GRASS: Introduction

Geographic Resources Analysis Support System

Commonly referred to as GRASS, this is a free Geographic Information System (GIS) used for geospatial data management and analysis, image processing, graphics/maps production, spatial modeling, and visualization. GRASS is currently used in academic and commercial settings around the world, as well as by many governmental agencies and environmental consulting companies. GRASS is an official project of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation. See also: Wikipedia entry (EN). See also: GRASS User map.

Newcomers: How to start with GRASS?

• Installation Guide for GRASS binaries
• GRASS migration hints (coming from different GIS)
• First Day Documentation
• Tutorial and Courses in various languages

Commercial GRASS support

There are numerous companies providing professional support.

Who is using GRASS?

Academic institutions, governmental agencies, public administration:

• ASU, USA: In the Mediterranean Landscape Dynamics/NFS project GRASS is used.
• Duke University, USA: GRASS is used for LIDAR and large scale terrain analysis.
• FBK-irst (formerly ITC-irst), Italy: GRASS is used for detection of unexploded bombs from World War II as well as Road-kill risk maps and other projects.
• European Commission, DG - Joint Research Centre, Italy: PVGIS: Map-based Assessment of Solar Energy Resource - GIS-based inventory of solar energy resource and assessment of the electricity generation from photovoltaics (PV) in Europe (r.sun module).
• McGill University, Canada: Groundwater management in the Basin of Mexico. Use of GRASS: Grass has been used to process all the required data as well as a pre and post processor for MODFLOW. GRASS has also been linked to PostgreSQL in which all the information is stored in relational tables.
• NOAA, USA: The GLOBE DEM was generated with GRASS: Development & Assessment of the Global Land One-km Base Elevation Digital Elevation Model (GLOBE)
• NOAA/NWS, USA: The Ohio River Forecast Center (OHRFC).
  GRASS, R, and gstat are used for precipitation analyses, which focuses on determining the radar estimated precipitation bias relative to a rain gauge only estimate. GRASS is also used as part of the NOAA/NWS Advanced Hydrologic Prediction Services (AHPS) Ensemble Streamflow Prediction (ESP) probabilistic forecast process. For this they use NWS Climate Prediction Center (CPC) 6-to-10 day, monthly, and seasonal outlook grids to make time series adjustments to the historical precipitation & temperature inputs that drive their hydrologic models.
• NCSU, USA: At North Carolina State University GRASS is used for erosion modelling, LIDAR data processing and analysis, coastal applications, visualization and more.
• ORNL, USA: Geographic Information Science & Technology Group of Oak Ridge National Laboratory
• University of California at Davis, USA: GRASS is used for various landscape and terrain modeling approaches to quantify various aspects of soil development. In addition, GRASS is used to pre-process much of the data used in the online soil survey system.