[GRASS-dev] Wingrass and TclTk

[Benjamin Ducke]

> 
> But it might install the same programs twice on the machine and probably
> bloat the grass distribution by quite a lot (don't forget that most
> people do not have broadband) ...

Yes, that's a fact.

> 
> IMO, we should stick to a basic wingrass distribution to which people
> can add what they want in terms of other programs. If they want access
> to R, they can add R's bin + lib directories to the path and that's it.

True, I was only looking into R to see how easy it would be to add.

> 
> If you have a particular audience that needs a series of add-ons and
> tweaks than you can provide a special package for them, but I prefer to
> distribute a simple package without any unnecessary additions (and I
> consider msys an unnecessary addition in this context as there is hardly
> anything you cannot do without scripts - it just might not be as
> convienient). Don't assume that everyone has the same needs as you.

Yes, I will do that.

> 
> And up to now feedback has been that installation of the wingrass
> package is very easy...
> 
> However, I agree that we could maybe provide more detailled
> documentation on how to integrate different packages (at least msys).
> 
> Moritz
> 
>> The benefit for the user is that only one .bat is visible in
>> the top dir: it's clear what to click on and there is no
>> searching in bin grass-6.3.cvs/bin or wherever to find
>> a startup-script.
> 
> If the instructions in the readme are not clear enough, please provide
> suggestions for improvement. Up to now I have not received any feedback
> from users not being able to find how to launch grass.
> 
>> Please keep in mind, that my Windows target users will often not
>> have the ability (or patience) to install MSYS by themselves and set
>> the appropriate vars in some obscure batch script -- they just
>> want to click and run GRASS!
> 
> And so they _can_ with the current distribution, except for the fact
> that they have to install ActiveTcl if they want the gui (and the fact
> that the instructions need a reference to how to start grass in text
> mode). This should be solved by giving the option of downloading a grass
> package including a free tcl/tk installation.
> 
> My point above concerning msys being unnecessary is obviously arguable
> and if there is a general opinion that we should include it, we can (but
> without any need to change the grass63.bat except for uncommenting the
> line about where to find sh.exe and another to set the necessary PATH).
> 
> Moritz
> 
> 

-- 
Benjamin Ducke, M.A.
Archäoinformatik
(Archaeoinformation Science)
Institut für Ur- und Frühgeschichte
(Inst. of Prehistoric and Historic Archaeology)
Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel
Johanna-Mestorf-Straße 2-6
D 24098 Kiel
Germany

Tel.: ++49 (0)431 880-3378 / -3379
Fax : ++49 (0)431 880-7300
www.uni-kiel.de/ufg