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free REBOL?

 [1/14] from: mh9831:comcast at: 1-Aug-2003 13:51


I know there has occasionally been discussions for or against REBOL being open source. I think RT's logic makes sense for REBOL not being open source. But how about the runtime and sdk being free? I mean with all the capabilities, rather than the free version missing sound and shell access and library access? I don't think Java or Python would be as popular as they are today if developers had to pay to use all of their features. Right now with REBOL, if you use any of these 'extra' features, you're forced with the decision to either purchase encap so that your program can be used by anyone without them having to buy REBOL, or making anyone who wants to use your program buy their own REBOL license. Any chance that things such as View/Pro might become free, similar to the Java sdk/runtime? Is RT making that much money off of these licenses? It seems logical that more people might be inclined to use REBOL if they didn't have to pay to use all the features, and more REBOL developers would be good for RT. I know I'd never suggest my company use REBOL because I know I can accomplish the same things with python, ruby or Java for free, even though I like using REBOL. And I certainly wouldn't consider it for a commercial project if faced with the choice of giving RT a percentage of my profits or just writing it in another language and keeping all the profits myself. Sorry if this has been brought up before. I was just curious. mike

 [2/14] from: greggirwin:mindspring at: 1-Aug-2003 10:32


Hi Mike, This does come up periodically, but I think it's good for RT to hear what each of us wants; a lot of people agree with your view. -- Gregg

 [3/14] from: rebol::techscribe::com at: 1-Aug-2003 9:01


Hi Mike. You wrote:
> I know I'd never suggest my company use REBOL > because I know I can accomplish the same things > with python, ruby or Java for free, even though I like > using REBOL.
1. Why do you like REBOL? In my mind REBOL is superior to the languages you list, because it makes me by far more productive. I can produce results much faster and more easily maintain existing solutions using REBOL. My increased productivity translates into significant savings for the company I'm working for. The $$ they pay me generate more results for them, therefore the per-result-cost is lower. Since when do companies prefer to spend more money on labor, rather then invest in tools that lead to a higher degree of productivity? No business entity I know of relies on the existence of free tools, in order to be successful. Everyone understands that superior technology has a higher price that is rewarded by improved results and increased savings over time, i.e. lower cost-per-unit. In short, IMHO you are not doing your company any favors, by assuming that the cost (free vs. commercial) is the most important criteria for choosing the appropriate tool for a job. This may be true for the impoverished hobbyist, who'll make do with substandard tools, since he can't afford anything better, and does not have to deliver commercial quality results within a set deadline, but certainly not in a professional/commercial environment, where money is meant to be spent, invested, used as a tool to improve productivity, the ability to compete on the market place, and the ability to optimally satisfy the needs of critical customsers, who want to spend as little as possible in return for as much as possible. Here, in the commercial environment, money is not intended to be saved and hidden away under the mattress and stretched to last as long as possible, here money is a means, a tool for accomplishing these commercial goals. If REBOL can improve the company's ability to accomplish these goals faster, and with less payroll costs, then REBOL is worth every penny of its price to your company.
> And I certainly wouldn't consider it for a commercial > project if faced with the choice of giving RT a percentage > of my profits or just writing it in another >language and keeping all the profits myself.
2. Commercial project? You mean you expect to get paid for your work? Guess what, so do others, such as RT. Share the wealth! The same arguments that I used above apply here as well. If you are going to make your choices based on pricing only, and choose inferior tools because they cost less, then you are reducing your ability to deliver the commercial project, and increasing the labor cost of production. You will be spending this "saved" money one way or another. Either it'll go to your landlord, grocery store, energy company, and so on, because the additional time it will take you to complete your commercial project will force you to spend more money on your livelihood, until the commercial product is finally completed, and begins to pay you back. From a false "selfish" point of view (I want to spend my money on myself, and not pay others) this may sound perfectly acceptable. But really it is not even sound logic in terms of selfishness. A healthier selfishness, that incidentally is also more consistent with a sound business logic, is the selfishness that says, if I can accomplish my commercial goal more easily, faster, then I will see the rewards out of it faster. RT's flagship product - Command/SDK - sells for $448 (US) (see http://www.rebol.com/purchase.html). How long can you live on $448, and how much more time will it take you to complete your commercial product using a different scripting language? If the additional time it will take you to complete the same feature set in one of the free languages, is more than the time you are able to survive on these $448, then you are wasting money. Consider also, that Command/SDK enables you to complete any number of commercial products, and therefore you should really assume only a fraction of the cost of Command/SDK per commercial project. Finally, I hope that your observation that Java, Python, and Ruby are popular because they are free is not quite precise. If indeed that would be the only nice thing you can see about the trio, then yikes! (Are you saying, "admittedly they're garbage, but - hey - their free"?). The great thing about Capitalism is that it harnesses selfishness as an engine for compassion. Take Care, Elan [mh9831--comcast--net] wrote:

