Good morning once again from San Diego!

I’m well rested this morning after yesterday's long day of plenary sessions and opening day announcements from Jack Dangermond and the ESRI executive staff. I was fortunate enough to have “accidentally” seated myself in the VIP section (really!) and was never asked to leave, which was nice...

Anyway, it was great because I spent the day sitting beside Mr. and Mrs. Roger Tomlinson (yes, the father of GIS!) as well as directors and CEOs from the USGS and the National Geographic Society.

The plenary began with Jack Dangermond addressing us (see the latest slideshow pictorial) and reiterating that there were some 9600 of us in attendance, representing over 86 countries.

Jack set the tone for the day by emphatically stating that “..we are building a global network of people” and that the purpose of the conference is to build and create relationships and friendships.

Jack then introduced us to his vision for the new millennium including a couple of big announcements regarding the reorganization of the ESRI product suite. If you remember, yesterday I mentioned that I was curious what the focus of this years conference would be.

Well, it appears that this year’s BIG hype is going to be the newly created geography network, and the future product direction, which will see a new family of products known as ArcGIS.

So what is ArcGIS?

It appears that ArcGIS is a series of 3 thin clients, ArcView GIS 8.1, ArcInfo Editor and ArcInfo 8.1 with all having the same user interface and sharing parts of the same applications, the same development environment, extensions, and data models. The products are to be redeployed in a "single" environment, and done in a way that developers will be able to use component technologies.

Users are likely to be confused with the announcement that ArcView will jump from a 3.x series to a 8.x series. Much like last year, all of these products are planned to be released in the future while ArcInfo 8.1 beta 1 will be available next week with final shipping hopefully by the end of the year.

Given the delay that users have experienced in the recent past while waiting for product releases (ArcIMS 3 and ArcInfo 8 an example) we won’t be holding our breath for a firm release date.

Clint Brown, ESRI director of software development later went through ESRI’s list of what GIS users need and what ESRI has considered in the latest software releases:

• support for existing data
• strong data models
• ease of use
• one repository for all data
• data model for any size project
• strong data management
• open access
• share data openly
• topology and strong editing capabilities
• use of standard data model

The day continued with detailed presentations and real time displays of ArcInfo, ArcEdit, ArcPad, and ArcIMS.

An ESRI lifetime achievement award was presented to Dr. Philip Lewis, notable landscape architect and lecturer out of the University of Wisconsin and mentor of Jack Dangermond.

I found him to be very captivating, particularly since my most memorable mentor from College was also an urban planner and vocal advocate of GIS in urban and political decision making (Dr. Larry McCaan of the University of Victoria, B.C.).

Pamela Johnson, deputy director of the National Partnership for Reinventing Government presented six Hammer Awards to ESRI and six teams from the National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) Community Demonstration Project.

Each recipient had developed projects that realized the benefits possible through expanded cross sharing of geographic information between federal and local agencies.

The Hammer Awards are awarded by United States Vice President Al Gore to agencies that find ways to make government work better, cost less, and get results.

My favorite award presentation was made to Lynne Malone and three of her seventh and eighth grade geography students from Barrington Middle School in Rhode Island.

They were awarded a copy of ArcPad and a Pocket-PC in recognition of their participation in the ESRI K-12 initiative.

I always find it very inspirational when I meet people that have such a positive impact and influence on children.

Luckily, I had a chance to talk to Mrs. Malone one on one after the presentation. She was very humble and seemed quite overwhelmed with the attention that her and the kids were receiving. Also, I was pleased to find out that she’s a very eager and daily reader of SpatialNews.com!

The day’s speeches concluded with a keynote address from Dr. Charles Groat, director of the USGS.

Dr. Groat conveyed his enthusiasm for the role that GIS has played in getting public and private industries to work together. He also bally-hooed the positive effect this has had in areas such as disaster planning and emergency response.

He noted that it is vital that standards such as those established by the FGDC, NSDI, and the OGC must be followed if we [GIS professionals] are to work together in the future.

He feels that the biggest challenge that lies ahead is dealing with urban development and predicting change that will most certainly occur in urban areas.

I concluded my long day by walking around the Map Gallery and of course, the opening day reception & cocktail party.

I must admit, however, that I was rather tired by this time, but did manage to look at some of the several hundred posters on display. I’ll definitely be going back for another look, particularly at the webmapping display, which is a nice new addition for this year.

Right now I am on my way to some lectures, which is a difficult choice to make since there are roughly 20-30 presentations going on at any given time!

Also, I have several nice interviews lined up throughout the week. One of the most exciting will be a chat with Roger Tomlinson, which I’ve arranged for tomorrow morning.

In the meantime I think I’ll concentrate on some of the mobile mapping products and wireless applications, of which there are many.

Later today, there is an official press conference concerning the Geography Network.

The Geography Network is definitely the focus for the ESRI executives, however, I’ve yet to see the same enthusiasm from the conference attendees… I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Some of my personal observations: