Workflows Drive Everything

One thing about using a “cloud based” data store is that you have to leave your tools to start using it. This means that you break any work-flows you are in and lets be honest, the last thing you want to happen when you are being productive is to head to the internet.

Seriously though, being able to stay in your content creation tools and work with SaaS based content management is a great idea. The reality of the situation is that there hasn’t been any good tools to accomplish this yet.

Enter WeoGeo Tools

Today we are releasing the first of our planned content creation tools that bring the SaaS WeoGeo Library and WeoGeo Market as well as any WeoGeo Library Appliances to ArcGIS Desktop users. With WeoGeo Tools for ArcGIS you can connect to these libraries and discover datasets in your area of interest. Inside ArcMap this area of interest is defined by your view window. So if you’ve got a project you are working on and want to see what is available in your work area, WeoGeo Tools takes your extents and returns only datasets in that region.

Text-based Search is Wrong for Geo-Content

WeoGeo has worked hard at changing the way we search for geospatial datasets. Rather than requiring users to type in keywords or other text search terms into a search query, we allow users to discover data via maps. You can see this in our WeoGeo Market. What is natural though about content creation tools like ArcGIS Desktop is that your canvas is a map. Why not take that bounding box extent and return data in that area? Our MapRank technology also returns datasets that best match your zoom level (if you are zoomed into a neighborhood you’ll get those datasets listed first and likewise if you are at the country level, you’ll get those datasets before neighborhood ones.

Uploading From Inside ArcGIS Desktop

Getting your content up to your Library or the Market should be just as easy. Why do you have to save out your data and then open your web browser and then proceed to fill out data forms and finally upload? Yep, that is what we call a workflow killer. With WeoGeo Tools for ArcGIS, ESRI users can easily upload datasets from within ArcMap with just a click of a button. Everything is handled for you. Just highlight the dataset in your layers list and click the upload to WeoGeo button.

Download WeoGeo Tools for ArcGIS

I encourage everyone to download WeoGeo Tools for ArcGIS and give it a shot. You can browse the WeoGeo Market without having to have an account so you can see how easy it is to bring data in. If you want to try out our Library, we offer free Library tiers and 30 day trials for the rest. Just use signup code: weogeolib5769. Lastly if you need any help, don’t hesitate to contact us.

This is our first release of WeoGeo Tools for ArcGIS and we will continue to work hard on improving it, so any feedback is welcomed. We are also working at more WeoGeo Tools for other GIS software packages. You can also create your own versions of WeoGeo Tools for your own software packages by using our open APIs.

Visit Us at the FedUC

If you are at the 2010 ESRI Federal User Conference, feel free to drop by out booth (#141) and get a full demo of WeoGeo Tools for ArcGIS as well as all our SaaS and appliance products.