the LAS/US Army GIS case

["Aldo Solari [APS]" <SOLARIS@cicei.ulpgc.es>]

There was GRASS, a huge GIS package  made by the US Army with public
US money.  But the US Army and  LAS  (the  company  who  took  over)
agreed  on  the  following (full text of agreement is enclosed below
,1):

 ''4) Distribution of GRASSLAND for  Windows/95 and Windows/NT (as a
commercial product) and distribution of GRASSLAND for SOLARIS and  a
few  other  undefined  UNIX  workstations  platforms  (as a freeware
product)''

If you go to their  ftp/www  site, there's **nothing else** than the
info for the nearly 1000 buck$ (500 for students) commercial license
for W95/NT and some manuals: LAS is doing everything possible NOT TO
RELEASE to the public the FREE Unix versions they agreed to  provide
as  well  as  the CODE they agreed to maintain AND, freely, release.
Both materials could be  used  in  SEUL  or  have them as a starting
point to port GRASS to SEUL.

This issue may be important if SEUL will set up a GIS-coding/porting
group: the GRASS code would be a precious material  to  port  it  to
SEUL.   Also,  we  could even put our hands on the already available
somewhere Unix  ports  but  this  canadian  company (www.las.com) is
playing a dirty  game  (hidding  the  code  and  ports  as  much  as
possible) for its benefit.

The first beta was readily available by ftp/www but now all the unix
material has vanished.

If SEUL chooses to go on with  a  GIS group, now or in the future, I
would suggest to WRITE to the boss at USACERL and  tell  him  what's
going on ...

This  kind  of  story is repeated over and over again ...  we need a
GPLed full power xGIS thing for SEUL and the world

Cheers,

    APS


(1) COOPERATIVE RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT AGREEMENT BETWEEN LAS AND  CERL
    FOR THE PURPOSE OF GRASS TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER


    CERL's EN Commander, Colonel James  T. Scott and LAS's President
    Gilles Clement the day of the signature of the  CRADA.   In  the
    back,  Robert Carl Lozar, Principal Investigator at COE Lab, Ms.
    Bea Saenz-Shahin,ORTA Program Coordinator  and William D. Goran,
    Chief of Land Managment Laboratory.

   The U.S.  Army  Construction  Engineering  Research  Laboratories
   (CERL),  Champaign  Ill., Announced in February 1996 that it will
   no longer develop  public-domain  software  related to Geographic
   Resources Analysis Support System (GRASS).

    CERL  has  signed  on  June  7th  1996  with  LAS  Inc  a  CRADA
    (Cooperative  Research  And  Development  Agreement)   for   the
    transfer  of GRASS technology.  The future development of GRASS,
    its  distribution  in  a   commercial  environment  is  now  LAS
    responsibility.



BACKGROUND

CERL  intents to no longer develop, support or distribute the public
domain version of the GRASS GIS.   At the same time LAS has released
a commercial, value-added versions of GRASS (known as GRASSLAND)  on
widely used hardware configurations.

Therefore, so that:

1)  The  research, time and money invested into GRASS in the past is
not lost and so that

2) A Commercial  Off  The  Shelf  (COTS)  alternative source for the
GRASS capabilities is  available  for  military  installations  (and
general public) and

3)  Growth  of  spatial  analysis  R&D  may continue outside of CERL
itself,

It is proposed that LAS  and  CERL  enter into a mutually beneficial
Cooperative Research And Development Agreement (CRADA).

This agreement is mutually beneficial because:

1) CERL must ensure that there will a  COTS  GRASS  alternative  for
their  military installations which have invested considerable money
and labor resources into GRASS implementation.

2) LAS is interested in seeing  GRASS  survive since it is the basis
of its new package GRASSLAND.

3) Though the current version of GRASS (4.1) is a very good and very
stable software  package  for  the  market  place,  and  before  the
decision  to  do no more development and distribution was made, CERL
performed a good deal of R&D which has resulted in significant GRASS
enhancements  since  version  4.1.   To  ensure  this  investment of
government moneys is not lost to  the  public  when  CERL  supported
GRASS  ends,  LAS  will  integrate  some  of  these  into their COTS
GRASSLAND product.

