#2396: proposal to rename v.in.ascii/v.out.ascii to v.in.text/v.out.text (or
similar)
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Reporter: mlennert | Owner: grass-dev@…
Type: enhancement | Status: new
Priority: normal | Milestone: 7.0.0
Component: Vector | Version: svn-releasebranch70
Keywords: ascii | Platform: Unspecified
Cpu: Unspecified |
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I have the feeling that less and less people actually know what ASCII
stands for (at least this is the case with my students). I propose to
rename v.in.ascii/v.out.ascii to use a more generic name such as
v.in.text/v.out.text (or similar).
* keywords: ascii => ascii, API change
* priority: normal => blocker
Comment:
I think you made a good point.
I'm not sure what is our policy about this but since it is an API change,
this is in fact a blocker unless we provide the other names as
alternatives. (We can of course resolve blocker as won't fix or move
milestone to futuristic 8.0.0.)
Note that there are also raster modules with "ascii" in their names. And
also the format is called "GRASS ASCII vector format".
meh, I'm not in favor of this. ASCII is the one universal format which has
survived for decades and is exactly known and described. "text" is... um,
a Word document? a pdf? an image scan of observer logs? who knows..?
IMNSHO if people don't know what ASCII is, then they should learn. This is
technical software, a minimum level is computer literacy is going to be
required. And we can help teach them through good tooltips, menu
presentation/organization, and documentation, and they will be better
future researchers for it.
Replying to [comment:2 hamish]:
> meh, I'm not in favor of this. ASCII is the one universal format which
has survived for decades and is exactly known and described. "text" is...
um, a Word document? a pdf? an image scan of observer logs? who knows..?
>
One could argue, though, that v.in.ascii is the wrong (and thhus
confusing) name since you can import files which are in different
encodings than ASCII. But I agree that 'text' is not necessarily clearer.
Maybe v.in.delimitedtext ?
> One could argue, though, that v.in.ascii is the wrong (and thhus
confusing) name since you can import files which are in different
encodings than ASCII. But I agree that 'text' is not necessarily clearer.
Maybe v.in.delimitedtext ?
it will not help to make it more clear. The module also import vector data
in GRASS ASCII (text) format which is not definitely a delimited text.
Replying to [comment:4 martinl]:
> Replying to [comment:3 mlennert]:
>
> > One could argue, though, that v.in.ascii is the wrong (and thhus
confusing) name since you can import files which are in different
encodings than ASCII. But I agree that 'text' is not necessarily clearer.
Maybe v.in.delimitedtext ?
>
> it will not help to make it more clear. The module also import vector
data in GRASS ASCII (text) format which is not definitely a delimited
text.
Agreed. Don't know if there is an easy "solution" to this. Maybe we should
just live with our historical heritage and keep 'ascii'... Don't think
that this should be a blocker.
> Agreed. Don't know if there is an easy "solution" to this. Maybe we
should just live with our historical heritage and keep 'ascii'... Don't
think that this should be a blocker.
it's blocker in the sense that it must be solved before we release GRASS
7.0.0. So we have to options:
* to find better name for modules
* or to close this ticket as `wontfix`
Replying to [comment:6 martinl]:
> Replying to [comment:5 mlennert]:
>
> > Agreed. Don't know if there is an easy "solution" to this. Maybe we
should just live with our historical heritage and keep 'ascii'... Don't
think that this should be a blocker.
>
> it's blocker in the sense that it must be solved before we release GRASS
7.0.0. So we have to options:
>
> * to find better name for modules
> * or to close this ticket as `wontfix`
>
> Personally I am fine with current names.
As Hamish said: we have more important things to do than this, so I'm
closing it as wontfix as I don't see an easy consensus on a new name.