In this Leanpub Podcast episode, Len Epp interviews Qiusheng Wu, author of Introduction to GIS Programming: A Practical Python Guide to Open Source Geospatial Tools. They discuss Qiusheng’s journey from growing up in rural China to earning a PhD and becoming a leading figure in the open-source GIS community.

Qiusheng shares insights into his development of popular Python packages like geemap, leafmap, and geoai, which are widely used for geospatial analysis and Earth Engine workflows. He talks about his passion for teaching and democratizing access to GIS tools through his YouTube channel and his book.

The episode explores the intersections of open source, data science, and education, highlighting Qiusheng’s philosophy of building tools that are not only powerful but also accessible and practical for a broad community of learners and professionals.

This interview was recorded on June 30, 2025.

The full audio for the interview is here: https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/leanpub_podcasts/FM318-Qiusheng-Wu-2025-06-30.mp3. The Frontmatter podcast is available on our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/leanpub, in Apple Podcasts here https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/frontmatter/id517117137, and almost everywhere else people listen to podcasts.