4)  GRASSLAND  is  a   logic   continuity   to  GRASS  for  military
installations since it solves some of the  most  important  problems
remaining in GRASS4.1 and since LAS will fully support the GRASSLAND
software package.

5)  CERL  is continuing to invest in advanced environmental modeling
based on  our  GIS  technology  needs.   Those  which have potential
interest to the general GIS market place could be made available  to
LAS for integration into future releases of GRASSLAND.

LAS  therefore proposes to implement a technology transfer agreement
that will help CERL to transion out of GRASS development and support
without putting the GRASS  based  R&D investment of several military
installations in  jeopardy.   Because  GRASS  has  a  public  domain
history,  and there are other individuals and groups who may wish to
continue to be active  in  GRASS  development,  LAS  is free to make
additional arrangements with those additionally interested parties.


RESPONSABILITIES OF THE PARTIES TO THIS AGREEMENT:

Each parties will have  the  following  enumerated  responsibilities
within the scope of this agreement:

LAS Responsibilities

Take  over  most  activities  previously  performed by the Office of
GRASS Integration (OGI) within the scope of this CRADA:

  1) Provision of a full  technical  support plan for both users and
developers,

  2) Enhancement, maintenance and progressive development  of  GRASS
user's    and    programmer's   documentation   within   GRASSLAND's
documentation,

  3) Progressive integration of existing  code developed by CERL and
  other interested parties into GRASSLAND,

  4) Distribution of GRASSLAND for Windows/95 and Windows/NT  (as  a
commercial  product) and distribution of GRASSLAND for SOLARIS and a
few other  undefined  UNIX  workstations  platforms  (as  a freeware
product),

  5) Maintenance of all  GRASS  source  code  (after  and  including
  GRASS4.1),  and  make it available to the user's community through
  an ftp site

  6) Progressive take over and maintenance  of the GRASS web and ftp
  sites and link  to  the  GRASSLAND  web  site,  (ftp  site  to  be
  transitioned  from  CERL  to LAS within 30 months after this CRADA
  becomes effective),

  7) Assistance and  technical  support  in transfering CERL's GRASS
    based application into GRASSLAND,

  8) Provide a continuing vehicle for CERL spatial research  into  a
COTS environment.


CERL Responsabilities

Provide  LAS  with  the  tools  necessary so this techology transfer
agreement is fully successful including:

1) Provide an Internet WWW and ftp facility for exchange of code and
information between CERL, LAS and other interested parties,

2) Provide all current documentation in digital format (programmer's
manual, user's manual, man  pages,  tutorial and others), 3) Provide
all source code of GRASS enhancements developed since version 4.1 so
LAS  can  intergrate  these  into  its  COTS  environment   product,
GRASSLAND.   (This  of course does not cover proprietary source code
that is owned or co-owned by third parties).

4) Inform all military  installations  of the existence of GRASSLAND
as a logic continuity to GRASS,

5) Give to LAS information about the  military  installations  where
GRASS has been/is currently used,

6)  Transfer  at  least one GRASS based application such as PRISM or
other, into GRASSLAND.

7) Distribute a press release through its regular channels about the
existence and benefits of the agreement to historic CERL customers.

8) CERL will act as  a  beta-site for GRASSLAND's releases which LAS
will make available to CERL at no cost.  If CERL fields GRASSLAND to
other sites (e.g.  installations), normal commercial charges for the
GRASSLAND product will apply.

9) LAS will have access to new software developed  by  CERL  in  its
spatial  research  program  to provide a COTS vehicle for technology
transfer  to  CERL  users.   The   question  of  royalties  will  be
considered in the future.  For any code/module for  which  LAS  pays
royalties, LAS will exclusively own the rights to that code/module.


DURATION

This  agreement will be in effect for three years or until the goals
and responsabilites of both parties are achieved.


PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS FOR LAS

Mr.Gilles Clement, CEO and Mr.Christian Larouche, PhD, Geomatics.

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