A Brief History of ERDAS ER Mapper

I thought I would take some time to briefly outline some of the major points in the history of ERDAS ER Mapper. I have rebuilt this history from "What's New" PowerPoints and "What's New" documents, software documentation, software media, software code, advertisements, and personal interviews. I do not have as much materials as I did to build the A Brief History of ERDAS IMAGINE, immediately at hand, but will build the history as I uncover documents.

As a master’s student at the University of South Carolina Department of Geography and Remote Sensing Specialist at SC DNR, I interviewed with ER Mapper while at ASPRS in Baltimore Maryland the week of March 24, 1991 and was invited to interview with ER Mapper in San Diego in mid-May 1991. During my visit in May, I met with David Hayward and Stuart Nixon. David gave me an extensive demo of the software. I was very impressed with the software.

I was somewhat concerned when Stuart stated ER Mapper would be larger than ERDAS within 2-years. ER Mapper hired Jill Andrews rather than me. I accepted a technical sales position at ERDAS and started at ERDAS on July 15, 1991. On May 21 2007, ERDAS announced the purchase of ER Mapper Ltd.

19 Feb 1990, Australian Beta Release (Beta 1)

• Introduces Dynamic Algorithm Compiler (on-the-fly image processing) to Remote Sensing community
• Sun Workstation only

6 Apr 1990, US Beta Release (Beta 2)
1 May 1990, ER Mapper 1.0 released
9 Jul 1990, ER Mapper 1.1 released
21 Sep 1990, ER Mapper 1.2 released
10 Jan 1991, ER Mapper 2.0 released

• Expanded marketing efforts into Europe and Americas

22 Nov 1991, ER Mapper 3.0 released
20 May 1992, ER Mapper 3.1 released
26 Aug 1992, ER Mapper 3.2 released
15 Jan 1993, ER Mapper 4.0 released

• Expanded capabilities to support forestry, land use and water resources
• As reported by GISL Limited, the first PC ER Mapper license was purchased in Europe by GISL Limited, but Windows was not supported until a later version.

25 Oct 1993, ER Mapper 4.1 released
4 Feb 1994, ER Mapper 4.1a released
18 Oct 1994, ER Mapper 4.2 released
30 Jun 1995, ER Mapper 5.0 released

• Support Sun, SGI, DEC, HP And Windows NT
• 3D Capability introduced

Sep 1995, ER Mapper 5.1 released

• Microsoft Windows 95 support added

20 April 1996, ER Mapper 5.2 released
27 Feb 1997, ER Mapper 5.5 released

• HP-UX and DEC Alpha support dropped, Sun Solaris, SGI Irix, and Windows 95/NT remain
• Improved 3D capability
• Oil and Gas Wizards to exchange data with Charisma, GeoQuest and SeisWorks
• Customers include Landmark, Schlumberger, BP Exploration, Mobile, Texaco and Shell

1 Feb 1999, ER Mapper 6.0 released

• Introduce real-time roaming and zooming
• Introduce ortho-rectification of images
• Introduce image compression wizard
• Introduce mosaic wizard
• Introduce image gridding wizard (ascii points and vector datasets)
• Introduce contour to screen wizard, file save as to create files
• Radar processing bundled into core package

15 June 1999, ER Mapper 6.0 CEP released

• ECW Compression Enhancement Pack added (ECW v2.0)

29 April 1999, ER Mapper 6.0 SP1 released
4 January 2000, ER Mapper 6.1 released

• Image Web Plug-in

11 May 2001, ER Mapper 6.2 released

• Improved licensing
• Improved ECW performance(70% faster)
• Add GeoTIFF support
• Wizard to support MapInfo .tab files
• Landsat Web publishing wizard
• Introduce Mineral Exploration wizard

29 June 2001, Release of OrthoWarp ER (Inpho add-on module)

• IKONOS, IRS, Landsat and Spot data supported
• Automated tools for orientation, measurement, and error correction

24 September 2001, ER Mapper 6.21 released

• Maintenance release
• HDF Translator

28 Feb 2002, OrthoWarp ER v2.1 released

• Simplified workflows

19 July 2002, ER Mapper 6.3 released

• Windows XP Support
• Enhanced Compression Tools
• Shapefile I/O
• Spectral Angle Mapper Formula
• Aster Processing Wizard

6 December 2002, ER Mapper 6.3 SP1 released

• Maintenance release

14 November 2003, ER Mapper 6.4 released

• Reprojection-on-the-fly introduced
• Compression to ECW of Multi-TB images (5TB tested)
• Reproject GeoTIFF and ECW
• Add floating network license support

