[GRASS-dev] GUI toolkits [-> ps.map CMYK]

[Trevor Wiens]

On Tue, 30 May 2006 19:07:49 +1200
Hamish <hamish_nospam at yahoo.com> wrote:

> > I can't even begin to calculate the number of hours I've spent f***ing
> > around with labels and colours in drawing programs because the output
> > from the GIS programs was so bad. In the realm of free software,
> > generating a quality map is similarly difficult if not worse.
> 
> ps.map is a pain as you usually need to use the trial & error method.
> Results are consistent and (hopefully) as expected, however, which is a
> major plus. Hopefully in the future Jachym's g-ps.map (or GUI equivalent)
> will make ps.map just a behind-the-scenes engine for generating the
> plots.
> 
> FWIW, I think ps.map output is just wonderful once you get the hang of it.
> 
> 
> > psmap is not bad, but it doesn't do process colours, so it can't be
> > used for publishing without extra processing.
> 
> I'll take a patch for a CMYK flag.

I looked a ps.map before starting my current project and had to use GMT
instead because of the process colour issue. I was seriously
considering patching in process colours into ps.map, but decided that
for now the easiest thing to do was to deal with GMT which I deeply
dislike.

I don't have any major issues with ps.map, although the config files
could be a bit more human friendly. But you are right, g-ps.map starts
to pave the way to a nice GUI with a solid back-end. 

In terms of ps.map and process colours I was wondering about
considering a replacement using the PyX library which supports process
colours and more importantly text control using TeX. I don't like
tossing out existing code or suggesting others do the same, but I've
started using PyX for graph generation (on the same book project) and
it is pretty nice. Having the ability to layout maps using the
power of TeX is pretty much as good as it gets IMHO (FYI, I use and
really like LaTeX). 

T
-- 
Trevor Wiens 
twiens at interbaun.com

The significant problems that we face cannot be solved at the same 
level of thinking we were at when we created them. 
(Albert Einstein)