Central to these services will be an open source Web authoring environment developed by DM Solutions Group that will be maintained within the MapGuide Open Source project.

The new Web authoring environment will allow users to load and style their GIS data for MapGuide and will act as the default interface to MapGuide Open Source. This is a critical component for growing adoption and long term sustainability of the open source project. This environment will be available to the MapGuide Open Source community by the end of June 2006.

DM Solutions Group has developed a successful business model around custom solutions delivery, professional services, and sale of related products for MapServer through its rich commitment to the open source project. The company envisions growing its success by emulating this model with the new MapGuide Open Source project.

“Today’s announcement represents just the beginning of our involvement in this important project” said Dave McIlhagga, president of DM Solutions Group. “MapGuide Open Source is a very viable web mapping solution for our customers. Just like MapServer, users of MapGuide Open Source require various forms of professional support – services we focus on providing. At the same time, this provides more choice for our existing customer base.”

In addition to the company’s professional services and custom solutions delivery, DM Solutions Group plans to expand its data product offerings to include map products for MapGuide Open Source and Autodesk MapGuide this summer.

Autodesk MapGuide software became an open source project this winter following the announcement by Autodesk to release the code for its next generation of web mapping technology to the open source community.

“We are delighted to see the DM Solutions Group development team becoming a critical part of the MapGuide Open Source project,” said Gary Lang, vice president of engineering for Autodesk’s Infrastructure Solutions Division. “Having more developers working on this project will ensure the technology continues to improve and innovate at a faster rate than could be accomplished by any company alone.”

MapGuide Open Source is available for download at the Open Source GeoSpatial (OSGeo) Foundation website at: www.osgeo.org

About DM Solutions Group Inc.

DM Solutions Group Inc. is a leader in the open source Web mapping community, the primary corporate developer and maintainer of MapServer – and a key contributor to MapGuide Open Source. Building on its open source success, DM Solutions Group focuses on custom solutions delivery, professional services, hosted online mapping services, and value-added products and solutions for users of open source web mapping technologies, and a broad range of vertical markets.

About MapGuide Open Source

MapGuide Open Source is an active open source project hosted by the Open Source Geospatial Foundation (www.osgeo.org). The Open Source Geospatial Foundation, or OSGeo, is a not-for-profit organization whose mission is to support and promote the collaborative development of open geospatial technologies and data. The foundation provides financial, organizational, and legal support to the broader open source geospatial community. It also serves as an independent legal entity to which community members can contribute code, funding and other resources, secure in the knowledge that their contributions will be maintained for public benefit. OSGeo also serves as an outreach and advocacy organization for the open source geospatial community, and provides a common forum and shared infrastructure for improving cross-project collaboration. The foundation's projects are all freely available and useable under OSI-certified open source licenses.

Autodesk and Autodesk MapGuide are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., in the USA and/or other countries.