15 May 2004, ER Mapper 6.4 SP1 released

• Maintenance release

22 April 2005, ER Mapper 7.0 released

• JPEG2000 support added (Lossly, lossless, NITF), created 1-TB JPEG2000 Landsat mosaic
• Added 13 new Batch Processing Wizards
• Added new projections

28 July 2005, ER Mapper 7.01 released

• Maintenance release

31 March 2006, ER Mapper 7.1 released

• Maintenance release
• Add support for ERDAS IMAGINE .img format
• GeoTIFF enhancements (read and write TIFFs up to 2GB, JPEG format TIFF)
• JPEG2000 Alpha Channel Support

21 May 2007, ER Mapper Ltd. Purchased by Leica Geosystems Geospartial Imaging (aka ERDAS)
2 Sept 2008, ER Mapper 7.1 SP1 released

• Maintenance release

19 Sept 2008, ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 released

• Significant maintenance effort
• Expanded projection support
• Native support to read IMG
• Clip Region Wizard, included rotated regions
• Add MrSID, RPF (CIB and CADRG) and PCIDSK support
• Joint Licensing with IMAGINE Professional
• License borrowing

11 Nov 2008, ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 SP1 released

• Maintenance release

23 Mar 2009, ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2.1 released

• Maintenance release

19 Nov 2009, ERDAS ER Mapper 2010 released

• Support for Windows x32 and x64 for Windows XP, Vista, and 7
• Improved raster file format handling
• ASTER Processing Wizard
• Expanded projection support (use ERDAS projection engine)
• Improved Image Handling and Processing
• Improved handling and visualization of 16-bit and floating point data

21 April 2010, ERDAS ER Mapper 2010 v10.1 released

• Transparency Masks in ECW and JPEG2000 images
• Implement 'Large Memory Aware' to better utilize RAM
• Upgraded to latest ERDAS ECW/JP2 SDK

7 Dec 2010, ERDAS ER Mapper 2011 released

• Maintenance release
• Expand 'Large Memory Aware' use
• Handle calibrated IMG files with affine map model
• Write IMG files
• Upgraded to latest ERDAS ECW/JP2 SDK

1 Dec 2012, ERDAS ER Mapper 2013 released

• Maintenance release
• Upgraded to latest ERDAS ECW/JP2 SDK

4 Apr 2013, ERDAS ER Mapper 2013 v 13.00.0002 released

• Maintenance release
• Upgraded to latest ERDAS ECW/JP2 SDK

12 Dec 2013, ERDAS ER Mapper 2014 released

• Maintenance release
• Upgraded to latest ERDAS ECW/JP2 SDK

5 Dec 2014, ERDAS ER Mapper 2015 released

• Maintenance release
• Upgraded to latest ERDAS ECW/JP2 SDK 

Trip Report from Perth Australia and Tokyo Japan ERDAS Rocks 2010

Sorry for the late posting this year; we in product management are very much in demand supporting sales on the recent 2010 release and working overtime planning 2010.1, 2011 and beyond. Far more than ‘all is well’ is the mantra early in 2010. Indeed, ERDAS Rocks!

Over the last two weeks, I have been in Perth Australia and Tokyo Japan for the ERDAS Rocks 2010 Tour. The customer and prospect reception was tremendous. I discussed the history of ERDAS IMAGINE and ERDAS ER Mapper as well as the current efforts in fusing of ER Mapper, Image Compressor, and IMAGINE technologies. I also discussed the future of the technology fusing efforts, which will include LPS and new technologies we have yet to openly discuss.

Chris Tweedie discussed the current stage of ERDAS APOLLO and the fusing of ERDAS IWS technology into ERDAS APOLLO. During his demo in both Perth and Tokyo, the audience was amazed at the speed ERDAS APOLLO served imagery and vectors. He did such a good job a PO for ERDAS APOLLO was waiting on us when we arrived in the Perth ERDAS office the following morning.

In Tokyo, the audience had thought web services were supposed to be slow, that slow was the nature web services. Were they every pleasantly surprised; their questions and comments showed a new interest in web services. And to think, what we have in development is faster than what we demoed live in Perth and Tokyo!

To my Chinese friends, Happy New Year! The year of the Tiger is off to a roaring start for ERDAS.

ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 and ER Mapper 7.2 now share licensing codes

On May 21, 2007 ERDAS announced the purchase of Earth Resource Mapping Ltd (ER Mapper). Among the products ERDAS acquired in that purchase was ER Mapper Professional. For almost two decades, ER Mapper Professional and ERDAS IMAGINE competed for market share in the remote sensing segment of the mapping community. Until ER Mapper moved its focus to enterprise development, ER Mapper Professional owned the second largest market share, second only to ERDAS IMAGINE.

