discussion between users of the gretl econometric software

Allin Cottrell | 4 Sep 2007 02:09

gretl: two or three things you could do!

Hello all,

I know, everyone in the academic world is busy: there are classes 
to teach, papers to be written, papers to be refereed, conferences 
to attend, and so on.

I'm subject to all these pressures myself, and I spend just about 
all of my "spare time" coding gretl.  The result is that I'm not 
able to devote time to various things that, I think, would help us 
all ("us" being people who think gretl is of value).  Here are 
three things that I think would be helpful, one of which has 
already been done, and two of which remain to be done.  If you 
feel you could contribute in any of these ways, please do!

1) Writing articles, or putting up websites, that explicate gretl 
for people who haven't heard of it.  This has been done.  For 
example, Tadeusz Kufel has a website that brings gretl to a Polish 
constituency; Talha Yalta, Ryan J. Smith and J. Wilson Mixon Jr. 
have published papers that assess gretl; and Lee Adkins has an 
excellent online guide to econometrics using gretl.

2) A Free/Open-Source Software award for gretl: Why haven't we won 
a prize yet?  The obvious answer is that gretl is a relatively 
specialized piece of software; it's not something that _most_ 
desktop users will have a need for, or _most_ sysadmins.  

But if someone had a a little spare time for research: Who awards 
such things and how are the nominations assessed?  I'm not the one 
to say this, but it seems to me that -- leaving aside the famous 
"LAMP stack" of Linux (kernel), Apache (web server), MySQL

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Tavis Barr | 8 Oct 2007 16:53

Re: gretl: two or three things you could do!


Hi Allin (and everyone).

Sorry for being a bit of a lurker and replying a month late, but I just
had a thought.  What about a session at the Eastern Economic Association
conference (or any other conference) about "Open Source Approaches in
Economics Teaching and Research" or something along those lines?  

I'm planning to attend anyway to present a paper (assuming it gets
accepted); I also have my own separate interest in a discussion on open
source teaching, since I've written an autograded homework system
(http://roster-in-a-box.sf.net) that I'd like to present some time at
some place, and I'm also writing an intermediate micro book under the
Open Publication License (see http://myweb.liu.edu/~tbarr/eco61 for
results so far).  

Another idea is that if we conduct such a session, it would also give
some of us a chance to meet face-to-face at the conference and also to
unofficially discuss GRETL-related stuff.  

If anyone here is thinking about attending anyway, then organizing this
would be easy.  I know it doesn't satisfy the need for "a Gretl
conference," but maybe it would provide us a stepping stone toward one?
And if it's successful at generating interest, it could also be repeated
at other conferences without much difficulty.

Any takers?

Best,
Tavis

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Cristian Rigamonti | 4 Sep 2007 09:37

Re: gretl: two or three things you could do!

On Mon, Sep 03, 2007 at 08:09:35PM -0400, Allin Cottrell wrote:
> 
> 2) A Free/Open-Source Software award for gretl: Why haven't we won 
> a prize yet?

Have a look at http://www.tropheesdulibre.org/?lang=en

Submissions are open until 1st October; I haven't checked out the details, but I
think that gretl could run in the "Science" category...

Cri

-- 
GPG/PGP Key-Id 0x943A5F0E      -    http://www.linux.it/~cri/cri.asc
Free software, free society    -    http://www.fsfeurope.org

On Mon, Sep 03, 2007 at 08:09:35PM -0400, Allin Cottrell wrote:
> 
> 2) A Free/Open-Source Software award for gretl: Why haven't we won 
> a prize yet?

Have a look at http://www.tropheesdulibre.org/?lang=en

Submissions are open until 1st October; I haven't checked out the details, but I
think that gretl could run in the "Science" category...

Cri

--

--

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Allin Cottrell | 5 Sep 2007 07:59

Re: gretl: two or three things you could do!

On Tue, 4 Sep 2007, Cristian Rigamonti wrote:

> On Mon, Sep 03, 2007 at 08:09:35PM -0400, Allin Cottrell wrote:
> > 
> > 2) A Free/Open-Source Software award for gretl: Why haven't we won 
> > a prize yet?
> 
> Have a look at http://www.tropheesdulibre.org/?lang=en
> 
> Submissions are open until 1st October; I haven't checked out 
> the details, but I think that gretl could run in the "Science" 
> category...

Thanks, Cri.  I filled out a submission for gretl.  So long as my 
execrable French doesn't disqualify us, maybe we have a chance...

Allin.