GRASS History and source code URLs

GRASS (Geographic Resources Analysis Support System) GRASS has been under continuous development since 1982 and has involved a large number of federal US agencies, universities, and private companies. The core components of GRASS and the management of the integration efforts into GRASS releases were accomplished by the U.S. Army - Construction Engineering Research Laboratory (USA-CERL) in Champaign, Illinois. USA-CERL completed its last release of GRASS as version 4.1 in 1992, and provided five updates and patches to this release through 1995. USA-CERL also wrote the core components of the GRASS 5.0 floating point version.

From 1998-2001, GRASS was hosted at University of Hannover, Germany.

From 2001-2007, GRASS was hosted at ITC-irst, Trento, Italy.

GRASS is developed by a worldwide network of developers who continue to release new GRASS versions regularly. The main web site, the GRASS development mailing list and further lists are hosted at OSGeo Foundation in US since 2008. The source code is maintained in a SVN server which is run along with the bug tracker. The GRASS project is supported by numerous mirror sites.

GRASS releases

1982-1991: Detailed release description table
1982 Fort Hood Information System (FHIS) (Vax 11/780)
1983 Installation Geographic Information System (IGIS) (SUN-1 Microcomputer)
1984 GRASS (SUN-1 and Masscomp)
1985 GRASS 1.0, GRASSnet established [GRASShopper archive 1991-95, GRASSList archive 1996-today]
1986 GRASS 1.1; receives "Exemplary Systems in Government Award" from URISA
1987 GRASS 2.0; first issue of GRASSClippings, GRASS video narrated by William Shatner (Captain Kirk of Star Trek)
1988 GRASS 3.0; Army R&D Achievement Award (Webster, Goran, Shapiro, Westervelt)
1989 GRASS 3.1; First release available on Internet (uxc.cso.uiuc.edu)
1990 (Winter) GRASS 3.2 released through Internet
1991 (July) GRASS 4.0 released through Internet - popularity grows with universities, business and government agencies. Vector Library changed significantly from the library used in GRASS 3.1
1993 (Spring) GRASS 4.1 released through Internet - Federal Lab Consortium - Award for Excellence in Technology Transfer
1995 GRASS 4.1.5 port to Linux: Yung-Tsung Kang, Michigan State University

1995 internal 5.0fp with floating point raster data implementation. US-CERL withdrawal from GRASS [funet copy]

12/1997 GRASS 4.2 Baylor University - The first "GRASS Research Group" takes control of GRASS Development from USACERL. Extended sites format.

This first new GRASS 4.2 release in 4 years adds numerous programs. Popularity increases with academic community.

1998 GRASS 4.2.1 Markus Neteler, University of Hannover, Germany (the team applied 243 fixes and 50 new modules to former 4.2)

HISTORY file with authors

Version 1 (7.1.98)
Version 2 (8.1.98)
Version 3 (11.1.98)
Version 4 (19.1.98)
Version 5 (27.1.98)
Version 6 (29.1.98)
Version 7 (4. Feb. 98)
Version 8 (5. Feb. 98)
Version 9 (3. March 98)
Version 10 (11. March 98)
Version 11a (21. March 98)
Version 12 (1. April 98)
Version 13 (15. April 98)
Version 14 (19. April 98)
Version 15 (30. April 98)
Version 16 (23. May 98)
Version 16a (29. May 98)
Version 17 (12. June 98)
Version 18b (22. July 98)
Version 19 (22. September 98)
Version 20 (7. December 98)
Version 21 (9. March 1999)
Version 22 released 1st November 1999

11/1999 GRASS 4.3 released (based on 4.2.1V22 with a few more fixes)

HISTORY file with authors

June 1999 GRASS 5.0 Baylor University and Markus Neteler

[GRASS 5 beta1 released 30. June 1999]
[GRASS 5 beta2 released 20. July 1999]

HISTORY of GRASS5.0beta2-4 file with authors

[GRASS 5 beta3 released 3. Sep. 1999]

The new GRASS Development Team released:

[GRASS 5 beta4 released 26. Oct. 1999] - GNU GPL release announcement October 23, 1999
[GRASS 5 beta5 released 8. Dec. 1999]
29.12.1999 CVS started for GRASS 5.0
[GRASS 5 beta6 released 16. Feb. 2000] - first version released from CVS

