[GRASSLIST:100] Re: Considering replacing ESRI

[Andrew]

I am a self-taught, non-geology/geography person (physics is my 
"trade"). I began learning GIS from the ground up without guidance in 
1995 to assist a Geology Prof in the school where I was an adjunct. I 
have used IDRISI, Xmap8, Grass, ArcView/ArcGIS and a lot of associated 
tools and have had considerable time and opportunity to onsider the 
"commercial package" option. It is ALWAYS possible to provide the 
functionality you need, but you have to understand the techniques 
well-enough to evaluste the outcomes. You also need a scripter or coder 
around who can do the conversions and batching, etc, that are inevitable 
when the tools) available don't quite do what you want.

ESRI is analogous to Microsoft if GIS suites are regarded as spatial 
data OS's. It was created with huge investments of time and energy 
according to a single philosophy of analysis in an effort to provide a 
single modular interface for this kind of work. How much of Windows, 
Office, etc do you really take advantage of when you purchase the latest 
and greatest version (simply to remain "current", whatever that means 
with software versioning/patching).?

When you know what you need and you know what is available you can work 
(almost) for free.

seeker at eventhorizon.ca wrote:
> Folks,
> 
> 	First of all I need to let you know that I am not currently working in the
> 	GIS field.  I do however support the Unix systems that are currently used
> 	by the people in our GIS area.
> 
> 	I certainly don't understand the complexities of our GIS area but I can
> 	see that we have a huge investment in ESRI products:
> 
> 	ArcInfo
> 	ArcView
> 	ArcSDE
> 	ArcIMS
> 
> 	These products are tied to an Oracle backend.
> 
> 	My question is this:  Is GRASS able to replace any of the above listed products
> 	and if so has anyone ever made this type of move in the past.  I can see
> 	huge cost savings here if it is possible.
> 
> 	I would appreciate any feedback.  I am trying to determine if it is
> 	worthwhile for me to explore Open Source alternatives for our GIS area so
> 	if anyone can offer some insight it would really help me out.
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> --
> CJR
> 
>