Hi,

It is always fun to see a new way to cobble together new functionality out of separate pieces of software. Maybe I don't fully understand the QGIS long term plans, but... Shouldn't analysis-type operations be delegated to the software that can already perform these tasks like GRASS ? Especially since QGIS and GRASS have a nice tight coupling as it is, I would expect that the contouring routines in GRASS are good enough, and quite possibly more robust than a cobbled together approach. Don't get me wrong, I am not criticizing your post, rather it seems that some of that effort could be better spent on the making the areas where QGIS currently excels better (data viz and management, etc.). I like the idea of more plug-ins, but the ones you have listed are already implemented in GRASS, PostGIS, ... many other places.

My 4c (after inflation of the weak US dollar),

Dylan