Introduction¶
GRASS GIS¶
GRASS GIS is an open-source GIS with over 500 modules, most of which provide advanced spatial analysis and modeling capabilities using raster, vector, 3 dimensional (3D), and temporal formats. Its scientific modules are often used as plugins to other systems. For example, QGIS, another open-source GIS, implements a processing provider system that can borrow third-party GIS modules such as GRASS GIS and SAGA GIS. You may already be using GRASS modules when using QGIS!
A brief history of GRASS GIS¶
GRASS was born in 1982 by the U.S. Army Constructure Engineering Research Laboratory (CERL). Watch The GRASS Story (14:25).
In 1992, they released their last release of GRASS as version 4.1. They provided updates to version 4.1 through 1995 and developed the core components of version 5.
In 1997, GRASS development was taken over by Baylor University in Texas and then by the University of Hannover in Germany led by Markus Neteler.
In October 1999, GRASS 5 was released as open source under the GNU General Public License (GPL).
In June 2000, Huidae Cho joined the core development team of GRASS after his contributions of master’s work to the project.
In March 2005, GRASS 6 was released.
In February 2015, GRASS 7 was released.
In January 2022, GRASS 8 was released.