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I'm looking for a free and reasonably licensed alternative to ArcGIS (or maybe just ArcGIS server). I'm quite new to GIS, so I'll state some of the things I want to be able to do and you can tell me what alternatives are out there. I need to be able to convert from GML or Shapefile format to some GIS database format, (I bet I cant do this with GDAL/OGR but I'm not sure). And then I want to be able to programmatically query the database for assets of certain types within specified bounds. For instance, I would like to find all roads within a lat/long box and extract their names and their polyline representations.

At this point I am only interested in a programmatic API. I'm not interested in anything with a GUI.

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There are already similar questions to this one on the site. gis.stackexchange.com/questions/24/… gis.stackexchange.com/questions/187/… – Zachary Aug 23 '10 at 16:44
those questions are related but not similar. John is looking for a framework for GIS software development not an end user product, and Open Source is not a requirement. – matt wilkie♦ Aug 23 '10 at 17:56
John I recommend adding "for software development" or similar to the subject line to emphasize the "no GUIs please" aspect of the question. – matt wilkie♦ Aug 23 '10 at 18:12
Understood. The reason I pointed them out is to avoid bogging the site down with variations of the same questions. – Zachary Aug 23 '10 at 18:20

4 Answers

up vote 6 down vote accepted

OGR can convert GML and/or shapefile to PostGIS, SpatiaLite and a number of other datastores, and has a well developed API. Both postgis and spatialite can support the kind of query you want, though I personally have not done so (actually depending on the details of your queries, you may be able to do all of it in OGR).

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up vote 4 down vote

Based on your description, you will need the OGR library (to convert from GML/shape to your database) and a spatially enabled database (I would recommend PostGIS).

If you are happy with a raw database to query with SQL, that's all you need. There are plenty of postgres utility libraries, and one for your programming language of choice.

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up vote 2 down vote

Free GIS Alternatives:

http://www.qgis.org/

http://udig.refractions.net/

http://www.openjump.org/

http://grass.itc.it/

Web GIS

http://mapserver.org/

http://geoserver.org/display/GEOS/Welcome

*Some require plugins or additional steps to incorporate your GIS requirements

Mapperz uses all of the above with Postgres (with Postgis) as the Spatial Database.

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the first three don't answer the question, "I'm not interested in anything with a GUI". – matt wilkie♦ Aug 23 '10 at 17:53
whups, sorry, I didn't notice the "no gui" requirement was added after your post. :) – matt wilkie♦ Aug 23 '10 at 18:13
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qgis can be compiled to your own spec with or WITHOUT a GUI if you so choose svn.osgeo.org/gdal/branches/1.4/gdal/ogr/ogrsf_frmts/gml/will convert your gml udig has a SDK again you can build your own from it udig.refractions.net/confluence/display/DEV/1+SDK+Quickstart OpenJump has too sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/jump-pilot/… hope it helps point you in the right direction. – Mapperz♦ Aug 23 '10 at 18:23
up vote 1 down vote

Take a look at TatukGIS it's not free but has a better licence model.

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