http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/OpenRouter_2010_SOC_Ideas

We're looking forward to hear from you!

Genetic Algorithms Fun

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 02:07:02 +0000

I have something to say for those of you who don't believe in the Darwin's Theory of Evolution - evolution just works!

I mean it really works. One can get perfect and exact solution of a problem from an ugly set of numbers which doesn't make any sense.

Here is the perfect and simple example of this:

(more info about this project is here)

See? It goes almost directly to a goal, all you need is to have one (here we can speculate if God has a goal).

To make evolution work we need an information which describes a creature - an information we can modify and pass to another generations. Mother Nature made it for us - things we call 'genes'. And as long as we copy everything from the nature, we just copied this perfect approach also to solve for example NP-hard problems. And we call it Genetic Algorithms (or GA).

We used GA in pgRouting before for solving Travelling Salesperson Problem (or TSP), and we used very nice and good working GAUL library for this. And it worked like a charm!

Now we are facing another challenge - to extend pgRouting by adding the Vehicle Routing Problem (or VRP) solver using GA. SO, this is kind of an announcement about what is cooking now at Georepublic's kitchen. I just wanted you to share my excitement about GA and thank Kristin Berg Bergvinsdottir for her theses dedicated to this problem and its solution.

OCU Incubator launch Party

Wed, 24 Feb 2010 09:18:00 +0000

Georepublic and Applied Technology Co. Ltd. will hold an OCU Incubator launch Party on March 2nd at the Media Center of Osaka City University.

The program will start with some presentations at 4:30 PM and will end with a nice party, we hope. So come to our event and meet with Osaka City University people, Kansai OSGeo community members and the people of Georepublic!

Call for pgRouting Project Steering Committee

Sun, 21 Feb 2010 04:07:00 +0000

Georepublic made a call for establishing a Project Steering Committee for pgRouting. We want to boost project activity and make it easier for others to join and influence pgRouting development.
Looking at successful OSGeo projects we think that it should become easier to participate for everyone, and decisions should be made more transparent.

We believe that having a PSC would be the initial step for pgRouting to become more "open", to handle project management properly, to improve code quality, to hopefully extend functionality and of course to attract more developers and users.

To start an initial Project Steering Committee we're now looking for candidates.
Since the number of people who have been involved so far is rather small, we welcome anyone who has strong interest and/or motivation to participate.

If any other individuals/companies are interested, please raise your voice now!

OSGeo Code Sprint 2010 in New York

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 17:00:00 +0000

From tomorrow the Code Sprint 2010 in New York will take place and Jeff McKenna and Georepublic are going to "take part". Not really by travelling to New York in person but via IRC and webcam. We want to use the opportunity to work intensively on pgRouting for a few days, and to clean up the project page and do some community work.

The idea of a "remote code sprint" came originally from Jeff, who would have liked to attend the event in New York but currently has some work to do at the Osaka City University in Japan with translating Mapserver and OSGeo4W documents.

More news about the remote sprint in the following days.

Georepublic moves into Osaka City University Incubator

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 16:00:00 +0000

Georepublic has moved this week to the new office in the Business Incubator of the Osaka City University.
The office is not very large but pleasantly quiet, and the technical facilities of the university especially the internet connectivity are excellent. Venkatesh Raghavan and others from the OSGeo community are just a few buildings away.

Our new address and contact details are:

〒558-8585
OCU Incubator, Sugimoto 3-3-138,
Sumiyoshi-ku, Osaka
Japan

Tel: +81 (03) 4578 9352
Fax: +81 (03) 3374 0291
VoIP: +49 (089) 4161 7698 - 3
E-mail: osaka@georepublic.co.jp

More photos at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dkastl/sets/72157623463349966/