[GRASS-dev] default GUI

[Helena Mitasova]

Although I have softly suggested to use wxGUI for GRASS64 release
I don't really have a strong opinion on that - I was teaching with  
TclTk GUI
for two semesters, this semester we use wxGUI and both
have their own issues.

One thing I found is that people who learn GRASS
with TclTk GUI have hard time using wxGUI for whatever reason
(not me - I am used to CLI and I think wxGUI is much better).
You just don't find your buttons where they used to be
and that drives people crazy.
Interestingly enough, as Michael has mentioned some time ago,
the old, colorful and somewhat amateurish looking icons are more
popular with some people than the more professional new icons.
So, I would not expect too many people switching to wxGUI with GRASS65
once GRASS64 is out with TclTk GUI - it may need to wait for GRASS7
(which may eventually work better).

As for the long RC cycle - we had that before (I would even say it  
has always been
like that). It really depends on what you
focus on - if you do a lot of new development work at the same time
when working on RC candidates, that certainly prolongs the cycle.
And Hamish is right - getting winGRASS has consumed some extra time
but it is quite important,

Helena



On Sep 22, 2009, at 6:13 AM, Hamish wrote:

> Glynn:
>>> What's the timescale for a 6.4.0 release?
>
> Martin:
>> I don't think that there is enough time to do that.
>
> I agree. Last few fixes then let's release.
>
>> First 6.4.0 RC 12/2008, the last (RC5) 7/2009, now we
>> have end of September - it's seems to me as very very
>> long time for RC stage.
>
> granted.
>
> but just think of what a nicer result it is and how much better
> a product we will ship. for many users (wingrass) this will
> be their first try with GRASS. if it came off as buggy and
> half-baked they would think the whole package is like that
> and not just a few glitches in the MS-facade.
>
> I'm really happy to have the python libraries in good shape now;
> if we released in April we would have been stuck with the old..
> Same with a number of core module bugs on WinGrass (eg v.?.ogr).
>
>
>> I would be happy to see 6.4.0 out
>
> I think you speak for all of us.
>
> A blocker-blocker is the WinGrass 'g.version -c' bug. We can't
> release without an in-program way to show the user the license.
> AFAIK only the gis.m help->about gets to to the GPL; the command
> line and wx help->about are both broken in different ways.
>
> the other RC bugs are fewer and fewer, some are fixed awaiting
> confirmation,
>   https://trac.osgeo.org/grass/report/13
>
> (I can finish off the rel. ann. in a day once it looks imminent)
>
>
>> and discuss if we would be able to change release politics
>> (releases more often, less RCs, etc.)
>
> ok this one went really quite slow but we all had a rather
> busy year AFAICT. I agree that faster RCs would be nice, but
> where we really needed them (wingrass), when the RCs started
> to fall out of date Colin and JEF have both provided interim
> svn snapshots. I am not sure about more or fewer RCs, I think
> those speak for themselves if they are ready or not. (rc5 ready
> on *nix for a long time; but not ms-win, unsurprising) For my
> 2c I am happy with the philosophy and the especially the result.
>
> The downside with it taking so long is that the powerusers/devels
> are no longer using the release version for their day-to-day,
> and so the best testers/fixers are not looking at the release
> version, focus moves away, and old bugs stagnate. C'est la vie.
>
>
> fwiw, I forget how long all the 5.0.0pre releases took, I'm
> pretty sure it was a bunch more than a year. And 5.1/5.7->6.0
> was what, like 3 years at least? 5.0->5.4 3yrs? Hey, we are
> gaining speed! We could probably plot something meaningless
> from the news history page there :)
>
>
>> Initially I was not thinking about wxGUI as default for
>> 6.4.0. Few days ago some of devs/users started speaking
>> about that.
>
> May I humbly suggest to make that a release goal for 6.4.1 in
> ~two months time. Hopefully with all C++/wx issues solved and
> it will have had lots more testing. 'til then Wx will be heavily
> advertised with this release & so should see plenty of exposure.
>
>
> regards,
> Hamish
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> grass-dev mailing list
> grass-dev at lists.osgeo.org
> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/grass-dev