Fwd: RE: [OSGeo Africa] GRASS GIS 6.1.0 released 11 August 2006

Wed Aug 23 06:51:33 EDT 2006

Hi Sindile,

Another OSS GIS that you might want to check out is
uDIG. It also seems to be making some good strides and
is quite user friendly. check it out at
http://udig.refractions.net/confluence/display/UDIG/Home

The other option of course could be to use ArcExplorer
(http://www.esri.com/software/arcexplorer/index.html).

Its not OS software and the open source guys might
bite my head off for suggesting it, but hey its free
and it works for GIS viewing and data
querying...perfect for education. 

There are also other freeware and/or OSS GIS packages
around that could do the job, but this would require
some research. You can start at
http://spatialnews.geocomm.com/features/viewers2002/
and also freegis.org

Enjoy searching

Cheers
Craig

--- Sindile Bidla <SXJBIdla at dla.gov.za> wrote:

> 
> 
> >>> Sindile Bidla 08/23/06 10:47 AM >>>
> Hi Gavin
> 
> Very much so, currently I am looking at Qgis and how
> it would address what is on the National Curriculumn
> Statement for Grades 10-12.  In fact I have looked
> at ArcView and the problem I have is with licences -
> this might not be sustainable in the long run.
> 
> 
> 
> >>> "Gavin Fleming" <GavinF at mintek.co.za> 08/22/06
> 11:48 AM >>>
> Hi Sindile
> 
> My wife Bridget teaches geography at St Davids
> Marist Inanda and has
> made huge progress using GIS in the classroom. She
> uses Google Earth,
> Geomatica (http://www.geomatica.co.za/) and ArcView.
> None of these is
> OSS, but I and others are investigating OSS GIS
> tools for the classroom.
> All OSS GIS tools are of course available for the
> classroom, but these
> need to be packaged and adapted for widespread use
> in schools. Are you
> perhaps interested in such an initiative?
> 
> Gavin
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Sindile Bidla [mailto:SXJBIdla at dla.gov.za] 
> Sent: 18 August 2006 11:37 AM
> To: africa at africa.osgeo.org; Gavin Fleming
> Subject: Re: [OSGeo Africa] GRASS GIS 6.1.0 released
> 11 August 2006
> 
> Good day
> 
> Has anyone have experience on OSS GIS application
> that could be ideal in
> a educational environment (preferably on a Windows
> platform).  Any
> information will be greately appreciated.
> 
> >>> GavinF at mintek.co.za 08/11/06 1:42 PM >>>
> 
> The GRASS Development Team announces:
> 
> GRASS GIS 6.1.0 released 11 August 2006
> 
> A new technology preview version of GRASS GIS is
> being released today
> in preparation for the next benchmark release, GRASS
> 6.2. This feature
> release, version 6.1.0, improves upon the previous
> stable version of
> GRASS by adding hundreds of new features as well as
> support for the
> latest GIS data formats.
> 
> The Geographic Resources Analysis Support System,
> commonly referred to
> as GRASS, is a Geographic Information System (GIS)
> combining powerful
> raster, vector, and geospatial processing engines
> into a single
> integrated software suite. GRASS includes tools for
> spatial modeling,
> visualization of raster and vector data, management
> and analysis of
> geospatial data, and the processing of satellite and
> aerial
> imagery. It also provides the capability to produce
> sophisticated
> presentation graphics and hardcopy maps.
> 
> GRASS is currently used around the world in academic
> and commercial
> settings as well as by many governmental agencies
> and environmental
> consulting companies. It runs on a variety of
> popular hardware
> platforms and is Free open source software released
> under the terms of
> the GNU General Public License.
> 
> Joining GRASS's well-developed raster engine the
> GRASS 6 series
> introduced a new topological 2D/3D vector engine
> featuring support for
> vector network analysis and SQL-based DBMS
> management of linked
> attributes. This release improves the integration
> and functionality of
> the raster and vector engines, and 3D raster (voxel)
> support has been
> greatly enhanced.
> 
> A new graphical GIS manager and menu system has been
> implemented,
> while the old GUI display manager has been retained
> and improved for
> legacy support. The NVIZ visualization tool has been
> enhanced to
> display 3D vector data and voxel volumes and
> supports the creation of
> on-the-fly MPEG animations. Additional improvements
> include
> substantial message translation (i18n) with support
> for FreeType
> fonts, including multi-byte Asian characters, and
> tools to allow new
> project locations to be automatically generated from
> input data or
> EPSG code.
> 
> This is the first release of GRASS as a proposed
> founding project of
> the new Open Source Geospatial Foundation. In
> support of the movement
> towards consolidation in the open source geospatial
> software world,
> GRASS is tightly integrated with the latest GDAL/OGR
> libraries. This
> enables access to an extensive range of raster and
> vector formats,
> including OGC-conformal Simple Features. GRASS also
> makes use of the
> highly regarded PROJ.4 software library with support
> for most known
> map projections and the easy definition of new and
> rare map
> projections via custom parameterization.
> 
> Full announcement:
> 
> http://grass.itc.it/announces/announce_grass610.html
> 
> 
> Short project description
>  http://grass.itc.it/announces/abstract_grass610.txt
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> winGRASS mailing list
> winGRASS at grass.itc.it 
> http://grass.itc.it/mailman/listinfo/wingrass 
> 
>
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