[GRASS5] Re: [Fwd: whinging about GRASS again]

tlaronde at polynum.com tlaronde at polynum.com
Tue Feb 1 07:02:32 EST 2005


On Tue, Feb 01, 2005 at 09:23:06PM +1300, Hamish wrote:
> 
> Re "what a pile of shit, let's start over from the CERL code".
> Thierry Laronde has already started this with his KerGIS:
>   http://www.kergis.com/

Yes, and there are lessons related to this thread to learn:

1) Remind that this is _unfortunately_ open source software: one has not
the excuse to say "if only I had the code, I will show you how to do". I
was not satisfied. I told it. So I code it.
I do not "buy" the trend: "let's talk about the freedom after the 
twelveth free beer". Libre software is a lesson about freedom that is
effort: one has the ability to buy software whether by contributing good
code matching the whole design or by giving someone money in exchange
for the efforts needed to adapt the software. There is not on the one
side users that have all rights, and on the other side developers that 
have all the duties.

2) GRASS is a great piece of software, still alive that is evolving but
that must keep what makes its strengths: this Unix like organization,
small dedicated programs, scripting abilities and so on. 
The core shall not be messed up due to user interfaces wandering.

3) Once the core is rock solid, there is the ability to build whatever
user interface matches the user need. The trend now (and it is quite
logical) is to have dedicated interfaces allowing users to do their job
in a straightforward way. GRASS/KerGIS, because of this user interface
agnosticism is decried now, but it is this very feature that makes it
the core component of the future GIS software.

4) Part of the mess happened because GRASS was orphaned when it was
engaged in major changes (on the vectorial part, leading to a fuzzy
organization of the sources). It is normal, and what the code shows is
not the superficial mess, but the rock solid foundations.

5) The core team of the CERL was a handful (but dedicated to this one
task). So it is indeed possible to do it. To take alone the whole
sources of GRASS and work from that seems silly. But I'm silly, so this
was a task for me. This means that there can not be an excuse such as:
"I can't do that alone" since somebody has done it.

6) My hope is that, when I will have achieved the demonstration of what
I have in mind, the GRASS family will reconcile because there will be
two implementations to compare. Two facts. There can be more facts...

There are undoubtedly good
things in the GPL GRASS 6.x, and there are undoubtedly good people in
the GPL GRASS community. But I did not agree with the priorities, nor
did I agree with how to manage users requests. For me there are two
cases (I'm binary) and only two: user can ask for some doable thing
because he will pay for (contract); or user/developer can ask about a 
design to see if it can fit with the engineering goals and then can 
submit patches. Wishes are only accepted from advanced users I do know
and from which I do appreciate the feedback. 
If a user wants to use the software for fun, he can do
it as long as his fun is not my hell. If a user wants to make money with
the software he can do it as long as what he sells is _his_ work; if he 
wants the money but would prefer the work to be done by developers 
"in the free spirit", I'm afraid I will not quite agree.

Cheers,
-- 
Thierry Laronde (Alceste) <tlaronde +AT+ polynum +dot+ com>
http://www.kergis.org/  |  http://www.kergis.com/
Key fingerprint = 0FF7 E906 FBAF FE95 FD89  250D 52B1 AE95 6006 F40C




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