HISTORY of GRASS5.0beta4-6 file with authors

[GRASS 5 beta7 released 20 Apr 2000]
[GRASS 5 beta8 released 26 July 2000]
[GRASS 5.0 beta9 released 6 December 2000]
[GRASS 5.0 beta10 released 7 December 2000] - Press release
[GRASS 5.0 beta11 released 4 Feb 2001]
[GRASS 5.0.0pre1 released 20 May 2001]

2001 - The GRASS Development Team, now headquartered at ITC-irst (Trento, Italy) released:

[GRASS 5.0.0pre2 released 13 September 2001] - Press release
[GRASS 5.0.0pre3 released 16 January 2002] - Press release
[GRASS 5.0.0pre4 released 13 May 2002] - Press release
[GRASS 5.0.0pre5 released 25 June 2002] - Press release
[GRASS 5.0.0 stable released 5 September 2002] - Press release
[GRASS 5.0.1 released 28 January 2003]
[GRASS 5.0.2 released 10 April 2003] - Press release
[GRASS 5.0.3 released 6 November 2003] - Press release

HISTORY (ChangeLog) of GRASS5.0beta6-11, pre1-X file with authors

[GRASS 5.3.0 released 5 May 2004] - Press release

[GRASS 5.4.0 released 5 November 2004]

[GRASS 5.4.1 released 26 July 2007]

Since 2001 - GRASS 5.7.x/6.x development

[GRASS 5.7.0 released 17 June 2004] - Press release

[GRASS 6.0.0beta1 released 12 January 2005]

[GRASS 6.0.0beta2 released 4 February 2005]

[GRASS 6.0.0 released 10 March 2005]

[GRASS 6.0.1RC1 released 3 August 2005]

[GRASS 6.0.1RC2 released 8 August 2005]

[GRASS 6.0.1 released 22 August 2005]

[GRASS 6.0.2RC1 released 29 December 2005]

[GRASS 6.0.2RC2 released 3 January 2006]

[GRASS 6.0.2RC3 released 3 January 2006]

[GRASS 6.0.2RC4 released 6 January 2006]

[GRASS 6.0.2 released 22 Feb 2006]

[GRASS 6.1.0beta1 released 14 Jul 2006]

[GRASS 6.1.0RC1 released 2 Aug 2006]

[GRASS 6.1.0 released 11 Aug 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.0beta1 released 28 Aug 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.0beta2 released 30 Aug 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.0beta3 released 18 Sep 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.0RC1 released 26 Sep 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.0RC2 released 6 Oct 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.0RC3 released 24 Oct 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.0 released 31 Oct 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.1RC1 released 6 Dec 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.1 released 12 Dec 2006]

[GRASS 6.2.2RC1 released 29 May 2007]

[GRASS 6.2.2 released 16 June 2007]

[GRASS 5.4.1 released 26 July 2007]

[GRASS 6.2.3RC1 released 21 Oct 2007]

[GRASS 6.3.0RC1 released 24 Oct 2007]

[GRASS 6.3.0RC2 released 20 Nov 2007]

[GRASS 6.2.3 released 27 Nov 2007]

[GRASS 6.3.0RC3 released 30 Nov 2007]

[GRASS 6.3.0RC4 released 9 Jan 2008]

[GRASS 6.3.0RC5 released 19 Feb 2008]

[GRASS 6.3.0RC6 released 21 Mar 2008]

[GRASS 6.3.0 released 23 Apr 2008]

[GRASS 6.4.0RC1 released 23 Dec 2008]

[GRASS 6.4.0RC2 released 12 Jan 2009]

[GRASS 6.4.0RC3 released 26 Jan 2009]

[GRASS 6.4.0RC4 released 12 Apr 2009]

[GRASS 6.4.0RC5 released 9 June 2009]

[GRASS 6.4.0RC6 released 20 March 2010]

[GRASS 6.4.0RC7 released 27 August 2010]

[GRASS 6.4.0 released 3 September 2010]

[GRASS 6.4.1RC1 released 3 Jan 2011]

[GRASS 6.4.1RC2 released 17 Mar 2011]

[GRASS 6.4.1 released 12 Apr 2011]

[GRASS 6.4.2RC1 released 10 Oct 2011]

[GRASS 6.4.2RC2 released 15 Nov 2011]

[GRASS 6.4.2RC3 released 12 Jan 2012]

[GRASS 6.4.2 released 19 Feb 2012]

[GRASS 6.4.3RC1 released 24 Oct 2012]

[GRASS credits]