AfriGIS recognised as a core contributor to GeoServer - Peter Smythe — Peter Smythe, senior systems analyst at AfriGIS

AfriGIS has been recognised as one of the core contributors to the GeoServer open-source project, marking a milestone for the company and the African geospatial technology landscape. Significantly, AfriGIS is the only African company to hold this status, a testament to its leadership in advancing open-source geospatial solutions on the continent and beyond.

This recognition comes alongside last year’s appointment of Peter Smythe, senior systems analyst at AfriGIS, to the GeoServer project steering committee, a body comprising individuals from around the world who guide and oversee the project’s development. For Smythe, the seat at the committee table represents years of consistent and meaningful engagement in the GeoServer community, from early documentation fixes to reviewing security vulnerability reports.

Why GeoServer matters

GeoServer is a widely adopted open-source mapping server that allows users to share, process and edit geospatial data. Built to be fully standards compliant with specifications published by the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC), it allows for seamless interoperability between GIS systems and data formats. For AfriGIS, this standards-based approach has been a strategic gamechanger.

Over a decade ago, the company made the deliberate decision to move away from proprietary platforms and adopt open-source solutions such as QGIS, GeoServer and Leaflet. This pivot enabled AfriGIS to deliver mapping solutions with exceptional reliability, flexibility and scalability, while allowing clients to retain greater control over their geospatial data.

Smythe’s journey with GeoServer began with modest contributions, making small corrections to the project’s online documentation via GitHub. Over time, these efforts evolved into code fixes. In recent years, Smythe has shared the responsibility of managing the monthly release process for GeoServer and its related projects, GeoTools and GeoWebCache. This meticulous and time-consuming work ensures the stability of each release and tries to free up other core contributors to focus on development and code reviews.

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His involvement has recently extended to reviving GeoServer’s OGC CITE certification process, which had been dormant for a decade after the build server was vandalised. By aiding in the effort to reinstate these compliance tests, Smythe has helped reaffirm GeoServer’s credibility as a fully standards-compliant platform trusted by thousands of organisations worldwide.

AfriGIS has also committed resources to the development of GeoServer 3, a long-overdue upgrade to the platform. GeoServer is a large and complex Java application built on numerous open-source libraries, which periodically undergo breaking changes that necessitate major upgrades.

The new version will introduce vital security enhancements and new functionality, but bringing it to life has required significant investment and global collaboration. While many organisations contributed financially, AfriGIS took a different approach by pledging dedicated man hours from its South African team, where resources are more cost-effective. This contribution, scheduled to be deployed in the latter part of the year, reinforces AfriGIS’s hands-on commitment to strengthening the future of the GeoServer platform.

Strategic alignment with AfriGIS goals

AfriGIS’s commitment to Open-Source software is no accident. Several years ago, the company set aside a dedicated budget for contributing to projects like GeoServer. This investment has enabled more ambitious and impactful work within the open-source ecosystem, strengthening AfriGIS’s reputation as a trusted provider of both hosted and on-premises geospatial solutions. Clients benefit from this expertise whether they use AfriGIS’s managed services or operate GeoServer independently with training and support from the company.

Smythe’s contributions have not gone unnoticed. At the end of 2023, the GeoServer project steering committee acknowledged his work by donating $500 in his name to the Geo-Information Society of South Africa, highlighting how corporate participation in open-source communities can extend to supporting local industry development.

For Africa’s technology sector, AfriGIS’s achievement is particularly significant. As the only African company with core contributor status, it ensures that the continent’s needs and perspectives are represented in the global governance of a critical geospatial tool. It is a clear signal that Africa is not only adopting but actively shaping the technologies that define the future of geospatial innovation.

“Every hour we invest in the GeoServer community is an investment in better, more open and more reliable geospatial solutions for everyone from our clients to our continent, and the global GIS community,” Smythe said. This recognition affirms AfriGIS’s dual commitment to delivering world-class geospatial services and to advancing the open-source technologies that power them.