Just a simple, dumb question…can ANYBODY provide the direct link to the GeoMedia suite of products?? It’s cheating if you have it bookmarked :-). I started at the Intergraph home page and after 15 minutes I’ve given up. Now…can anybody find a link to ArcView from the ESRI home page??? I did it in literally five seconds!
I even Googled GeoMedia. Both the GeoMedia5.com and GeoMedia6.0 links return 404 errors. In fact, I typed in “Intergraph GeoMedia” into Google. Of the first four links, the first three return a 404 error.
Sorry this post wasn’t too helpful. And honestly, I’m not try to slam Intergraph. However if I’m having a hard time navigating my way through the Intergaph web site, I can only imagine how hard it would be for a prospective GeoMedia customer.
[Off my soapbox now]
[Back on my soapbox] – Update
I think I finally found my link. I had to LOGIN to get to it. HUH???????? I’m sorry…but what marketing genius decided on this?? Here’s the page I get if I’m not logged in (from the Intergraph web site):
New Customer
Intergraph product-specific information is only available to existing Intergraph customers. If you are interested in Intergraph solutions, click here to complete our contact information form, and an Intergraph representative will contact you.
Could that be less useful?? All I was trying to do was pass on some information about the GeoMedia suite to a colleague.
Isn’t there a way someone can find out more information WITHOUT registering???
[Off my soapbox]
Hehe, spot on! I guess they do not want new customers from their webpage, only by paying agents to go to your company. It`s stupid, but how long till they realise? My personal opinion is that Intergraph as a company is getting too big 🙁
A similar issue is the “free” GeoMedia Viewer. You can only get it via surface mail… as if they are ashamed of this -really great- piece of software. I don’t know if it is mentioned on the web somewhere.
Jeff- I complained to someone at Intergraph about this too, but I’m sure it fell on deaf ears. Intergraph’s website is so poorly organized and confusing that if you don’t have certain pages bookmarked, it will take at least 4 or 5 clicks just to get to the information you need and even then it feels like you are going in circles sometimes. I noticed the other day that just doing a google search for “GeoMedia” doesn’t even get you close to the GeoMedia software page. Your website is the 3rd and 4th result and the other entries lead to Intergraph 404 page not found errors.
Zym,
The justification in the past for not having the GM Viewer on the site is a bandwidth issue. Not sure how it’s such an issue…but I’ve heard that it is an issue. I’ve also heard that Intergraph does not want to release the software to everybody without first understanding how the software will be used. I’ve been told this is done to ensure the user is aware of how to connect to a shapefile, MapInfo tab file, etc. Since you need to first create an .ini file for these types of data types and that can be confusing to a user with little exposure to GeoMedia.
I understand everyone’s frustration. It’s the same for me when I get on their site and try to find something. Maybe we should just make the switch to ESRI.
Strange moves that intergraph has been making lately. Its almost as if someone working there is trying to hide the fact that there is an alternative to ESRI products. They seem to be using the exact opposite tactics that other software companies use to get exposure to their products. They have a great development team, but a really poor marketing and advertising team.
‘A great development team’…
Then they’ll have to do more effort to prove they have. I agree, GM 6 is a great -great- product and it’s potentials are underestimated. But, the interface lacks simple, efficient customisation abilities that I would expect. The development team seems to stop just that little bit too early. Take a look at the ‘visual modelers’ for example of other products. One example is provided by the OpenSource community, namely in a 3D software package called Blender3D. It looks like this: http://orange.blender.org/wp-content/themes/orange/images/blog/memory.jpg Some GIS and image processing softwares have great examples how it can be done. Why not do better? Add ‘export to script’ and/or publish as a webservice?
Another great example (personal opinion) are Yahoo Pipes… How productive can web interfaces be?
Dynamic queries are great, but once you start to make larger processing chains with it, it can get really messy and difficult to distribute over an enterprise.
Another extra that would greatly openup the power of GM6 would be the support for a scripting language like Python. Simple, more easy to learn than C++ and C#.
Next to all this, please Intergraph, don’t be too shy, be proud and document all this with tons of examples. Allow non-Intergraph developers to experiment (in depth) with all aspects of the software/API. Why not start a wikibook on GeoMedia… Take a look at the company with the two GG’s and two oo’s. There documentation is truly impressive.
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@Jeff re: an .ini file for data types:
Maybe they should make a freebie viewer a little easier to use? Mucking with .ini files?!?
Crazy.
A GeoMedia Wiki sounds really nice! Especially a WebMap-Wiki.
Jeff,
I communicated exactly what Zym says in comment #7 to a couple of managers who came to meet us for a requirements discussion back in 2005. They are aware that they lack those things. But I am still stunned that Intergraph is so dinosaur slow in reacting after so many years. I pushed for a Geomedia internal development blog, so developers themselves can blog about new features, instead of users like you. I gave up.
Their user interface sucks and it sucks so bad compared with the competition (that includes Map3D and maybe Manifold) that it hurts. They have a superior product but old-world user interface, terrible marketing and distribution. Development is so constrained and features come to market so late that they concede bragging rights to others e.g. Manifold is now using GPU’s for processing. How about letting users try out beta features on a package basis? That is, new feature is packaged in a .dll which you can use or not use. I can understand the concern for stability but increasing the testing base not only helps but you can iteratively drop or change upcoming features based on open and visible community feedback. Rather than prioritizing based just on what their biggest customers want.
