TIGER is Dead, Long Live the Shapefile!

It looks like the Census Bureau is switching from their TIGER format, to ESRI shapefiles and a TIGER/GML (GML = Geographic Markup Language), in addition to web services for all future offerings.

TIGER/Line files — End of an Era

With the Census Bureau now directly publishing shapefiles, its likely the shapefile format will be around for a long time.

Going to Developers Summit?

Are you going to the ESRI Developers Summit? I'm not, but I know a few people that are. Perhaps the Wisconsin community should try to meet up while there. Post a comment, to suggest a meeting place and time.

Hope to see you at WLIA

I haven't mentioned the WLIA conference because I figured everyone who reads this blogs already knows about it. If I'm wrong, WLIA (Wisconsin Land Information Association) is holding their annual conference next week. This is Wisconsin's premier GIS conference.

DS Map Book

After doing a complete uninstall of 9.1 and installing 9.2, I'm wondering - Why is the DS Map Book not part of the core software installation? The sample has been around a long time (8.1.x ish?).

To me the Map Book capabilities are basic functions of the software. I've found that most people who use ArcMap on a regular basis end up install Map Book. This is even more impressive because doing a search on the knowledge base won't link you to the download, (but there are plenty of discussion forums mentioning it). You'll find it only by searching on EDN.