[Qgis-developer] SAGA Interface for QGIS - Final GSoC Report

[Camilo Polymeris]

> It's great to see the final touches improving the usability.
>
> Regarding the number of settings it would be good to offer as few
> choices as possible. Many times the settings can be avoided and a
> sensible default choice can be used. For example the setting "Number
> of tags to show" is very confusing.

Agreed, in general terms. What the right number of settings is, we'll
find out through experimentation. As you probably noticed, the 'number
of tags' slider doesn't actually do anything, yet.

> For the module dialog the status bar could be changed to a simple
> QLabel if you are not going to add further widgets or indicators to
> it. The status bar also contains a superfluous size gripper for
> changing dialog size. Additionally the Open and Save buttons simply
> close the module dialog - that's a bit unexpected :)

I use the size gripper! Sometimes the parameters don't fit
horizontally, so I expand the dialog. Anyways, the feedback mechanism
should be refined. I like those "non intrusive" pop-ups that e.g.
firefox features, don't know if they are available in Qt, though.

>> Finally, due to rising interest in interfacing other libraries (GRASS,
>> OTB) I have published the API documentation[3] on the framework and
>> started writing a Developer's Tutorial[4].
>
> Thanks for the documentation. In the developer's tutorial I am missing
> two important bits:
> 1. how to implement the module's functionality when "Execute" button is clicked

Yes. The tutorial is in a very early stage. Next chapter will be about
that. I am looking for some simple algorithm or library to have the
demo module do something at least remotely realistic/useful.

> 2. how to execute a module from a script or python console

That would belong in the user's docs, I think. I have recently added
some convenience functions. Will probably modify them, but for now you
can e.g. type:

from processing import framework
framework["Pythagoras' Tree"].execute(Method = 2)

See also issues #46 & #47 (github issue tracker).

> It was great to have you aboard during the summer! We hope you enjoyed
> it and you will continue hacking on the processing/SAGA tools to
> support even broader range of modules and to make the user experience
> as seamless as possible. And of course you are welcome to start
> hacking on other parts of QGIS, too :-)

Thanks! It has been a great opportunity and lots of fun. I certainly
will continue hacking on the processing & SAGA code.
In the long term, there are also some experiments I'd like to do with
some geophysical models, to return a bit to the semantics of the
problem.


Regards,

Camilo