Get your head out of the sand!!! And start kicking ass.
Hei,
just yesterday I discovered the same issue when I wanted to inform myself about the Features of Geomedia (and to show it to a colleague). I wrote also an email to Intergraph on that issue and cc’ed James Fee, he told me about this blog entry 🙂
I attach the email below, that I send to sgisupport/@/intergraph.com ..the only email address I could find immediately.
Interestingly.. I should note, that on German Intergraph Website (intergraph.de) I had no problem to find in a drop down box on the first page a link to Geomedia. I guess this is the reason while Geomedia in Europe has about the same market share as ESRI!
Dear Support,
Today I wanted to get information about Geomedia Professional.
When I googled for “Geomedia GIS” the first link was this: http://www.geomedia6.com/
The page required me to login… but what for? If I only wnat to know the products specs? Why should I apply for a login if I am not a customer yet?
Furthermore If I go the Intergaph homepage I stuck again. I simply don’t know what I should look for. Do I need “Enterprise Engineering Software”? or “Geospatially Powered Solutions”? .. maybe both… What do this marketing terms mean?
Now, clicking on the Geospatial link leads me to a new page that does not help that much. Because I simply like to see a button/link that leads me to the Offered Software, in particular GIS Software.
I really ask myself how much did Intergraph pay for that web design? And If there was any usability study involved and not only marketing guys? It seems like you focus exclusively on future customers that have not your software yet (i.e. don’t know exactly what they search for) and try to achieve this with as many clicks as possible.
Btw.: Now, you may wonder why I write to the support? Because it is the only (GIS) email address I found to address my problem.
Ohh.. yes finally my support request: Where can I find product specifications for Geomedia Professional on your Webpage?
best wishes (really)
Stefan Steiniger
Dear Stefan from Germany,
I have to adjust your claim that Geomedia in Europe has about the same market share as ESRI! At least for Belgium, this is definitively not true. 95% of the governmental institutions use ESRI… The reason is not clear, but my personal oppinion:
– most students at universities were trained with ESRI products, and when these students have to decide on buying software, they will most often select what they’ve experience with. The reason of this high rate of ESRI usage at universities is (was ?) probably the flexibility of the old ESRI product and it’s ease to script, ideal for research purposes.
– once some key institutions use a product, institutions that depend on them often take the easiest decision of using the same product.
– Intergraph has a problem with marketing, especially towards the potential GeoMedia users group.
Stefan,
Interesting..didn’t know James read my blog…. Did you hear back from Intergraph support? I still really want to find those specs as well.
All in all, the Intergraph site has never been that strong…but I just can’t understand why they make it so hard….
Hei Jeff,
no infos from Integraph yet. I will tell you when I get them. However, it could be that my sending address is also not that much attractive to them (as I use my university account)
Btw.: I browsed yesterday the German Intergraph page. While I have been first “excited” finding some info to every software product (in German), a minute later I was disappointed about the infos in the PDFs. No details inside – just how good the software is; in general. Not that it believe it is not (at least I hope so, as the University of Zurich just replaced in the GIS I course ArcView by Geomedia after an evaluation)… but I my expectations…
stefan
Jeff,
You’ve got to have an “e-service” login to get anything… I think their marketing strategy is changing. Not sure what direction, but everything is starting to get hidden behind locked doors….
For instance, I have customers that I have to support that need new e-service loggin accounts just to get hot fixes for their current GMP lics. That’s only changed in the last couple of months too. Not sure what’s going on with that unless they’re suddenly worried about non-Intergraph customers getting this information for some alterior purpose.
Unofficially (I seriously dont know for sure) I think the prodcut spects for GMP are 1GHz processor and 1GB of RAM, but I’ve used it on a 2GHz Processor and .5GB RAM machine (a bit slowly), and I recomend a Duel Core 2GHz processor and 2GB RAM machine (my current configuration). You can always use more RAM as the program is a memory hog, but with the 2GB, I’ve never run out.
I too have looked for GeoMedia product information in order to determine whether it offers me, and the clients to whom I make technology recommendations, any advantage. I find it hard to believe that it is not readily available. Fortunately, there are many other commercial and open source offerings which I can easily research on the web.
This turned out to be a rather big issue at the Intergraph conference. Although there are mixed thoughts about this at the Intergraph level, I was talking to David Holmes today at the Intergraph Customer Feedback forum and he said that they would begin exposing some of the “sales” type of information/literature to the public (folks without a login/password) again very soon (as in this month). Although Intergraph still very strongly believes that they’re providing some “value” to the customers by placing minor releases and other types of information behind a login and password. I guess the theory is that maintenance-paying customers are getting a value from having minor releases/patches put behind a login and password. That way we can be assured that folks that aren’t paying maintenance are able to get this login and password. I’m actually probably going to have a seperate blog entry on this as I really think the thought process is rather flawed.
I encountered the same frustration again today when looking for product information on Intelliwhere so blogged abouit it at PolyGeo – hope it helps the cause…
a new product specific section has been added not too long ago – if you search geoMedia on the top search banner, you get more links now http://www.intergraph.com/sgi/products/
I know this is an old post, but everything written is still relevant today! I used Geomedia in college but now work with ArcInfo and have an ArcEditor license for some consulting I do on the side. That license is expensive, and I wanted to see what Intergraph has to offer now. All I can find are one-paragraph descriptions of the products, and no feature lists or screenshots. Terrible marketing.