International Software Testing Service Goes Live on Web

A new website that helps software developers and online services providers test and validate the compatibility of their Geographic Information Systems, was launched this week. The web site’s builders believe it will save software developers around the world hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in testing costs.

The website was built in Australia by local companies, Social Change Online and Sinclair Knight Merz, for a US-based industry association, the OpenGIS Consortium (OGC).

The CITE (Compliance and Interoperability Test and Evaluation) web site provides automated testing for compatibility with GIS software in use or being developed -- anywhere across the globe. The compatibility standards have been developed over the past 10 years by OGC.

Social Change Online CEO, Sean Kidney said: "Without these compatibility standards software developers and online service providers need to spend time and money modifying their systems every time that want to integrate a new piece of data or a new service If the standards are being complied with, they don't have to do this -- saving hundreds and thousands of dollars in effort.

"For both service suppliers and users, the CITE Web site is the easy way to check.

Mr. Kidney said the CITE web will also benefit Geographic Information System (GIS) software developers and vendors by allowing them to market their compliance in the marketplace.

GIS software is used in land development, environmental management, and many other mapping applications. It combines data from surveying and mapping, satellite photography and location directories, and turns it into information on maps for everyone from engineers and planners to restaurant-seekers and travellers.

"Most GIS users around the world want to know if the product they're buying meets OGC standards and specifications," Mr Kidney said.

"If products and services do comply CITE can give them compliance certification to reassure buyers," he said.

"Before CITE there was no objective way of independently verifying compliance against those standards, and anyone could claim it.

"CITE has solved that problem - it is a watershed in compliance testing.

"Testing on the CITE Website is free. But developers that also want to claim compliance in their sales literature have to submit their results for checking and, if they pass, pay a trademark licensing fee," Mr Kidney added.

The CITE site's owner, the OpenGIS Consortium (OGC), is an international industry consortium of more than 230 companies, government agencies and universities working to develop publicly available standards for mapping information on the Web.

The CITE project is sponsored by the European Union Satellite Centre (EUSC). The EUSC saw the benefit of using standards-based software, but they needed a way to ensure that its purchases of commercial off-the-shelf products met its standards compliance requirements.

Research had indicated that automated compliance tests developed by consensus were far more successful than those developed by a single organisation and later accredited by an outside firm.

The CITE initiative is part of OGC's Interoperability Program - a global, collaborative testing program that ensures geospatial software compatibility.

As well as Social Change Online and Sinclair Knight Merz in Australia, other teams involved in the Project include: The Open Group (UK); Galdos Systems (Canada); Northrop Grumman Information Technology TASC (US); and a team of The Open Planning Project (US), The Centre for Computational Geography at the University of Leeds (UK), lat/lon (Germany), National Center for Atmospheric Research (US), Universitat Jaume I (Spain), Intergraph (US), and IONIC Software (Belgium).

"Social Change Online's involvement in the CITE Project reinforces its reputation as a leading web development firm, not only because of its technical capability, products and market knowledge, but also because we are able to understand our clients' needs," Mr Kidney said.

As well as building large web sites for public sector clients, Social Change Online develops and supplies portal builder software for geo-spatial web sites.