 [4/14] from: maximo:meteorstudios at: 1-Aug-2003 12:32


> 1. Why do you like REBOL? In my mind REBOL is superior to the > languages > you list, because it makes me by far more productive. I can produce > results much faster and more easily maintain existing solutions using > REBOL. My increased productivity translates into significant savings > for the company I'm working for.
for rebol/pro 30$/hour salary = three hours worth of time to your company. if you can code twice as fast (this is my experiece so far) then you've paid it back in one day! this is simple maths. I bought a license for my own personnal useage and was able to deliver 80 seconds worth of broadcast quality 3d animation in three weeks because I was able to code a render farm in 8 hours and a complete production shot tracker/editor in about 16 hours. together, these tools would typically save me one hour of manual work per day. times 18 days. if you calculate it I was even, but then when the week or two of approvals came along and I had to redo one shot nine times before it was accepted, the tool would save me about 2 hours per day and many possible problems where alleviated (which translates in to about 2 days of accumulated lost time worths of problems). If you tabulate it all, I saved at a very minimum 4 days in time total. 32 hours * 30$/hours = 960$ saving minus 75$ I still saved 895$ worth of my life in time. that means I was able to work on steel (actually the production tracker is my first steel test) and see my wife and kids for 5 days, which I would have lost had I not spent the 75$.. I think I was a winner. now realize that I have about one project per season... and it really starts making sense. I currently do not need sdk, although It sometimes would be usefull. but If I start developing commercial apps for others, you bet I'll spend the dough. my 0.02$ -MAx

 [5/14] from: maximo:meteorstudios at: 1-Aug-2003 12:53


hi, I do not know how the bills are being paid by RT but I'm not sure they are selling rebol/pro 75$ just because rebol sounds cool. I think they have bills to pay and they have to get money somewhere and the pro package is enticing enough so that some of us spent part of one paycheck to get it, without ruinning ourselves. the problem is more like how do we get rebol to get industry acceptance, which would permit RT to either: -reduce the price of /pro, because it gets enough orders that its actually making profits and lowering the price will entice new users. -make enough money with IOS to make everything else free. that takes a while. It would be nice if they could partner with a large vendor, so that it gains support from a large group of users. (like whatever happened to the morpheus deal?). for example, softimage uses VB for its 3d scripting... I've heard softimage can't even write a VB tutorial, because they don't have the rights to do so, you are thrown to a MS VB site when you press on VB help! If rebol was integrated as a scripting tool for third-party apps, it truely would be powerfull, and it would allow a broad range of visibility with a wide range of users, which could help rebol gain more stability. -max ----------- meteor Studios, T.D. ----------- Never Argue with an idiot. They will bring you down to their level and beat you with experience

 [6/14] from: Rebolinth::nodep::dds::nl at: 24-Dec-2003 22:29


Quoting [mh9831--comcast--net]: Hello mh9831, If there would be a Compagny called "OpenSource" and they would pay me $ 500.000 a year for programming...i could think about it :-) (R)egards, Norman.