ERDAS announced on October 6, 2008, ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 and ER Mapper 7.2 now share licensing codes at the IMAGINE Professional level. This means customers purchasing new licenses or receiving licenses through software maintenance (SWM) for IMAGINE Professional 9.3 and ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 will be able to use both products at the same time on the same desktop, with one license of either of these ERDAS products.

At first glance it may appear customers will now receive two licenses for every one license. This is not correct. The customer will continue to have one license.

To help explain, allow me to introduce the idea of an “ERDAS Session.” An ERDAS Session begins when the customer launches an ERDAS product on a computer. Each session consumes a single license of an ERDAS product. ERDAS allows only one session per computer.

When a customer launches ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 or ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2, they launch an ERDAS Session. Because ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 and ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 use the same license codes, they also use the same session. Thus, the customer can launch both products on the same computer at the same time.

To help make this clearer, let's look at a few scenarios. Assume we have one floating license of ERDAS Professional 9.3 and one floating license for ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 on a network to be used among three people.

Scenario 1:

1. Shirley begins an ERDAS Session by launching ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 on her computer. She then needs to use a classification tool found in IMAGINE Professional 9.3, and launches it as well (not closing her ER mapper tools). No problem, she has occupied 1 license within her ERDAS Session.
2. Soon thereafter, Stephanie begins an ERDAS Session by launching ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 on her computer. No problem, she has occupied the second (and final) license within her ERDAS Session.
3. A few moments later, Jessica tries to launch ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 and is denied a license by the license broker. Jessica’s problem is both licenses have been consumed by Shirley and Stephanie’s two ERDAS Sessions. Her solution is to ask Shirley or Stephanie to close their sessions, or purchanse another license.
   

Scenario 2:

1. Matt begins an ERDAS Session by launching ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 on his computer.
2. Soon thereafter, Chenda begins an ERDAS Session by launching ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 on her computer. No problem, she has occupied the second (and final) license.
3. A few moments later, Trey tries to launch ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 and is denied a license by the license broker. Trey’s problem is both licenses have been consumed by Matt and Chenda two ERDAS Sessions. His solution is to ask Matt or Chenda to close their sessions, or purchase another license.
   

Scenario 3 (added 2 days after original post by popular request). Assume we have one floating license of ERDAS Professional 9.3 on a network:

1. Troy begins an ERDAS Session by launching ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 on his computer.
2. Soon thereafter, Michael tries to open an ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 session on his computer and is denied by the license broker. Michael's problem is the one license is occupied by Troy's session. His solution is to ask Troy to close his session or purchase another license.

So, why the change?

ERDAS is creating the next generation of desktop geospatial authoring tools. These new tools are being developed from customer’s demand of a fusion of the best of ERDAS IMAGINE, ERDAS ER Mapper, other existing ERDAS technology (desktop and enterprise), as well ERDAS' desire to introduce new technologies under development at ERDAS (not yet released).

Because the fused product will have a 100% capability match at the ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 and IMAGINE Professional 9.3 level, ERDAS decided to provide both tools to customers, today.

It is my opinion, ERDAS is providing a future vision while delivering some of the capability in that vision, today. The combined licensing of ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 and ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 delivers the most powerful geospatial imagining offering available today. Making the change today provides ERDAS customers an opportunity to experience the power of both products, and knowing their SWM has value today and in the future.

A few benefits to existing ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2 Customers are:

• Expand ortho-rectification capability with many different sensor models supported in IMAGINE Professional
• Expand the raster data format support to >150 formats
• Provide robust native vector editing/attributing capability found in ERDAS IMAGINE (arc coverage & shapefile)
• Provide pathway to all of the IMAGINE Add-on Modules (VirtualGIS, Vector, Radar Mapping Suite, Objective, and so forth)

A few benefits to existing ERDAS IMAGINE 9.3 Customers

• Rapidly mosaic, color-balance and compress massive volumes of image data. Using the 32-bit compressor on a 32-bit OS, mosaic terabytes of imagery (limit between 1 and 5TB) Using new-64-bit compressor on a 64-bit OS, mosaic many terabytes of imagery (limit estimated above 72TB)
• All image processing is dynamic / on-the-fly; process to screen rather than process to disk
• Domain specific workflows and wizards suitable for a range of industries and specialized applications (e.g. Oil and Gas)

A few benefits to new ERDAS Customers

• ERDAS customers will have both ERDAS IMAGINE and ER Mapper on the same desktop
• ERDAS customers do not have to pick between the products, making their decision easier and quicker
• No need to study both products to determine which meets their need