PostGIS 2.0 og Raster

This article provides a short discussion of the development of free and open-source software for geospatial analysis (FOSS4G), focusing in particular on raster innovations in PostGIS 2.0. While many previous FOSS4G products had limited functionality as compared to expensive proprietary software alternatives, this has indeed changed. With the introduction of PostGIS 2.0, both vector and raster support are included and the documentation has been improved considerably. This article first introduces some of the major advantages and disadvantages with open-source software. Second, this article shows using spatial raster and vector data, examples of new functionality in PostGIS emphasizing aggregation from raster to vector. I conclude by arguing that FOSS4G has become a real contender to proprietary software alternatives.