GRASS user categories?

[Rich Shepard]

On Tue, 28 Sep 1999, Lori Kingery wrote:

> 	CONFIG: compile failing on 5.0 for Sol 4.1.3
> 	LINUX: getting r.tif working under red hat
> 	DATA: translating polar coords to (i don't know)
> 	COMPILE: blah blah
> 	ANNOUNCE: GRASS 5.0
> 	DOCS: where do i find info on ?

Lori,

  Thank you. Prefixes -- especially if we can define a standard set -- will
be extremely useful. I'd like to add a category: APPS: <for algorithms and
applications>.

  But, this does not address the problem I tried to express. I'm not
promoting another mail list (I subscribe to enough as it is), but a
compendium of user categories. Perhaps a table on one of the web sites would
be the appropriate place for this.

  I am interested in learning for what purposed people are using GRASS. I'd
like to know what modules (other than those already posted on the web site)
are in use or development. How many biologists/ecologists use GRASS? How
many geologists or land planners? Who's working at fairly large scales
(i.e., comparatively small sites) and who's working at small scales
(regions, countries or hemispheres)? What sort of problems are being solved
better using a GRASS GIS than by a strictly-numeric approach? How many users
are in government, academia and the private sector? Who is using GRASS for
production work versus reasearch/teaching GIS principles or analyses? What
sort of hardware have people integrated into GRASS? (For example, I have a
high-resolution scanner, a 36"x48" digitizing table and an HP DeskJet 2500C
for output; what are others using?)

  These are the types of questions I have. I think that answers to these
would be useful to the community in general. As far as I'm concerned there
is no distinction between users and programmers, but there are distinctions
among the different types of users and our differing needs.

  I'm just a curious person and I'd like to see GRASS and linux become more
visible. Again, I'm available to help with this effort; I won't just sit
back and let others fulfill my needs.

Rich

Dr. Richard B. Shepard, President

                       Applied Ecosystem Services, Inc. (TM)
              Making environmentally-responsible mining happen. (SM)         
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