 [7/14] from: mh9831:comcast at: 1-Aug-2003 17:44


Sorry, I certainly didn't mean to provoke any ire here. I was just wondering about it. I was under the impression that a percentage of the profits from selling a commerical application written in rebol and encapped go back to RT. I thought I read somewhere, but I could be misinformed. Anyway, sorry if that was a sensitive topic. I wasn't harping on RT or REBOL, and I don't intend to suggest RT has no right to make money. I think it comes down to how much of their profits are tied to selling View/Pro versus how many more developers they might potentially get if it were free. I don't know that answer, that's why I wrote my original email. mike

 [8/14] from: greggirwin:mindspring at: 1-Aug-2003 12:26


Hi Mike, mcn> Sorry, I certainly didn't mean to provoke any ire here. I was just wondering mcn> about it. No problem. This comes up from time to time and people have strong feelings on both sides. Please don't hesitate to express your opinions here. Even the heated discussions never get *too* hot :) and, as I said, it's good for RT to know how we all feel. You're not alone in your thinking on this, though I'm with Max and Elan myself. We all have different backgrounds and viewpoints. What we have in common is that we all like REBOL and want it to succeed. mcn> I was under the impression that a percentage of the profits from selling a mcn> commerical application written in rebol and encapped go back to RT. I thought I mcn> read somewhere, but I could be misinformed. That's correct. I'm not a big fan of royalties myself, but REBOL is so insanely great (IMHO) that I--even with my background, where it would have been a deal-breaker--will not begrudge them one red cent. For someone like a shareware author, or small-time vendor, the royalty system can work better than paying a large sum up front, whether you end up selling any product or not. This way, you pay less, and if you end up making lots of money, you might just raise your price a little to cover the royalty (if you want). For some folks, the principle is still a deal breaker. Even a .1% royalty wouldn't work for them, and that's OK. For me, I'm OK with it, and if I had an issue, I'd talk to RT to see what I could work out with them. mcn> Anyway, sorry if that was a sensitive topic. I wasn't harping on RT or REBOL, mcn> and I don't intend to suggest RT has no right to make money. I think it comes mcn> down to how much of their profits are tied to selling View/Pro versus how many mcn> more developers they might potentially get if it were free. I don't know that mcn> answer, that's why I wrote my original email. Again, we all want the same thing in the end, and RT *is* opening up more and more features in the free versions. It's all a balancing act and, even though my view is different than yours, I appreciate your input. If there are things keeping *anyone* from using REBOL, we need to know what they are. -- Gregg

 [9/14] from: maximo:meteorstudios at: 1-Aug-2003 14:57


yes we all forget that rebol is two different things 1- A suberb language platform, which IS free. 2- A commercial software developper, which has to stay alive. Its hard to have both at the same time. Like greg said it a hard balancing act. The problem is that everything (like employees, and marketing) costs money and word of mouth is not enough when you have behemoths like microsoft which probably loose more money per year in stolen pen and paper by employes than your total net worth and total sales figure for your last 5 years... You want to attract people, but can't cut in research $$$. I actually wish rebol where free, but I understand that they have to eat and if rebol where open source, then they couldn't keep the high-end stuff private, because anyone could turn around and rip it off. all in all a good discussion, no one's angry :-) ciao! -max ----------- meteor Studios, T.D. ----------- Never Argue with an idiot. They will bring you down to their level and beat you with experience

 [10/14] from: rebol:techscribe at: 1-Aug-2003 12:05


Hi Gregg. Been away for a while. You must be referring to the sdk license: Programs created by this product cannot be sold, bundled, or distributed as part of any product without a separate commercial distribution license from REBOL Technologies. (see http://www.rebol.com/docs/sdk/intro.html#sect0.2.). As I recall there used to be a "unlimited" option for the old /runtime version (that I purchased at the time.) I would assume that the unlimited license is the equivalent of an outright purchase. Has that changed? Or does the "separate commercial distribution license" include an unlimited license option? ;- elan Gregg Irwin wrote:

 [11/14] from: rebol:techscribe at: 1-Aug-2003 12:29


Hi Mike. I don't think that you have provoked any ire whatsoever and - as far as I'm concerned - you have no reason to apologize.. I have spent a number of years mulling over this topic, and - without getting into details - I think the view you present is perfectly leigitimate. There are scenarios in which what you say makes perfectly sense. Other scenarios do not lend themselves to this kind of approach. See the mixed model, for instance, that is used for Tcl. I also feel that there are some important questions that you should be aware of, and that are just as legitimate. Anyway, I don't see that RT would stand to gain by giving away their more feature-rich software for free. Nor do I think that I would gain by them doing so, because - unless they found some generous sponsor to make it lucrative for them to continue to improve and enrich REBOL -, they would have to eventually reduce their support for REBOL and none of us are served if that happens. If RT is to be successful, then their efforts to provide a superior development tool, combined with my/your/other REBOL scripters additional efforts to package RT's technology as some product that targets the market of technology consumers, must generate a sufficiently large income stream to support all participating contributors, namely us, the REBOL scripters, and the RT team as well. I think the future of REBOL is of interest to all of us, and it is useful that we raise this kind of topic on the mailing list. We simply have to keep in mind that REBOL is not only a scripting language and interpreter, it is also a team of people that - like all of us - need to see their efforts rewarded financially, and - as their clients - they depend on us to make that happen. I am certain that RT will appreciate any and all bright ideas that will help them generate a stronger income stream. Giving their software away for free may - perhaps - not be that bright idea ... ;-) . Take Care, ;- elan [mh9831--comcast--net] wrote:

