Abstract
Open geospatial data and tools are an increasingly important paradigm offering the opportunity to promote the democratization of geographical information, the transparency of governments and institutions, as well as social, economic and environmental opportunities. During the past decade, developments in the area of open geospatial data and open-source geospatial software have greatly improved. Many parts of the research community believe that combining free and open software, open data, as well as open standards, leads to the creation of a sustainable ecosystem to accelerate new discoveries to help solve global cross-disciplinary societal challenges, from climate change mitigation to sustainable cities. The consistent prevalence of open source GIS studies motivated this thematic collection. The contributions are divided into two main categories. In the first category, seven concrete studies on open-source tools and technologies for urban and environmental studies are briefly presented. Each one has been implemented for and applied to a certain use case, and at the same time it may be applied to other use cases due to the reproducibility nature of open source software. The second category presents and discusses the usability of open source geospatial solutions for laser scanning technology and its applications.
Highlights
Open-source GIS has consistently and effectively improved during the past decade [1]
Governments and stakeholders from academia and industry actively participate in open geospatial data, software and standards initiatives and support related organizations such as the Open Source Geospatial foundation (OSGeo)
Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) consistently design and test open standards which are at the core of major infrastructures such as the European Union’s INSPIRE Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI)
Summary
Open-source GIS has consistently and effectively improved during the past decade [1]. Concrete projects based on open geospatial data and software have significant and measurable impact on communities, including their economy, political life, environment, health, transportation, and many other areas [4]. While such projects provide their own benefits, the data and software developed by these projects are often reused beyond the original plans, reflecting the real potential of Open Source GIS and its value. The contributions of this collection are divided into two main categories. The second category presents and discusses the usability of open-source geospatial solutions for Earth Remote Sensing applications
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