Just my contribution to the discussion regarding Mark's last bit and 
Philip's reply...

Dear Mark,

I am more a scientist than a programmer but I am sufficiently
familiar with Unix and I have been programing several GRASS
programs. However I must tell you that I would rather prefer
GRASS running on a PC under Windows NT (or Windows 4.0)  than on
Unix box. It is PLEASURE working under windows on a PC and
work is much faster (just clicking on icons and menu). Plenty
of available SW for funny low prices allow me to combine those
SW packages which are best for solving a specific task.

> Most GRASS users are analysts, however, and tend to be confronted
> daily with the non-cut-and-driedness of the real world. In that kind of
> context, you need the flexibility and bandwidth that can only be provided
> by powerful languages.

I think you miss the point a little bit. Most of users are 
like Mr. Frank Davis - they want use GRASS immediately solving their
problems and not deeply learn Unix, C and shellscript programming. The task of
GRASS programmers is to provide powerful and easy-to-use tools and not to
tell them: use awk, sed or make your own program.

Cordially,

Jaro

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Jaro Hofierka
Dept. of Cartography, Geoinformatics & Rem. Sensing
Comenius University
842 15 Bratislava          E-mail: hofierka@devin.fns.uniba.sk
Slovakia                           hofierka@geoinfo.fns.uniba.sk
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