 [12/14] from: greggirwin:mindspring at: 1-Aug-2003 13:56


Hi Elan, E> Been away for a while. You must be referring to the sdk license: E> "Programs created by this product cannot be sold, bundled, or E> distributed as part of any product without a separate commercial E> distribution license from REBOL Technologies." (see E> http://www.rebol.com/docs/sdk/intro.html#sect0.2.). Pre-SDK, the Encap tool required the royalty agreement as well, btu yes. E> As I recall there used to be a "unlimited" option for the old /runtime E> version (that I purchased at the time.) I would assume that the E> "unlimited" license is the equivalent of an outright purchase. Has that E> changed? Or does the "separate commercial distribution license" include E> an unlimited license option? For non-encapped scripts, I think you can still distribute the free REBOL products with your script, but that rules out pro features. I'm not sure what you have. It must have been before my REBOL time. :) -- Gregg

 [13/14] from: mmastroianni:lepcorp at: 1-Aug-2003 17:25


Hi all, On the topic of REBOL's (and by extension RT's) success: how many people in the REBOL community do you think would pay significant and reasonable dollars to get training at a variety of levels, i.e., basic, intermediate, advanced? I would use REBOL *far* more in many projects if I had a structured training course w/ access to a talented instructor; many projects in my company would be better served using REBOL if we had more time to explore it and increase our proficiency. In fact, we did an ad hoc search some months ago that did identify some talented, professional folks that employ REBOL productively, and were willing to give us a 1/2 day training session -- so we flew two of us there and it was very much worth the effort and cost. If you can show businesses the substantial benefits that REBOL can deliver, and give them the path to become productive in a reasonable time for reasonable cost, REBOL adoption will increase dramatically, I believe. It happens all the time -- all you have to do is talk to people who pay $$ to upgrade the skills of their technical staffs and you'll hear the same tune again and again -- frequent, effective training enhances skill, enthusiasm, and innovation--and helps guard against the "if all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail" syndrome. (Of course plenty of training $$ are wasted as well if one is not careful...) Do you think folks would respond to a REBOL training program, or even certification? Mike

