I've enjoyed corresponding with Allan Doyle, and will be a regular reader of his new Think blog. His first post has drawn the Ordnance Survey's Ed Parsons into a discussion about enterprise use of open source. Parsons would consider using MapServer, etc, if only there were accountable support for it in the UK like we have in North America. Allan follows up with a list of geospatial consultants, and the comment
I'm sure there are others, so people can help out in the comments. Maybe as the saying goes, when the student is ready, the master will appear.
Anymore, when I read "master", I think "Pei Mei". Sometimes mastering MapServer does feel a lot like punching a board from dawn till dusk.
It's no accident that the US and Canada have a large and healthy ecosystem of open source geospatial consultants. The Canadian government, particularly, has invested in open standards and in support for open source geospatial companies like DM Solutions. The free geodata that we enjoy in the US and Canada also play no small role. It's up to the Ordnance Survey, Britain's National Mapping Agency, to make similar investments in a open source ecosystem for the UK.