Talk:Therion (software)

Notability
The notability of Therion has been questioned.

I have some experience in this area (maintained a list of Cave Survey software since 1990, edited a Cave Surveying magazine for 10 years, and wrote the Encylopaedia of Cave and Karst Science (http://bookshop.blackwell.co.uk/jsp/welcome.jsp?action=search&type=isbn&term=1579583997) entry on Cave Surveying) so hope I can say with reasonable authority that Therion is certainly significant software within its (relatively obscure) field, with an active user community. There are several other cave survey programs with significant userbases, but only one of them has its own wikipedia page, so far as I can see: Survex.

Having looked at the notability criteria I'm not entirely sure whether Therion qualifies or not. Plenty of users and a long history is not quite the same as notability. The cave surveying expert community who might write about it is sufficiently small that few truly independent people have written about the software in any detail, but many have used it to draw up significant projects, and it is significant within the field.

There are independent articles on the software. Here are a few:

* HOWTO written by a user: http://marcocorvi.altervista.org/caving/tbe/ * Mulu Caves overview writeup on using Therion over several expeditions: http://www.mulucaves.org/wordpress/surveying/the-therion-survey * Training course material on using the software: http://cp.cavesurveying.org.uk/index.php/articles/3-therion-tutorial * Forum discussion on 'best cave survey software': http://ukcaving.com/board/index.php?topic=10647.0

I do wonder whether rather than arguing back and forth about this it would make sense to have a cave surveying software page that collected info on various programs widely enough used to deserve a mention in wikipedia (Therion, Survex, Tunnel, Compass, WALLS, SMAPS, Toporobot, WinKarst, Auriga, PocketTopo). To start with that would combine the Survex and Therion pages, and others could be added as enthusiasm allows. It seems like that should make the editors happier. It also puts things into context around the general surject matter. (There is currently a small 'Surveying Software' section on the Cave_Survey page, that such a page would replace).

Would doing that satisfy everyone? Wookey (talk) 02:46, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

clean up suggestions
1) Remove subjective language. For example, change "is totally free" to more neutral language such as "is free of cost". 2) Remove sources that do not mention the subject. 94.103.41.46 (talk) 19:22, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
 * I am sorry but statement 1 above is complete rubbish: "is free of cost" is far less neutral language, in fact it is extremely biased, but more importantly is not correct. Who ever typed the above seems to have little understanding of the subject. Totally free is the correct unbiased statement of GNU software, lets face it lots of main stream software packages use the same description and I quote ''http://www.libreoffice.org/about-us/faq/licensing-faq/is-libreoffice-really-free/!! Anyway it has been changed to free AndrewAtkinson (talk) 22:19, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Changed (sorry for my English). There is no any source which doesn't mention the subject. BTW all free images for first version of this article were refused. So I'm not able to add free images evidently. Msluka (talk) 08:56, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
 * There is yes any source which doesn't mention the subject. Neither www.cave-registry.org.uk/ nor www.groupe-speleo-vulcain.com/03_topos.html?lang=en nor www.groupe-speleo-vulcain.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/jb-Xav-2010-plan5000.pdf?lang=en mentions "Therion". I can't tell whether Atkinson and Moody mention Therion, as the source is not online. Most of the other sources barely mention Therion. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:20, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
 * What it means "barely mention Therion"? If the map is exported from Therion it means all the drawing was made in Therion. I added several links the Therion was object of thesis work or used in professional documentation of show cave.
 * www.cave-registry.org.uk: Appendix 4 *Data files* *Preferred formats* Plain text (.txt) Survex (.svx) Therion (.th) *Acceptable formats* Compass (.dat ?) (Other common surveying software file formats?) *Vector Drawing files* *Preferred formats* Scalable Vector Graphics (.svg) Autocad DXF (.dxf) – widely support and parsable plain text file Therion sketch (.th2) Tunnel XML (.xml)
 * www.groupe-speleo-vulcain.com/03_topos.html: http://www.groupe-speleo-vulcain.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/jb-Xav-2010-plan5000.pdf - this map is definitely exported from Therion.
 * http://www.groupe-speleo-vulcain.com/explorations/topographies-effectuees-par-le-club/ - link to Therion
 * Is there any other problem with Therion (software)? In mailing group is 141 participants over all the world. So it is not any joy or joke!!!Msluka (talk) 11:03, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
 * What "barely mention Therion" means is that the sources mention Therion, but only very briefly. For example, the page www.linuxlinks.com/article/20110401180655303/EarthScience.html contains a table headed "Earth Science Software", in which it lists various programs. in that list appears the text "Therion Cave surveying - 2D and 3D drawing software", and that is the only mention of Therion anywhere in that page. That is barely mentioning it, whereas several paragraphs of detailed text about Therion would be substantial coverage, not barely mentioning it. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:55, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Although things most references only mention that fact that Therion was used, is that not the nature of the beast in software. If a project that takes thousands of hours to complete, often far more only writes, drawn in Therion that is substantial coverage. The equivalent logic would mean most actors and directors would have to be deleted from Wikipedia, as they only get mentioned once at the end of the film. Doesn't coming in the top 10 of a software category notable by definition? (We could argue about the reputation of the source, but that was not the point you were arguing. AndrewAtkinson (talk) 22:19, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Notability
Google Scholar finds over 200 papers mentioning Therion, so notability of the project is out of question. I have added two representative articles to the article and removed the notability warning. Pawel Krawczyk (talk) 04:42, 29 July 2013 (UTC)