 [14/14] from: petr:krenzelok:trz:cz at: 4-Aug-2003 12:33


Hello Elan and all, sorry if I don't match the discussed topic precisely - I was away for some two weeks from all rebol happenings, but I will try to provide another pov. I have to say that your post is very educated and balanced and my intention will not be to say - hey, you are wrong here or there, but rather to ask questions ... kind of passing another arguments into the game ... Elan wrote:
> Hi Mike. > You wrote:
<<quoted lines omitted: 31>>
> with less payroll costs, then REBOL is worth every penny of its price > to your company.
I think there are several levels mixed here. I think that with rebol, we - developers (but also RT) is still walking in circle and we can't get past the circle: 1) Large companies - I work for one. There is already the list of tools for programming set. It is very difficult to introduce new ones. Let's face it - IT manager does not care about the tools - he/she just wants things to safely work ... and work the cheapest way it can be. So how does rebol technology get itself into the company? I think there is nearly NO chance for it to happen from the management pov. Rebol is not known, even amongst programmers, not to mention IT managers. So the only chance is some programmer/employee, who really likes Rebol and starts writing some small helpfull scripts in the company. Even if Rebol is free for basic scripting, it still brings a risk and IT managers will try to kill any such initiative - and why? Because me - the programmer trying to introduce rebol to the company environment can get hit by car and noone else will be able to fix my scripts anymore! I know it because I faced it with our VO (Visual Objects) project, where the rest of the company used Delphi. Now let's say I have some influence on IT managers and they will listen to what I say. I am in such position, but to be fair, I am scared to suggest rebol - and why? Because they will ask me questions like - where can we buy books about rebol? - where is enough web resources, docs? - training courses? - rebol success stories? - rebol roadmap? - known bugs database? - RT technical support? - ... and finally - how many ppl uses it? Should I tell them 8 ppl in Czech Republic, 5 in Italy and maybe 30 in france? IT managers really tend to be realistic (or let's better say scared ) of new, unproven things and will regard rebol as a hazard game for the IT department. Let's even supposed I will be succesfull and some manager will say - OK - then I will probably face another problem even Steve Shireman described - programmers are already using some scripting environment anyway, being it python, ruby, curl, php and they will feel you try to push them to use rebol, will provide IT managers with SWOT analysis of why tool XY is better than Rebol is etc. And you know what? - It all will be negative to rebol - ah, you can't even start externall app in free version? What? Just to access mySQL we whould pay for /Command etc kind of nonsense, which will lead to feature to feature comparisons and suddenly you will find yourself in the hostile environemnts ... 2) hobbyists - kind of folks like web scripters etc. I had quite few friends who were interested in rebol. But quite frankly, mySQL as part of Command was one of RT's mistakes. They just laughed where I told them there is no apache module, no ability to access at least mySQL - for free. Yes, for free - because that is how those ppl start - from one project at a time, small websystems and then - they grow. Those who don't understand, that it is like spiral effect and think only in narrow-minded $$ fashion should not do marketing. Because - just in my case - I lost at least 10 potential rebol users. You may say - well, they wanted everything for free, but that is EXACTLY wrong pov I am talking about. Those ppl run some websites here or they, they grow, employ new ppl, but all happens without Rebol. If they would have had rebol at hand back at that time, they would be using rebol even more, they would spread it, another ppl joining their projects would be influenced etc etc. - can you see the tree/spiral of potential users, who, in a long term, would bring RT and rebol much more money? It all was blocked with /Command 250USD pricing - basic features which should never be charged for were not identified. What you are offering now is how to cure situation which should be avoided in the first place long time ago. I am one of those who paid for /Pro, our company bought /Command and upgraded to /Command SDK for two platforms and I also hope I will bring RT another sales - just to prevent potential reactions that I am the one who suggest everything to be for free. I think that the problem rebol faces nowadays is - how to spread it even more. Some folks here even surprised me with opinions like - VB was cool untill it was masivelly accepted, but well - in my opinion, we didn't reach critical mass acceptance for current situation at least to be vital. And results we have to face: RT is rather slow for commercial accpetance and I will once again name- - not enough manpower - no clear and public defined roadmap - no known bug public database - sometimes non existant tech support - we can't be sure when/how RT decides to implement eventually needed feature XY That's for RT part - in some areas we can help ... if we can find enough manpower ourselves. So - can't you see us still running in circle? I can. New features are only slowly implemented if even, it all smells like stagnation from external pov (pov of ppl who don't use rebol yet but follow it from time to time - no significant technology changes for 2 years), not enough customers to pay RT, so RT can't employee another ppl to implement requested features and take technology further ... still the same circle ... The question is - how to escape it? Do I know the answer? I don't know - my proposition was - - the roadmap (goals, heh, Gregg? :-) - Carl should define areas in which we could help, set some coordinators - BUT - he would HAVE to be available at least from time to time - not like with VID projects where we reached some decision points and were not able to get some questions asnwered for 2 months. Maybe RT could even accept few skilled community members to participate on technology (C level) development itself. Once roadmap is defined, we should try to get there - fullfill the goals. I would think in following areas: - where do we want to see rebol? As for me - Win, Linux, maybe one or two Unices, Mac and mainly - mobile devices .... if rebol is too resource hungry, let's internally modularize even more - rebol technology developments - announced plug-ins, async networking - product redefinition - especially /Command and /Pro - kill pro, free library and shell, remove mySQL and Oracle from kernel - it does NOT belong there. Improve certificates handling in Command, add fast async engine to Command (or all products - kinf of Doc's proposed uniserve) - simply - make the framework stronger! - VID group - docs group - and finally - IOS group Cheers, -pekr-

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