11 Sep 2003: GRASS 5.1 renamed to GRASS 5.7, see roadmap
GRASS 5.7 is under development. It is rather complete now.
Development releases are provided for people who want to help test, debug,
and improve GRASS 5.7.
GRASS 5.7 features
The improvements of the vector architecture
cover the new 3D multiattribute, multilayer vector library,
a modified NVIZ and a few database management tools.
DBMS is now integral part of the system.
Vector library (geometry):
multiformat - also external data formats supported (SHAPE-file, PostGIS)
without the need of data conversion (through OGR library with 'v.external');
Optional PostGIS support implemented for geometry storage via OGR library.
which probably allows for multiuser write access to the same vector map;
spatial index - v.build (was: v.support) significantly accelerated;
Database Management Interface (attributes):
Attribute storage in DBMS for compatibility with industry standards
(SQL based interface for PostgreSQL, mySQL, ODBC, dBase)
multiattribute - attributes saved in dBase files (default) or
saved in external DBMS
multilayer - features in one vector may represent one or several
layers and may be linked to one or several external tables
2D/3D vectors may be created (see screenshot)
(eg TINs), already supported in NVIZ
forms library implemented for user friendly query dialogs
Linear reference systems supported (LRS, to come)
Applications/Misc:
SQL queries/selects supported by vector modules
attributes updating is supported through the forms library
(d.what.vect lets you modify directly the attached attributes)
Shortest path vector networking (screenshot) - based on
DGLIB (Directed Graph Library), costs may be assigned
both to nodes and arcs (and also different in both directions of a vector
line)
new v.digit with GUI under construction (screenshot)
import and export of any OGR
vector formats as supported by OGR (Shapefile, TIGER,
MapInfo and GML2, PostGIS and DGN)
GUI generated by front end on runtime and display
manager (screenshots)
i18n: support for multiple languages (at time framework implemented,
translators needed)
multiple GRASS sessions: a user can start more than one session
in parallel
Large File Support
GRASS 5.7 supports reading and writing large files (> 2GB)
if it is possible in your operating system. If you compile with
-D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64, you should be able to have raster maps
which are larger than 2Gb.
GRASS 5.7 Development
