[GRASS-dev] Brainstorm about new GRASS GIS startup

[Moritz Lennert]

Le Mon, 19 Mar 2018 21:34:58 +0000,
Stefan Blumentrath <Stefan.Blumentrath at nina.no> a écrit :

> Hi Moritz,
> 
> Looks nice.
> 
> The "Open into a predefined lat-long location but give information
> message" option seems less involved than the first. Thus if
> "simplification" is the aim, I would probably continue in that
> direction. Having lots of choices already at the first startup-screen
> is probably counter-productive.

Some even dream of a one-button system...

> 
> An example location can be helpful for new users to get the concept
> in any case. And I would suggest to start the predefined lat-lon
> location in a mapset other than PERMANENT...

We discussed this today. I personally agree that using something else
than PERMANENT is good practice, but at the argument was that this is
probably not really relevant for first time users and that using
mapsets is actually already an advanced usage of GRASS.

> 
> However, the placement of the GISDBASE directory is also an important
> choice, that is not covert by the current mockups. So, maybe a more
> wizard like approach might be worth a thought? Right after choosing
> the GISDBASE dir, there can then be a "let me explore in sample
> project" button (together with the other main buttons from the first
> alternative maybe).  

Again, we discussed this today. One suggestion was even to
automagically create a hidden GISDBASE directory and just create the
first location there. Again, does a new user really have to worry about
the location of the GISDBASE ? 

> 
> In any case, I would also consider a "don`t show this message again"
> checkbox together with a grassrc setting...

Agreed. The idea also obviously is that power user can still start
GRASS in the classical CLI way by directly giving the path to the
desired mapset.

> 
> And users should be informed in advance before additional data is
> downloaded.

Agreed.

> P.S.: A less relevant side note: Personally I rather translate
> mapsets with "projects" (but that is not very accurate either)...

We all have our own personal uses of GISDBASES, locations and mapsets.
The general idea was to actual keep all of that out of the newbie
user's sight at first contact and to introduce it slowly afterwards
(but the how of this introduction still needs to be discussed).

Thanks for your feedback !

See you tomorrow,

Moritz


> -----Original Message-----
> From: grass-dev [mailto:grass-dev-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf
> Of Moritz Lennert Sent: mandag 19. mars 2018 21.48
> To: grass-dev at lists.osgeo.org
> Subject: Re: [GRASS-dev] Brainstorm about new GRASS GIS startup
> 
> Le Mon, 19 Mar 2018 21:23:14 +0100,
> Moritz Lennert <mlennert at club.worldonline.be> a écrit :
> 
> > Hi everyone,
> > 
> > At the code sprint in Bonn we (including virtually with Helena,
> > Anna and Vaclav) discussed about possibilities of making the GRASS
> > GIS startup more newbie friendly. This raises several issues
> > concerning what we should do concerning possible default startup
> > location, default GISDBASE, etc.
> > 
> > I started a wiki page to collect ideas and reflections:
> > 
> > https://trac.osgeo.org/grass/wiki/New_Startup  
> 
> For better wiki structure, the page was renamed to:
> 
> https://trac.osgeo.org/grass/wiki/wxGUIDevelopment/New_Startup
> 
> Moritz
> 
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