[GRASS5] Re: gis.m

[Michael Barton]

Hamish,

Welcome back.

> From: Hamish <hamish_nospam at yahoo.com>
> Date: Thu, 2 Mar 2006 13:52:27 +1300
> To: Michael Barton <michael.barton at asu.edu>
> Cc: <grass5 at grass.itc.it>
> Subject: gis.m
> 
> Just checked out gis.m for the first time since ~ day 1. It is looking
> really good!

Thanks for the encouragement. I think it is a good direction and hope that
others do too. Just did a brief intro to GRASS at the end of a class today.
Not enough time to do it justice. But it is clear that the opening screen
has to be changed. New users (including exerienced GIS'ers) get glassy-eyed
and can give up before they start. It is very confusing (even if it makes
perfect underlying sense). I have an idea and may try to show something
soon.


> 
> One question: (annoyance really, qgis is the same)
> Why draw a box for zoom out? It doesn't make sense to me. Why not a
> single click to trigger zoom-out? Does it control the amount you zoom
> out? (I think that would be confusing too)

Gotcha! It DOES do a single click to zoom out AND to zoom in. Single clicks
zoom in or out by 20%. The rectangle offers more control. Zoom in most
people are used to. Zoom out: the displayed map 'shrinks' to fit into the
zoom out rectangle.

> 
> Matlab's display monitor window has a nice way of doing things- if you
> are in zoom-in mode then the left button draws a box, and a right
> button-click unzooms. Three or four unzooms in a row and the display
> resets to the default (ie 'g.region rast=') region. If you are in
> zoom-out mode the mouse buttons are reversed. Also a single click
> instead of a drag & box does a 50% zoom under the cursor. This means
> only the left mouse button is needed, but the right mouse button isn't
> "dead", it provides optional functionality.
> 

I could put zoom and unzoom on the same button, but I don't have a way of
visually signaling to the user which mode he/she is in (like the button
icons). No good cursors in TclTk for this. I've gone through them all. The
radio button style gives good visual feedback and isn't REALLY that much
more effort is it?

> 
> Another question:
> Vector area boundaries look a bit blurry in the GUI. Sort of like when
> you set d.vect linewidth=1 instead of width=0(off). ?

Never noticed this, but can check.

BTW, did you see my shell script query?

Cheers
Michael

> 
> 
> 
> Hamish

__________________________________________
Michael Barton, Professor of Anthropology
School of Human Evolution and Social Change
Arizona State University
Tempe, AZ 85287-2402

phone: 480-965-6213
fax: 480-965-7671
www: http://www.public.asu.edu/~cmbarton