CERL has signed on June 7th 1996 with LAS Inc a CRADA (Cooperative Research And Development Agreement) for the transfer of GRASS technology. The future development of GRASS, its distribution in a commercial environment is now LAS responsibility.
BACKGROUND CERL intents to no longer develop, support or distribute the public domain version of the GRASS GIS. At the same time LAS has released a commercial, value-added versions of GRASS (known as GRASSLAND) on widely used hardware configurations. Therefore, so that: 1) The research, time and money invested into GRASS in the past is not lost and so that 2) A Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) alternative source for the GRASS capabilities is available for military installations (and general public) and 3) Growth of spatial analysis R&D may continue outside of CERL itself, It is proposed that LAS and CERL enter into a mutually beneficial Cooperative Research And Development Agreement (CRADA). This agreement is mutually beneficial because: 1) CERL must ensure that there will a COTS GRASS alternative for their military installations which have invested considerable money and labor resources into GRASS implementation. 2) LAS is interested in seeing GRASS survive since it is the basis of its new package GRASSLAND. 3) Though the current version of GRASS (4.1) is a very good and very stable software package for the market place, and before the decision to do no more development and distribution was made, CERL performed a good deal of R&D which has resulted in significant GRASS enhancements since version 4.1. To ensure this investment of government moneys is not lost to the public when CERL supported GRASS ends, LAS will integrate some of these into their COTS GRASSLAND product. 4) GRASSLAND is a logic continuity to GRASS for military installations since it solves some of the most important problems remaining in GRASS4.1 and since LAS will fully support the GRASSLAND software package. 5) CERL is continuing to invest in advanced environmental modeling based on our GIS technology needs. Those which have potential interest to the general GIS market place could be made available to LAS for integration into future releases of GRASSLAND. LAS therefore proposes to implement a technology transfer agreement that will help CERL to transion out of GRASS development and support without putting the GRASS based R&D investment of several military installations in jeopardy. Because GRASS has a public domain history, and there are other individuals and groups who may wish to continue to be active in GRASS development, LAS is free to make additional arrangements with those additionally interested parties. RESPONSABILITIES OF THE PARTIES TO THIS AGREEMENT: Each parties will have the following enumerated responsibilities within the scope of this agreement: LAS Responsibilities Take over most activities previously performed by the Office of GRASS Integration (OGI) within the scope of this CRADA: 1) Provision of a full technical support plan for both users and developers, 2) Enhancement, maintenance and progressive development of GRASS user's and programmer's documentation within GRASSLAND's documentation, 3) Progressive integration of existing code developed by CERL and other interested parties into GRASSLAND, 4) Distribution of GRASSLAND for Windows/95 and Windows/NT (as a commercial product) and distribution of GRASSLAND for SOLARIS and a few other undefined UNIX workstations platforms (as a freeware product), 5) Maintenance of all GRASS source code (after and including GRASS4.1), and make it available to the user's community through an ftp site 6) Progressive take over and maintenance of the GRASS web and ftp sites and link to the GRASSLAND web site, (ftp site to be transitioned from CERL to LAS within 30 months after this CRADA becomes effective), 7) Assistance and technical support in transfering CERL's GRASS based application into GRASSLAND, 8) Provide a continuing vehicle for CERL spatial research into a COTS environment. CERL Responsabilities Provide LAS with the tools necessary so this techology transfer agreement is fully successful including: 1) Provide an Internet WWW and ftp facility for exchange of code and information between CERL, LAS and other interested parties, 2) Provide all current documentation in digital format (programmer's manual, user's manual, man pages, tutorial and others), 3) Provide all source code of GRASS enhancements developed since version 4.1 so LAS can intergrate these into its COTS environment product, GRASSLAND. (This of course does not cover proprietary source code that is owned or co-owned by third parties). 4) Inform all military installations of the existence of GRASSLAND as a logic continuity to GRASS, 5) Give to LAS information about the military installations where GRASS has been/is currently used, 6) Transfer at least one GRASS based application such as PRISM or other, into GRASSLAND. 7) Distribute a press release through its regular channels about the existence and benefits of the agreement to historic CERL customers. 8) CERL will act as a beta-site for GRASSLAND's releases which LAS will make available to CERL at no cost. If CERL fields GRASSLAND to other sites (e.g. installations), normal commercial charges for the GRASSLAND product will apply. 9) LAS will have access to new software developed by CERL in its spatial research program to provide a COTS vehicle for technology transfer to CERL users. The question of royalties will be considered in the future. For any code/module for which LAS pays royalties, LAS will exclusively own the rights to that code/module. DURATION This agreement will be in effect for three years or until the goals and responsabilites of both parties are achieved. PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS FOR LAS Mr.Gilles Clement, CEO and Mr.Christian Larouche, PhD, Geomatics.
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