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365 lines
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>The Future of GRASS?</TITLE
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>The Geographic Information Systems: GRASS HOWTO</TH
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><A
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NAME="FUTURE"
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>8. The Future of GRASS?</A
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></H1
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><P
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> Excellent question! Several possible answers have been thrown out:
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</P
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><P
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></P
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><OL
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TYPE="1"
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><LI
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><P
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> USA/CERL's announced intention is to use GRASS and COTS (commercial
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off-the-shelf software) for internal uses, to leave the GRASS
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public web- and ftp-site on its system indefinitely, and to sign
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cooperative research and development agreements with three
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companies: (1) the Environmental Sciences Research Institute
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(ESRI), (2) Intergraph, and (3) Logiciels et Applications
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Scientifiques (L.A.S.) Inc. The first two agreements encouraged
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the incorporation of GRASS concepts into ESRI's and Intergraph's
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commercial GISs. The third encouraged the adaptation of GRASS'
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concepts and code into a new commercial GIS by L.A.S. L.A.S. also
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offered to encourage the continuation of a public domain GRASS, as
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a viable stand-alone system and as a potential source of new ideas
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and code for L.A.S.'s GRASSLAND. One observer noted that the first
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two agreements might be akin to someone signing Linux over to
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Microsoft. The same observer considers the experiment by/with
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L.A.S. to be an interesting possibility - an attempt to keep viable
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public domain and commercial versions of GRASS.
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> Some people believe that GRASS will wither without USA/CERL's
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central management. Some believe that the Open GIS Consortium will
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successfully guide industry into an open architecture that will
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benefit all developers and users. Others believe that OGIS' effort
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will lead to a cacophony of almost similar (but not quite
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interoperable) vendor-specific "standards," so the loss of GRASS as
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an open development platform will be felt sorely.
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> Some people believe that developments on some campuses and other
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sites may result in those institutes keeping GRASS for awhile, but
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in non-standard forms. In short, GRASS will undergo "cell
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division" and lead to a cacophony of internally valuable, but
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externally unused, GISs.
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> Others hope that GRASS' previous management model under USA/CERL
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has left it ready for a new model. Perhaps:
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</P
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><P
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></P
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><OL
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TYPE="a"
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><LI
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><P
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> Under a new mentor, such as NASA (which needs an open,
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powerful and scientific, GIS integrated with image processing
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system for its Earth Observing System).
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> Under a distributed management model... perhaps somewhat like Linux?
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> Perhaps a bit of a hybrid? Perhaps a Web-based effort could
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spawn a series of usenet discussion groups beginning with
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</P
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><P
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></P
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><UL
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><LI
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><P
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> comp.infosystems.gis.grass, and evolving to:
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> comp.infosystems.gis.grass.academics
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> comp.infosystems.gis.grass.publicservice
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> comp.infosystems.gis.grass.commercialvalueadded
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> comp.infosystems.gis.grass.commercialdistributors
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> comp.infosystems.gis.grass.programming
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> comp.infosystems.gis.grass.users
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> comp.infosystems.gis.grass.centralcommittee
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</P
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></LI
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></UL
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><P
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> Clearly the topics are a bit tongue-in-cheek. However, under this
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model, a Central Committee (including representation of academic,
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public service [government and nongovernmental organizations],
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commercial distributors and value added firms, programmers, and
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users) would guide overall grass development and testing. The
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other special interest groups would serve their user communities.
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Academics, for example, would involve GIS and GRASS education, but
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would also try to pull GRASS development in its direction. Value
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added commercial developers would serve their own interests,
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including trying to pull GRASS development in a direction that
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would help their businesses. Users would help each other learn
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GRASS, develop workarounds to bugs, etc.
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</P
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></LI
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></OL
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></LI
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></OL
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><P
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> GRASS offers considerable potential for:
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</P
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><P
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></P
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><UL
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><LI
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><P
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> Use as a scientific, as well as a traditional graphically oriented
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GIS. Many GISs can make pretty maps. Many of those GISs cannot
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easily perform certain scientific analytical functions as easily or
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powerfully as GRASS. GRASS was designed and developed in response
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to a perceived need for scientific GIS, specifically for
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environmental analysis, and the environmental management/protection
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of public lands. Incidentally, there is at least one Web-based
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GRASS version.
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<A
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HREF="www.regis.berkeley.edu/grasslinks"
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TARGET="_top"
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><I
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CLASS="CITETITLE"
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>GRASSLINKS</I
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></A
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>,
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developed at
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<A
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HREF="www.berkeley.edu"
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TARGET="_top"
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><I
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CLASS="CITETITLE"
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>The University of California at Berkeley</I
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></A
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>,
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uses Web forms to submit commands to the server, which
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creates .gif-based display output, places the images into pages,
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and serves them up to the requester. More on that later.
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> Education. GRASS is easier to teach and learn than some other
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GISs. It is easier to modify (for those that want to learn GIS as
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computer science, rather than as "geography") than most other GISs
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that come without source code and treat the program as a magical
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black box. And, of course, it is more affordable for the student
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of GIS than many other GISs.
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> Applications research and development. Many universities have used
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GRASS. Its available source code, easy modification, easy
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scriptability, etc., give it distinct advantages over some more
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closed systems.
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> Public Service. GRASS has been used as a scientific GIS for many
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public service applications. There is considerable value in
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continuing a robust GIS that can ba packaged with any UNIX
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workstation. There is considerably more value if that UNIX
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workstation universe can include Linux (but is not constrained only
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to Linux).
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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>GIS research and development. For example - do you want to
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experiment with a different data model? Add it to GRASS!
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</P
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></LI
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><LI
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><P
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> Commercialization. This document gives contact information for a
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commercial version of GRASS. That company (and perhaps others?)
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may welcome your help in enhancing/supporting their product.
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</P
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></LI
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></UL
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><P
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> Who would be the Linus Torvalds equivalent in this management model?
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Perhaps no single person. I have been involved in GRASS for about a
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decade, when GRASS was the only GIS that satisfied my needs in
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scientific data management and GIS application. Indeed, I had been a
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dedicated avoider of the user-unfriendly UNIX environment until GRASS
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forced me to learn it. Several senior GRASS developers are active in
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GRASS-related activities and would like to see the continued vitality of
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an open GRASS. It's likely that a reborn GRASS would attract a new crop
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of friends. Thus the concept of a "Central Committee" to collectively
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lead GRASS' transition to a more open management and development style.
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</P
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><P
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> In short, the Linux community has an opportunity to take under its wing
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a killer ap. GRASS' current public domain status is slightly different
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from Linux's. However, that status could be discussed....
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</P
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><P
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> Comments would be appreciated!
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</P
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