The Internet will never take off because my 14.4 modem ties up my phone line

Published Wednesday, January 30, 2008

I’m an avid reader of James Fee’s popular GIS blog, and I’m sometimes tempted to weigh in with a comment, but then I wonder if instead it is best left to people wanting to vent. There have been some good discussions lately, so I decided to comment.

This is all reminiscent of everyone kvetching about ArcIMS 3.0 in the summer of 2001, before ArcIMS went on to be such a phenomenal success (overwhelming its flaws). Technology improves over time, yet so many people are ready to pass judgment before a given technology comes into its own. Or maybe we all just need a place to vent with our buddies, then get back to it.

by David Stevenson
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Comments

James Fee said on Thursday, January 31, 2008 8:40 AM

Well ArcIMS was completely rewritten after version 3.0 was arrived.  If that is what it takes for the WebADF to be successful then I'm all for it.

David Stevenson said on Thursday, January 31, 2008 9:50 AM

Yeah, whatever it takes.  ArcIMS continued to evolve and improve for many years, and people built better and better applications, hardly looking back.  It would be nice if software was perfect right out of the gate, but seldom is this the case.  9.2 is the first ADF release that harmonizes development across ESRI's server stack (and others like OGC) and I really question the wisdom of dismissing it this early in the game.

Mike said on Wednesday, February 13, 2008 2:13 PM

I'm OK with dismissing it for something better. Depite its problems and the user community's frustrations, is there something better on the market that has all the complex GIS functionality?

If all one is doing is creating a read-only map application, there are numerous ways to do it. However, if one is building an application that supports editing and GIS analysis, what are the alternatives?

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