proposal to rename v.in.ascii/v.out.ascii to v.in.text/v.out.text (or similar)

[mlennert]

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).

[wenzeslaus]

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".

[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..?

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.

2c, Hamish

[mlennert]

Replying to 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 ?

Moritz

[martinl]

Replying to 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.

[mlennert]

Replying to martinl:

Replying to 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.

Moritz

[martinl]

Replying to 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.

[mlennert]

Replying to martinl:

Replying to 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.

Moritz