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

[Mark P. Line]

Russell Nelson said:
> Joel Peter William Pitt writes:
>  > I wasn't aware public domain software required the source code
>  > to be released...
>
> The BSD license doesn't require the source code to be released.  Open
> source code is only open source if it's the source you're releasing.
> If you only release binaries, you can't exactly claim it's open source.

Software under a BSD license is not public domain.

You said: '"Open source constraints"?  Public domain software is open
source software.'

BSD-licensed software has copyright protection, which is one type of
constraint that open source software is typically placed under. Public
domain software is not copyrighted, by definition.

It remains the fact that GRASS started out being in the public domain, and
only relatively recently had open source CONSTRAINTS placed on it.


> I'm not trying to convince, I'm trying to explain why I feel strongly
> about this.

I'm confused by your choice of venue, and surprised that somebody here was
in the market for an explanation of your strong feelings. It's not a
closed list, though, so I'm sure you can do whatever floats your boat. :)


> GRASS has the reputation of being "the open source GIS
> package", which, technically, it is.  I, however, wouldn't recommend
> it to anybody but a GIS expert.

I can only speak for myself, but as far as I'm concerned: Please do not
recommend GRASS to anybody but a GIS expert. There may be some here who
disagree, but I bet they're in the minority.

Once GRASS has a good GUI that supports inexperienced and/or casual users,
that can change. But the GRASS you would be referring a naive user to
today is not the product they need to be using today.


>  > There are several frontends out there already, you should be
>  > speaking to them.
>
> Okaybut.  GRASS qua GRASS still needs to have a user interface that
> makes easy things easy.

No it doesn't. That would be an inefficient engineering approach to the
problem.

The correct solution would be to construct one or more GUI's or GUI
frameworks from whole cloth that wrap around all of GRASS, and then to use
the resulting elbow room to streamline GRASS qua GRASS down to engine
status. From where I'm sitting, that seems to be exactly the trend that's
happening.


> If people are referred to GRASS, and they run
> 'grass' and they get the current user interface, then the front-end
> may as well not exist.  For them, it doesn't.  I can make the
> whizziest GUI in the world, but if it doesn't come with GRASS, what's
> the point?

If people are referred to MySQL, and they run 'mysql' and they get the
current user interface, then the front-end may as well not exist. For
them, it doesn't. I can make the whizziest GUI in the world, but if it
doesn't come with MySQL, what's the point?


-- Mark

Mark P. Line
Polymathix
San Antonio, TX