Here’s an attempt to create a simple taxonomy of the currently active and popular web mapping frameworks available. This covers web mapping that delivers a consumer-navigable geographic “slippy” map of raster and/or vector tiles containing bespoke geographic data.
| FRAMEWORKS | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
< < < EASY, costs, limited, quick
Flexible, Needs resources, time, HARD > > > |
||||||
| Ecosystems | Hosted Wrappers | Managed Wrappers | Managed APIs | Open Frameworks | Spatial Servers | Server Programming |
| Mapbox Studio
|
|
Google Maps Embed API
|
HERE Maps API for JavaScript
|
OpenLayers
|
MapServer
|
R (ggplot)
|
| Capabilities/Requirements of the above Frameworks | ||||||
| Data analysis | Data analysis | |||||
| Remote server dependency | Server with shell access required | |||||
| Web space required | ||||||
| Scripting knowledge required | Programming required | |||||
I will aim to update based on feedback and new discovery. This initial version is based on my own usages/experiences in the field, so it is quite possible there are some very obvious candidates I have missed.
Additionally (and with the some proviso as above) here’s a 2×2 table of file formats used in slippy and static web mapping, for vectors and rasters – the latter including attribute fields like UTF Grids. I am only including formats widely used in web mapping, rather than GIS in general.
| DATA SPECIFICATIONS & FILE FORMATS | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Static “WebGIS” | |||
| Raster | OGC WMS
GIF, JPG, PNG, (Geo)TIFF |
OGC WFS, GeoJSON, TopoJSON, KML, SVG
XML, SHP, JSON |
Vector |
| TMS, WMTS, XYZ, UTFGrid
GIF, PNG, JSON |
Mapbox Vector Tile Specification
JSON, PBF |
||
| Tiled “Slippy” | |||
2 replies on “Taxonomy of Web Mapping Frameworks and Formats”
Certainly needs KML as well as XMLin 2nd table IMHO. Web platforms could have Google Earth, maybe due a revamp soon? Google not saying of course
Thanks, yes that was a typo as it was in my original presentation – added in now.