ESRI Developer Summit 2009

This year ESRI Developer Summit will be held from 23rd -26th March in Palm Springs. If you are new to ESRI developers community here is what this is all about.

The Developer Summit is dedicated to GIS, mapping, and spatial developers. This event exists to give you access to the help you need and the ideas you crave, from detailed technical presentations led by ESRI's development team to one-on-one meetings with ESRI staff representing all areas of the ArcGIS platform. Join your fellow developers and learn how to build and deploy better solutions in your job.

As with all ESRI conferences I have attended in past this will be a great opportunity to get face to face with ESRI developers and other fellow developers from all over the world.

Site does not have too many details about technical sessions but you will be exposed to ArcGIS 9.3.1. features and see a glimpse at 9.4 as presented by it's developers.

Keynote speaker at the Summit will be David Chappell from Chappel & Associates. Here is a brief about David.

Chappell has given the keynote address at events worldwide including the Software Development West Conference and several Microsoft-oriented events including Tech-Ed. His seminars have been attended by thousands of developers, architects, and decision makers. Chappell’s books grace the shelves of developers across the globe and have been used in courses at MIT, ETH Zurich, and other institutions—he’s also series editor for Addison-Wesley’s award-winning Independent Technology Guides and a regular columnist for several publications.


In his consulting practice, Chappell has helped clients including Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Microsoft, Stanford University, and Target Corporation adopt new technologies, market new products, train their sales staff, and create business plans. His comments have appeared in The New York Times, CNN.com, and many other publications.

No doubt this will be another great event!

New features in upcoming ArcGIS 9.3.1

ESRI is working on new version of ArcGIS, 9.3.1 and it should be available in second quarter of this year. At the moments there are some new features announced but I'm sure there will be a lot more.

So far here are new features:

High performance dynamic map publishing
This will allow faster map drawing that outperforms equivalent ArcIMS service and shorten map caching time. New "Map service publishing" toolbar can be used to review MXD for errors, unsupported content, provide estimate of rendering time and save in new format.


New layer sharing options
Layer files will be packed with data (optional) so they can be e-mailed, shared or used with ArcGIS Online.


Enhanced support for Java
Java developers will be able to extend ArcObjects framework and create native custom geoprocessing tools, server object extensions, class extensions, custom renderers, etc. Also, support for integration with Eclipse IDE is added.


Easy to migrate
Finally, upgrading does not require uninstall of ArcGIS 9.3. In addition to this there are no changes to geodatabase and map document formats.

Full info is available here.

ArcGIS Flex API on esritv

If you are an ArcGIS Server developer and you are considering utilizing Flex API but not sure how have a look at this new video on esritv channel on YouTube. The video is called "ArcGIS API for Flex, Basics for Developers".

It runs for 6'15" and covers basics from where to download it from, overview of documentation including API reference, samples that are included, etc. Be sure to check the web resources under Community tab  which includes Code Gallery and access to Flex API forums directly.

And now without further ado here is the video.

Feedburner moving to Google

In 2007 Google has acquired FeedBurner and behind the scenes FeedBurner started moving technology, applications, etc to Google servers and data centres. Now they are moving user accounts over to Google. If you have a Google account that it can be very easy. There is a wizard to move your account from FeedBurner. You can keep the transfer page opened and wait for it to finish or check a progress of the transfer later on.

To log on to your moved feeds you have to change URL to http://feedburner.google.com/ and log on with your Google credentials.

As a result of this move you will notice that there is no more Visitors section on your Feedburner Analyze page. Below is a sample of the page.

I haven't tested everything yet so if you find any problems with reading feed from this blog I would appreciate any feedback. You can post a comment or send me an e-mail to ZergOne@gmail.com.

Free LIDAR viewer

It is always nice to get something useful for free. Sometimes it is data, sometimes it is an application. QCoherenet is well known for its product LP360. At least if you are working with LIDAR data. They made a free viewer for LIDAR or LAS files.

Here is what LP Viewer does:

LP Viewer is a free standalone viewer (Windows OS) that provides unlimited file loading/access, on-the-fly tinning and contouring, our custom viewing toggles built specifically for LiDAR, importing ASCII, 2D, 3D, and profile visualization. As with all of our products, an entire city, county, or consortium's full LiDAR dataset can be loaded into LP Viewer.

There is a little catch. Viewer is part of the LP360 product evaluation. Evaluation period is 30 days and after that you have LP Viewer to keep and use. After all, this is not a bad thing - you get to use full product for a month and still have free viewer (and not just a viewer).

Full details about the Viewer are available here and evaluation version can be downloaded after registration on this page.