[GRASSLIST:1253] Re: creating a desktop GIS application using GRASS

[Bill Dickinson Jr]

>
>I feel that if somebody want to profit from the development
>many people have put into GRASS, they should give their developments back.
>History has shown that proprietary software makers for GRASS
>do not help GRASS, but keep it low.
>
>As far as I can tell you want to make a proprietary product out of GRASS.
>This is not something many Free Software people will like,
>because you want to profiting from the freedom they gave you
>without giving them or other people the same opportunity.
>

I agree completely that someone (like me) should not profit off of 
the hard work of others, which is, of course, the root of this entire 
debate. I also believe, though, that there is only so far you can go 
without some amount of commercial development, so I guess I am not 
completely in the Free Software camp. I think of it more as being in 
the Reasonably Priced Software camp. ;)

Seriously, though, it would be absolutely wrong to profit off of 
other peoples work and I certainly don't want to imply that this is 
what I want to do. What I would like to do is help create an 
environment where GRASS is more readily available to a wider audience 
and is easier for new users to get involved with. Debate is certainly 
worthwhile on the topic, but I also believe that there has to be some 
action to see just where you can take things - hence my pushes for a 
"commercial product" (granted, possibly not the best term) using 
GRASS.

We might be discussing a very fine difference of view about my 
proposed cd-rom, but it is definitely something I want open to 
discussion as I would hate to come crosswise of the GRASS community. 
Currently, my view is that my proprietary piece would be the unique 
analysis process of the remotely sensed data - something that is 
unique to our researchers and could not be argued as our proprietary 
property. I agree that GRASS itself could not be sold as proprietary, 
but our piece could be and we have the right to attempt to do so.

The question becomes how does one attempt to sell a GRASS module and, 
I guess as well, is it even right to do so.

Sticky question, really.

In an ideal world, my company would target any commercial products at 
the big players (ESRI, ENVI, IDRISI) while also funding development 
on open-source initiatives (GRASS). We may be able to work something 
out along these lines in the end as NASA is favorable to open-source 
initiatives, but I know my company would not spend any of their own 
money on such a thing.

Which raises the question in my mind as to what people's vision is 
for GRASS. Do you want to see the project grow and become more 
respected as a development environment, or is it strictly a nifty 
little project to work on to give a small segment of GIS 
professionals an alternative option to the commercial GIS products? I 
believe open-source development has a lot of strengths and is a more 
noble effort then the mercenary commercial practices of big business, 
but I also believe the reality is that for a development effort to be 
anything more then "nifty" it has to make it in the real world as 
well.

By "real world" I mean GRASS needs to show that it can compete, on a 
real level, with ESRI and the others in creating useful GIS 
applications in an efficient manner. I don't think GRASS is there yet 
for all it can do, and some of what it can do it does better then 
ESRI. As distasteful as it may be to some people, the move towards 
solid commercial products is one way to get to that goal.

We have seen the same movement in the primary open-source example - 
Linux. From a truly free, openly available operating system, we have 
seen Linux become viable commercial products distributed as many 
different flavors.

Why couldn't GRASS follow the same progression? I know it comes back 
to how to correctly recognize the countless hours that mostly unnamed 
developers have spent getting GRASS to where it is now, but there has 
to be an answer out there somewhere. One answer may be for the 
developers to form a more solid legal entity and supply licenses. 
Granted, that is an off-the-cuff answer, but it is one possible 
answer.

Hmmm, I guess I could ramble on, but I will see what the response is 
to all that first. ;)

Bill



-- 

Bill Dickinson
GIS Specialist
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Environmental & Safety Branch, Code 250
wdickins at pop700.gsfc.nasa.gov