GeoSurf vs. QGIS

• Well-suited for testing and demonstrating any product on any device for worldwide compliance.
• Can be used for latency testing, but there are probably better solutions available.
• Probably not as well suited for privacy; could be used like Private Internet Access, but I haven't seen general adoption of GeoSurf for that purpose. This would not help with my role at Disney though.

Incentivized

Well suited:

• To build beautiful and dynamic maps quickly.
• To conduct quantitative and qualitative analyses.
• To work cross-platform, as both the Windows version and the Linux version are identical in appearance and available resources.

Less appropriate:

• To use and import files from proprietary software such as ArcGIS and AutoCAD.

Incentivized

• Simulate network requests from different parts of the world in order to see how our tech performs from different regions.
• Test how our system behaves with when operated from client devices that identify as from different world regions.
• Test security and fraud prevention systems that handle global IP ranges differently.
• Operate web crawlers anonymously and legally.

Incentivized

• QGIS is free and very easy to install, and no license is required. Not having to deal with licensing issues has saved me considerable time and frustration.
• The QGIS help community is very active, and it is easy to find answers. Although QGIS does not offer support in the way that ArcMap does, I was always able to google my question and find either a tutorial or website that solved my problem.
• QGIS seems to crash less often than ArcMap. It is super annoying to have a program crash when you are in the middle of a project, but I have not had any issues with QGIS. Also, QGIS is updated frequently.

Incentivized

• There is no iOS app which is a big gap and we need an alternative product for such devices.
• Our subscriptions is with shared and limited bandwidth, some users forget to turn off GeoSurf when they are done with the proxy thus incurring unnecessary costs. Would be good to have some reality checks implemented to avoid unintended long session.
• The Android interface is little outdated, although it's still simple and quick to use. I'd prefer slightly more modern design, including usage statistics.

Incentivized

• QGIS is hard to use for beginners. A better tutorial and clearer online tutorials could improve this.
• Labeling interface is overly complicated. Allowing users to manually add labels to relevant items could be helpful.
• QGIS should have more "wizards" that can easily import common data points (median income, population density, etc) and cross tabulate that with other categories easily from uploaded data.

Incentivized

It has become critical to my business.

Easy to use and has a browser add-on

Incentivized

I wasn't a GIS user at all when I started using QGIS, nor did I have any background working with data in anything other than Excel, and as a result, I struggled quite a lot in the beginning (it's not quite Google Maps). But having said that, I haven't come across anything that I couldn't do with a little help from the online community. I've done complex spatial analyses on large datasets of metropolitan cities, designed custom multi-page pdf reports that automatically cycle through different areas of an area, etc.

And the GIS staff that I've appointed, after their initial resistance, took to the tool like a fish to water, and I haven't heard them complain after starting to use the tool for a week or two.

But if you're new to GIS, be patient and invest some time to learn how to use the tool. It is absolutely worth it.

Incentivized

Never had a problem.

Excellent speed on all of the proxies I have used.

They are super responsive and helpful.

Incentivized

Even though there is a no dedicated support team for QGIS (or at least we are not aware of it), there is a huge online community and a large number of forums catering to every question you may have regarding any particular functionality of QGIS. So, you have a lot of help available but you will have to sift through it on the web.

Incentivized

The program is simple to understand.

I have not had occasion to use any other products similar to GeoSurf, but have been very satisfied with the power, speed, and reliability that GeoSurf offers, and based on that experience would tend to return to GeoSurf should the need come up to rely on similar features in the future

Incentivized

QGIS is open source and freely available for Windows and Mac iOS Geographic Information System Software. QGIS is highly customizable as per project requirements and different application usage. QGIS has ample tools and plugins that are useful for the analysis of raster and vector data. It also supports GRASS, GDAL, and SAGA tools.

Incentivized

• Easy to find mistakes that would have cost a lot had they gone unnoticed.

• We can ingest data in any format, and convert it to industry-standard spatial files for hosting on our online GIS platform.
• Many client projects require us to analyze and understand data before we can report on it.
• Because QGIS is free, and the learning curve is negligible for bright GIS technicians, the ROI is practically infinite because the investment is basically zero.

Incentivized