QGIS » QGIS Application

I cannot reproduce this:

GRASS 6.4.0svn (spearfish60):~ > v.buffer --interface-description
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>                           
<!DOCTYPE task SYSTEM "grass-interface.dtd">                     
<task name="v.buffer">                                           
        <description>                                            
                Creates a buffer around features of given type (areas must contain centroid).
        </description>                                                                       
        <keywords>                                                                           
                vector, buffer                                                               
        </keywords>                                                                          

The new code is obviously named "v.buffer" as before:

GRASS 6.4.0svn (spearfish60):~/grass64 > head vector/v.buffer2/Makefile
MODULE_TOPDIR = ../..

PGM = v.buffer
...

The GRASS 6 production line should maintain full compatibility even if a module is rewritten from scratch as in the case of v.buffer.

GRASS 6.4.0svn (spearfish60):~/grass64 > v.buffer help

Description:
 Creates a buffer around features of given type (areas must contain centroid).

Keywords:
 vector, buffer

Usage:
 v.buffer [-sc] input=name output=name [type=string[,string,...]]
   [layer=value] [distance=value] [minordistance=value] [angle=value]
   [bufcolumn=name] [scale=value] [tolerance=value] [--overwrite]
   [--verbose] [--quiet]

Ha, I see the problem:

# GRASS 6.3, http://grass.osgeo.org/grass63/manuals/html63_user/v.buffer.html:
buffer=float
    Buffer distance in map units

# GRASS 6.4, http://grass.osgeo.org/grass64/manuals/html64_user/v.buffer.html:
distance=float
    Buffer distance along major axis in map units

This is bad and needs to be fixed in GRASS unless QGIS can update "buffer" to "distance" in the XML file.

Markus

I would suggest to change it in GRASS. If this is not possible, please let us know, and we'll change the qgis module (but I do not like the idea of having two different modules, one for grass63 and one for grass64, even though they can be selected during compilation)

Markus:

unless QGIS can update "buffer" to "distance" in the XML file.

Even though the old name now works again, the XML file should be updated for forward compatibility with GRASS 7, when the old name will be removed again. (currently both names for it work)

Hamish

(but I do not like the idea of having two different modules,
one for grass63 and one for grass64, even though they can be
selected during compilation)

... ok, leave it as buffer= then.

H

Same thing happens for r.surf.fractal (option d=float has been changed in option dimension=float), so it does not work with grass64

Replying to [comment:8 pcav]:

Same thing happens for r.surf.fractal (option d=float has been
changed in option dimension=float), so it does not work with
grass64

that one should not matter, the parser will accept shorter names.
See http://grass.osgeo.org/wiki/Module_command_line_parser

I reopen the ticket, to remember changing the option when
grass63 will be deprecated, and no longer widely available.

maybe better just to leave the XML file as it is and close the ticket. A stable GRASS 7 release may be a long time away.

Hamish

Replying to [comment:8 pcav]:

Same thing happens for r.surf.fractal (option d=float has been
changed in option dimension=float), so it does not work with
grass64

Hamish ha scritto:

no? what is the exact error message?

Paolo:

option d not recognized

Using grep I can not find any trace of that message in the latest qgis trunk/ SVN or GRASS's libgis. Has it been retranslated?

does QGIS's grass toolbox double-check the module options using the 'g.module --interface-description' or does it just try to run what the programmer/user threw at it and see what happens?

??
Hamish

An useful comment by neteler:
I feel that it is a parsing problem in QGIS that might expect full names. If so it should not do so.