The GRASS Development Team announces
We are happy to announce that a new stable version of GRASS GIS has been released today. This release fixes several bugs discovered in the 6.2.0 source code. It is solely for stability purposes and adds no new features. Besides bug fixes it also includes a number of new message translations, updates for the help pages, and will better handle errors caused by missing or incorrectly installed support software. It also introduces a new 3D raster module which was left out of the last release due to time constraints.
GRASS 6.2.0 added hundreds of new features, see the earlier 6.2.0 release announcement (Oct. 2006) for more details.
The Geographic Resources Analysis Support System, commonly referred to as GRASS, is a Geographic Information System (GIS) combining powerful raster, vector, and geospatial processing engines into a single integrated software suite. GRASS includes tools for spatial modeling, visualization of raster and vector data, management and analysis of geospatial data, and the processing of satellite and aerial imagery. It also provides the capability to produce sophisticated presentation graphics and hardcopy maps.
GRASS is currently used around the world in academic and commercial settings as well as by many governmental agencies and environmental consulting companies. It runs on a variety of popular hardware platforms and is Free open-source software released under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
GRASS is a proposed founding project of the new Open Source Geospatial Foundation. In support of the movement towards consolidation in the open source geospatial software world, GRASS is tightly integrated with the latest GDAL/OGR libraries. This enables access to an extensive range of raster and vector formats, including OGC-conformal Simple Features. GRASS also makes use of the highly regarded PROJ.4 software library with support for most known map projections and the easy definition of new and rare map projections via custom parameterization.
GNU/Linux, Mac OS X/Darwin, Microsoft Windows (native using MinGW or with full UNIX support via Cygwin), Sun Solaris (SPARC/Intel), Silicon Graphics Irix, HP-UX, DEC-Alpha, AIX, BSD, iPAQ/Linux and other UNIX compliant platforms. GRASS runs on both 32 and 64 bit systems with large files (>2GB) supported by many key modules.
The new source code is available now and binary packages for major operating systems will be published shortly.
For details on GRASS software capabilities please refer to: http://grass.itc.it/intro/general.php, the previous GRASS 6.0.0 and GRASS 6.2.0 release announcements, and the newly renovated Wiki collaborative help system.
(selected improvements from the more than 100 minor and important fixes)
For a comprehensive list of changes see the ChangeLog.
For a complete list of commands available in GRASS 6.2.1 see the online manuals and the GRASS 6 module list.
We are always looking for testers, code developers, and technical writers to help us maintain and accelerate the development cycle. The GRASS GIS project is developed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (the GPL) in the open by volunteers the world over. GRASS differs from many other GIS software packages used in the professional world in that it is developed and distributed by users for users, mostly on a volunteer basis, in the open, and is given away for free. Emphasis is placed on interoperability and unlimited access to data as well as on software flexibility and evolution rate.
Release history: