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The future of Rebol - achieving critical mass

 [1/15] from: geoff:productivity at: 21-May-2001 12:15


Hi folks I have just been evaluating Rebol, (with the kind help of Carl and this list) and it seems to have a lot going for it. But I am wary of making a major commitment, as I have reservations about its future, given the RT business model. At the risk of being flamed, I thought I would share my concerns and see what the wider community feels about this issue. I have been bitten before by technically superior products with the wrong marketing model - I invested in the Amiga and NextStep to name just two. A lot of developers lost their shirts on NextStep. I fear that Rebol may go the same way. As Windoze, VB, ASP etc demonstrate so eloquently, technical excellence and commercial success are not at all the same thing in the software industry. I have two concerns about the current approach: - First, I fear that RT will fail to achieve a critical mass of users - Second, that they will fail to achieve a critical mass of libraries and APIs It is hard to get a new language established, especially if it is based on a paradigm that will be unfamiliar to most programmers (ie functional programming). I suspect that it may be impossible if you charge hundreds of dollars for the basic functionality in /Command. Rebol is up against powerful, free environments like Perl / Python / PHP / Ruby / Dylan / Lisp / Scheme / Guile etc etc. Most are Open Source. Rebol is nice, but the source is closed and by charging for the basics it is entering the market with a huge handicap, right from the start. So far as I can see, commercial success in the software industry is all about achieving a critical mass of users and generating Java style buzz. If I were Carl and his backers, I would be giving away the full versions of /Command, /View and the application wrapper, to get momentum going. I appreciate that this would take commercial courage, but in the medium term I think it would be much the safest strategy. With a large and vibrant community the future of Rebol would be assured, and they could be generating much greater revenues from selling advanced servers and applications, specialised libraries, an integrated IDE, and consultancy than they will ever generate selling /Core to a tiny community. With their current approach, they may well be going up the same dead end as all the closed 4GL languages that were supposed to revolutionise the industry (remember them, anyone?). And there would be a second, very major advantage. By charging for the C/C++ API they are creating a major disincentive for the community to integrate Rebol with external libraries. Much of the success of PHP, for example, can be attributed to its APIs to external libraries - almost 2000 internet related functions available at the last count. I have an idea for an Open Source project, but it would require /Core to run and this just does not sit well with the Free Software ethos. If Rebol is to achieve a critical mass of APIs and library code, Carl must somehow harness the energies of the Rebol community. Compare what is available in Perl or PHP with the Rebol code repositories and you will see the nature of the problem... What do people think? Geoff Caplan

 [2/15] from: petr:krenzelok:trz:cz at: 21-May-2001 13:59


Hello Geoff, very shortly, as I am pressed for time: - we definitely need per component pricing model. While I am not currently interested in Oracle component (we have DB2 here :-), I would love to even buy FastCGI, but in no way I will spent some 350 USD, unless it is our company money :-) So just for you - RT already stated there are going to be run-time loadable/unloadable dynamic components avaiblable, so let's hope the future is not so much far away ... - although I am not computer sound folk, sound component in non-free version of Rebol doesn't make much sense imo - /Apache was cancelled. Currently there is only FastCGI option, but it comes with /Command only - so hobby or smaller web projects are dead with Rebol - who is interested in CGI if PHP or other direct Apache modules are available? - Rebol killer app - so, maybe you consider Perl as being so popular, but, as for me - newcomer to web programming - Perl for e.g. would not be buy for me. Maybe Python - but then - Rebol is very ambitious here. It is very young language. Although we don't have Zope e.g., we do have Express - it's really very well thought out and cool collaboration platform. Maybe some kind of Authoring tool would be good too, but the question is - what should it serve for? I can imagine creation of dbase based apps, so you place items on screen, create update mechanisms, views etc. - but that's me - having dbase background. Last week I saw presentation of Hybris Jakarta. Java based - it was not so difficult to imagine similar functionality in Rebol - you have just project tree and can import various java beans, simply said objects with exposed apis. You are not dependant on app author - you can just incorporate any java bean around ... I can imagine small "reblets" floating around ... ... but .... how large is Rebol community to create all those apps? I hope Rebol will gain some more public acceptance soon. We all can help. I for e.g. wrote article about Rebol to one Czech computer magazine, and I am thinking about writing another one covering Rebol/View. We need more publicity. One other important question - imagine corporate sphere - all companies have their existing IT infrastructure already. What do Rebol (or other scripting solution) offers them to choose it as part of solution? Maybe Rebol/Command has some advantage here because of its database capabilities, but maybe it would be worth the money to enable incorporation of Rebol into external environments? (if possible) -pekr- Geoff Caplan wrote:

 [3/15] from: gschwarz:telstra:easymail:au at: 21-May-2001 22:47


At work (about 20+) have heard or are using Rebol, because I used it a home and have made one very useful program for staff to use. Most PC's have Rebol running all day and think it is great, it only took about 6 months. The work tool I made was accepted as OK at the start and many did not use it, but a few months later they reused it and would not go back. It always takes time for people to change there thinking and I do not think you can force it any faster on them what is taking place. Carl and crew know many things can be done, but time is needed to do it right, and get a solid base of users. I write a weekly computer article and have used the word "Rebol" at odd times, the next few are on programming and Rebol does get a big plug. Regards, Greg

 [4/15] from: joel:neely:fedex at: 21-May-2001 8:00


Hi, Greg, Tanja Schwarz wrote:
> I write a weekly computer article and have used the word > "Rebol" at odd times, the next few are on programming and > Rebol does get a big plug. >
Are your articles published on the 'net? If so, where might we find them? -jn- -- ------------------------------------------------------------ Programming languages: compact, powerful, simple ... Pick any two! joel'dot'neely'at'fedex'dot'com

 [5/15] from: holger:rebol at: 21-May-2001 6:03


On Mon, May 21, 2001 at 12:15:52PM +0100, Geoff Caplan wrote:
> I have been bitten before by technically superior products with the wrong > marketing model - I invested in the Amiga and NextStep to name just two. A > lot of developers lost their shirts on NextStep.
NextStep: agreed. Amiga: actually the Amiga was a commercial success, for many years, with millions of units sold. In Europe it was the second-best selling platform, ahead of the Mac. In the US it was by far the best-selling platform for video applications. In the end it died because the company owning the technology went backrupt because of losses from its sales of (IBM-compatible) PCs running MS-DOS, not because of bad Amiga sales due to lack of marketing. Yes, Amiga marketing could have been better, but this was not the deciding factor. Up until the very end Amiga sales were still doing pretty well. After the death of Commodore the Amiga never recovered, mostly because of long court battles and incompetence and lack of vision among the new owners (Escom, Gateway). And, of course, Escom later went bankrupt because of losses in its PC sales as well...
> - First, I fear that RT will fail to achieve a critical mass of users > - Second, that they will fail to achieve a critical mass of libraries and > APIs
Valid concerns.
> It is hard to get a new language established, especially if it is based on a > paradigm that will be unfamiliar to most programmers (ie functional > programming). I suspect that it may be impossible if you charge hundreds of > dollars for the basic functionality in /Command.
/Command is primarily a server product targetted at companies, ISPs etc., not a consumer application. The consumer applications are /Core and /View for basic functionality, and both are free. Extended functionality for both is available using a shareware-like model (View/Pro and later Core/Pro), for hobbyists. /Pro products include the /Library component and are therefore open systems that can be arbitrarily expanded by users.
> Rebol is up against powerful, free environments like Perl / Python / PHP / > Ruby / Dylan / Lisp / Scheme / Guile etc etc. Most are Open Source. Rebol is > nice, but the source is closed and by charging for the basics it is entering > the market with a huge handicap, right from the start.
The basics (/Core and /View) ARE free.
> So far as I can see, commercial success in the software industry is all > about achieving a critical mass of users and generating Java style buzz. If > I were Carl and his backers, I would be giving away the full versions of > /Command, /View and the application wrapper, to get momentum going. > > I appreciate that this would take commercial courage, [...]
It is not so much a matter of commercial courage, but rather of resources. RT is a corporation with full-time employees, not a group of volunteers who work on the language an hour every day after their regular job. In a commercial setting it is pretty much impossible these days to develop a product for years without any revenues.
> I think it would be much the safest strategy. With a large and vibrant > community the future of Rebol would be assured, and they could be generating > much greater revenues from selling advanced servers and applications, > specialised libraries, an integrated IDE, and consultancy than they will > ever generate selling /Core to a tiny community.
We are not selling /Core at all. /Core is distributed free of charge, as is /View, in order to build a community, as you suggest. We are selling /View/Pro, /Command, /Express, runtime licenses, commercial licenses and other supporting material and services (consulting services through REBOL Consulting, books through REBOL Press etc). -- Holger Kruse [holger--rebol--com]

 [6/15] from: cyphre:volny:cz at: 21-May-2001 15:48


Hello Pekr and list, ----- Original Message ----- From: Petr Krenzelok <[Petr--Krenzelok--trz--cz]> To: <[rebol-list--rebol--com]> Sent: Monday, May 21, 2001 1:59 PM Subject: [REBOL] Re: The future of Rebol - achieving critical mass
> - although I am not computer sound folk, sound component in non-free
version of
> Rebol doesn't make much sense imo >
I completely agree with you...I thought that using sound in application was quite common since 8-bit years so why it is so special feture today in multimedia age ? Creating sound in REBOL should be a kind of art not commercial bussiness(I cannot imagine any commercial sound app in REBOL/View for now...but maybe one day...) On the other hand I'm "infected" with this great language enough to buy the /Pro key as soon as I save $50... Happy reboling... Cyphre

 [7/15] from: geoff:productivity at: 21-May-2001 15:16


Holger Thanks for responding in so much detail...
> /Command is primarily a server product targetted at companies, ISPs etc.,
not
> a consumer application. The consumer applications are /Core and /View for > basic functionality, and both are free. Extended functionality for both is > available using a shareware-like model (View/Pro and later Core/Pro), for > hobbyists. /Pro products include the /Library component and are therefore > "open" systems that can be arbitrarily expanded by users.
So what are the plans for Core/Pro? Is there a release date in view?
> The basics (/Core and /View) ARE free. >
Agreed, but unless you have access to external libraries and persistent data they are of limited use. I would suggest the following as basic free components if Rebol is to take off: - Fast-cgi and/or mod_rebol (after all, the web is going to be the main internet API for some time to come... so an internet messaging language must surely offer an efficient web platform) - APIs to MySQL, Postgres, Berkeley DB - C/C++ Library access I wonder how far Sun would have got with Java if they had charged for the basics?
> It is not so much a matter of commercial courage, but rather of resources. > RT is a corporation with full-time employees... > In a commercial setting it is pretty much impossible these days to develop > a product for years without any revenues. >
I would hope that everyone understands this, but the question is what is the quickest route to those revenues? It's only my opinion, but I would have thought that the future of the company is in high-end applications like /Express, not in selling the basic functionality that other languages offer for free. And if there is is a large and dynamic community creating a rich environment of libraries and applications, this is surely the environment where sales of /Express and related consulting would take off.
>> than they will > > ever generate selling /Core to a tiny community. > We are not selling /Core at all. /Core is distributed free of charge, > as is /View, in order to build a community, as you suggest.
Slip of the pen - I meant /Command, of course. I certainly understand what you are saying, but I have a nasty feeling that Rebol will not build the community it deserves unless the free offering allows people to get serious work done. The word is going to be spread by enthusiasts doing personal projects and home or off-budget projects at work and then evangelising to their managers. With so many free options available, they won't pay out of their own pockets to take this first step. Geoff Caplan

 [8/15] from: jeff:rebol at: 21-May-2001 8:52


Howdy, Geoff:
> > The basics (/Core and /View) ARE free. > > Agreed, but unless you have access to external libraries > and persistent data they are of limited use.
Sure. I wouldn't characterize them as of "limited use", though. There's an infinity of uses but Core and View have less capability than their PRO counterparts (The basic uses are a lower order of infinity than the Pro uses). Hopefully you'll enjoy the basic View and Core (and put them to great use as many have) but you'll be unsatisfied by their comparative limitations to Pro. This feeling of disatisfaction will cause you to produce your credit card and purchase the Pro versions for their low low fee! :-)
> It's only my opinion, but I would have thought that the > future of the company is in high-end applications like > /Express, not in selling the basic functionality that other > languages offer for free.
I think in the longer run, higher end components like Express will play a role, but REBOL Tech.'s expertise is in building REBOL. The functionality that's nicely bundled in half a meg of REBOL is available for free out there in other languages, if you're willing to cobble it all together yourself. You have the time as a programmer that it takes for you to cobble together all functionality found in REBOL when you need it (each time you need it) and the time it takes to make it reusable and then tailor it to your specific needs. If the amount of money you would have charged for this amount of time spent on a programming task ever approaches the cost of REBOL/Pro then, at the very least, you could be making better use of your time! :-) I like the simplicity of the REBOL/Pro business model: Make something valuable and people will buy it.

 [9/15] from: bertrand::mayesky::laposte::net at: 21-May-2001 17:22


Amiga is a computer and REBOL is cross-platform: the same problem cannot occur. I am equally preoccupied with the critical mass of user but I saw a growing interest in the computing community. If the actual Rebol team reach a financial balance, nothing will stop the growing of REBOL possibilities and community. And this need a commercial attitude. The REBOL paradigm seems very familiar to me. In a certain manner it contains 90% of what I expect from a scripting language. And after 6 years passed to write or design applications I think that it has a real place. I only deplore the lack of free hosting with REBOL support ... b.

 [10/15] from: dmurrill:mindspring at: 21-May-2001 10:31


Hi folks Remember this?... Applications are created to solve solutions in the most expedient manner, in possible different environments... and rebol can do this fast,easy,and very well (just my thoughts). The Internet, for creating the WWW is a practice that's used for advertising services. Why would masses who need to bring services for a profit to a public by the means of using applications? Because the Apps not seen, it just does its' thing, it puts things into there browsed pages for us to gawk at. Can Rebol now, automatically, without the use of other add-ons,... function like: PHP,Pearl,Javascript,beans,Activex for the browser environment? ... No. Remember, before those scripting languages became openS. they talked to the browser, and that's why we chose them.....but know there really bloated. Don't want them. Rebol creates apps to get things done. I believe if you want masses from the WWW, your stuff better talk to the page, masses like to gawk not program. On the WWW, if your App can,t give away or sell services straight from the IE/NS, it will get flamed. Why ? because it's the Internet, and Browser Joe don't have too much time to think. Examples not used by Browser Joe &SurfChatHappy Sally: XML .Net Java C# Lisp C/C+ etc..... Lists getting bigger... And for all intent and purposes, they are all dying,don't fit the personal user internet idea. What ever can they do? Think like Cisco, become a carrier of info for the net and do it well. (Rebols approach?)

 [11/15] from: ssutherland:avhsd at: 21-May-2001 11:13


>Hi folks >I have just been evaluating Rebol, (with the kind help of Carl and this >list) and it seems to have a lot going for it. But I am wary of making a >major commitment, as I have reservations about its future, given the RT >business model. At the risk of being flamed, I thought I would share my >concerns and see what the wider community feels about this issue.
You won't be flamed by me! :^)
>I have been bitten before by technically superior products with the wrong >marketing model - I invested in the Amiga and NextStep to name just two. A >lot of developers lost their shirts on NextStep. I fear that Rebol may go >the same way. As Windoze, VB, ASP etc demonstrate so eloquently, >technical excellence and commercial success are not at all the same thing in >the software industry.
I don't put Amiga in the same boat with NextStep and other failed technologies. Amiga did not fail. I made some serious money in the Amiga market for an extended period of time. The Amiga opened up new markets, desktop video, kiosk, government telemetry, etc. We can't help the fact that Commodore completely ignored marketing and failed to cultivate any of the new markets Amiga opened. REBOL has the chance to open up new markets as well. It is up to developers to create these markets as New Tek did for the Amiga. It is still a bit early in the game, and REBOL must press forward until a developer comes up with an idea that makes money. The key will be to find something that really can't be done any other way as easily as it can be done in REBOL. The other push could be to open up the government. Amiga still enjoys a huge base of government installations. There are some very powerful things that REBOL can do for the government, and the feds really don't care about marketing much.
>I have two concerns about the current approach: >- First, I fear that RT will fail to achieve a critical mass of users >- Second, that they will fail to achieve a critical mass of libraries and >APIs
I see libraries and API's as an old paradigm, that tends to promote bloat, and unwelcome divergence. So much can be done currently with REBOL's tremendous capacity to quickly create high levels of abstractions. Maybe a better paradigm would be the proliferation of dialects.
>It is hard to get a new language established, especially if it is based on a >paradigm that will be unfamiliar to most programmers (ie functional >programming). I suspect that it may be impossible if you charge hundreds of >dollars for the basic functionality in /Command.
Here is an interesting dilemma. While opening up /Command to the free world would certainly cause a proliferation of library integration, would it promote REBOL? I would prefer to see most solutions be native to REBOL with the integration of libraries reserved for implementation necessities. Do we want REBOLutionaries spending their time integrating libraries, or writing native REBOL code? This may be an answer that changes later down the REBOL timeline.
>Rebol is up against powerful, free environments like Perl / Python / PHP / >Ruby / Dylan / Lisp / Scheme / Guile etc etc. Most are Open Source. Rebol >is nice, but the source is closed and by charging for the basics it is entering >the market with a huge handicap, right from the start.
How much money have the developers of Perl / Python / PHP / Ruby / Dylan / Lisp / Scheme / Guile etc etc. made from the language they created? Could some of the shortcomings of these environments be due to the fact that they are free. Why has JAVA succeeded in making Sun billions, many times more that all the other languages combined. The key is to make something everyone must have, and need REBOL to have it. This is a tremendous opportunity for those of us that understand REBOL.
>So far as I can see, commercial success in the software industry is all >about achieving a critical mass of users and generating Java style buzz. If >I were Carl and his backers, I would be giving away the full versions of >/Command, /View and the application wrapper, to get momentum going.
Interesting that you choose to drop the name "JAVA" here. It is not a free environment, but Sun doesn't make all their money from Java either. This is an interesting fact that needs to be considered at RT.
>I appreciate that this would take commercial courage, but in the medium term >I think it would be much the safest strategy. With a large and vibrant >community the future of Rebol would be assured, and they could be >generating much greater revenues from selling advanced servers and >applications, specialised libraries, an integrated IDE, and consultancy than >they will ever generate selling /Core to a tiny community. With their current >approach, they may well be going up the same dead end as all the closed >4GL languages that were supposed to revolutionise the industry (remember >them, anyone?).
I do remember them, and they didn't impress me anywhere near as much as REBOL does. They died because the weren't "better enough," so nobody created a must-have application. Why should REBOL put themselves in the position of competing against their own developers? This would not encourage top professional developers to adopt the language. It will take a new company creating a killer ap, or a large company adopting REBOL solutions as an integral part of their business for REBOL to become a serious money maker. Rather than looking a languages and their proliferation, we should be looking at companies, AOL, Oracle, Sun, Microsoft all companies that leveraged software to make powerful companies. Someone will make a business model that works, or REBOL will become a gift for helping people do their jobs, but not viable for making serious money.
>And there would be a second, very major advantage. By charging for the >C/C++ API they are creating a major disincentive for the community to >integrate Rebol with external libraries. Much of the success of PHP, for >example, can be attributed to its APIs to external libraries - almost 2000 >internet related functions available at the last count. I have an idea for an >Open Source project, but it would require /Core to run and this just does not >sit well with the Free Software ethos. If Rebol is to achieve a critical mass of >APIs and library code, Carl must somehow harness the energies of the Rebol >community. Compare what is available in Perl or PHP with the Rebol code >repositories and you will see the nature of the problem...
There are two kinds of critical masses. A critical mass of users makes a language proliferate. A critical mass of money makes a company succeed. Which has made a bigger difference in the technical world, Oracle, AOL, Microsoft, Sun, etc., or Linux, C++, Lisp, Perl, PHP, etc.
>What do people think?
The last time Carl created something, it became the engine that ran the Amiga. It also created completely new markets, multimedia, desktop video, kiosks and many other imbedded markets. REBOL has the potential to do the same thing. The technology needs to stay in the hands of the person who understands it, Carl. We need to help, and making it free doesn't help.
>Geoff Kaplan
Scot Sutherland

 [12/15] from: geoff:productivity at: 21-May-2001 22:50


Hi folks Some very interesting comments from Scot::
> I see libraries and API's as an old paradigm, that tends to promote bloat,
and unwelcome
> divergence. So much can be done currently with REBOL's tremendous
capacity to quickly create
> high levels of abstractions. Maybe a better paradigm would be the
proliferation of dialects.
I only partially agree - APIs to data stores, functions for working with .pdf files etc etc ... there is simply no substitute for a comprehensive library. This is surely why Perl is so widely used, despite its many failings. Provided Carl provides a decent library management mechanism (Present in Perl, missing from PHP and, at present from Rebol) this need not lead to bloat. After all, we are only talking server side here - it would defeat the purpose to bloat the client side.
> The key is to make something everyone must have, and need REBOL to have
it.
> Rather than looking a languages and their proliferation, we should be
looking at companies, AOL,
> Oracle, Sun, Microsoft all companies that leveraged software to make
powerful companies. This is an interesting perspective. Of course the key in each of these cases is that they identified and met a real and present need (simplicity, reliability, a usable platform for technical computing and standardisation respectively, I would suggest). But I can't think of any company that made serious $$ selling a language - the big boys sell products that solve problems for their customers. The problem at RI is that the language isn't really finished, and they have a compelling need to generate income. I understand that. But in the longer run, they will have to make their $$ out of selling solutions built in or for Rebol, not out of Rebol itself. If there is a wave coming for distibuted computing, Rebol is in a great position to catch it. If not, the argument for Rebol won't be compelling enough.
> The technology needs to stay in the hands of the person who understands
it, Carl. I don't think that any sane person would dispute that - great languages are created by personal vision, not by committees. But resources are clearly thin at RI - I suspect that it will be touch and go. For a very small player like myself, it is a question of balancing the potential rewards with the risk of RI going down and taking me with it. Thanks for the comments - very thought provoking Geoff Caplan

 [13/15] from: ssutherl:westmont at: 20-May-2001 17:21


Hi Geoff, I don't post to this list very often, but I thought you brought up the most critical of discussions. Maybe we should issue a challenge to the REBOL community. 1. ENSURE THE FUTURE OF REBOL AND DISTRIBUTED COMPUTING AND CREATE THE KILLER BUSINESS MODEL. 2. CREATE THE DISTRIBUTED COMPUTING WAVE OF THE FUTURE. Amiga did not wait around to catch the multimedia wave, it created it! Scot M. Sutherland Geoff Caplan wrote:

 [14/15] from: ssutherl:westmont at: 20-May-2001 17:27


I REBOL cross-platform? Or does it run on a new platform...the internet? It depends upon how you look at it. Scot M. Sutherland bm wrote:

 [15/15] from: agem:crosswinds at: 22-May-2001 2:12


See, somewhere i read, Carl made rebol reality after he had to fight with all this special config-dialects while installing linux. Thinking a common base for all with special dialects would be good. hm. anyone knows suse-linux/yast? Suse had a similar idea. They realized it by making their own config-files. Which are then translated/inserted/.. to this specialist-stuff-files. Made them able to config linux by setting some variables from gui-tools. Sounds a lot like translating between dialects, meta-programming and so on? Rebols strenghts. Maybe working with / making some linux-distro would be a business? Could be the easiest manageable out there? Money? I think suse can pay >100 employees? Volker
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Ursprüngliche Nachricht <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Am 21.05.01, 01:21:13, schrieb "Scot M. Sutherland" <[ssutherl--westmont--edu]> zum Thema [REBOL] Re: The future of Rebol - achieving critical mass: