GvSIG

gvSIG is a multilingual, open source geographic information system (GIS) that can handle both vector and raster data. It features basic editing tools for the creation and maintenance of vector or raster spatial data on a variety of file formats, including remote data sources. gvSIG is being actively developed in Java by IVER Tecnologías under the GNU General Public License (GPL). Its name is an abbreviation that stands for Generalitat Valenciana, Sistema d'Informació Geogràfica.

gvSIG was started in 2003 when the Conselleria d'Infraestructures i Transports (CIT) of Valencian Community proposed the development of software for the management of geographic information. The private enterprise IVER Tecnologías won the proposal and is now developing the software together with the Generalitat Valenciana and the Jaume I University of Castellón.

Currently gvSIG runs on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X operating systems. It supports many open and proprietary standards of geospatial data. A plugin system allows for expandability and compliance with many standards of the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) making it compatible with many other GIS software and data.

Standards
gvSIG supports the following data formats:


 * Vector formats: shapefile, DXF, DGN, DWG
 * Raster formats: ECW, MrSID, JPEG, jp2, TIFF, geoTIFF, PNG, GIF

gvSIG is able to read remote data with Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards:
 * Web Map Service (WMS)
 * Web Feature Service (WFS)
 * Web Coverage Service (WCS)

gvSIG also offers support for remote data from ESRI’s ArcIMS. As of Feb/2008 there is also a plugin that adds support for ESRI's ArcSDE databases.

The WMS has been tested with MapServer, deegree and GeoServer; the WCS with MapServer; and the WFS with MapServer and GeoServer.

There are plugins available that enable gvSIG to read ERDAS IMG files and also connect to PostGIS and MySQL databases.

One new plugin lets you visualize and manage the free editable maps from the OpenStreetMap (OSM) project.

Sextante GIS has been ported to a plugin for gvSIG adding a host of raster and vector analysis functions in addition to gvSIG's impressive built-in vector analysis tools.