Re: GNAT GPL 2005: Too clever by half?

[Ludovic Brenta <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org>]

"Frank" <myworstenemy@somewhere.com> writes:
> Hi
>
> What oportunities does an open licensing give to the big customers of 
> AdaCore?
> What if a big company choses to keep all their development on the 3.15p 
> version --- because they have 25 developers
> this becomes cheap. However they need the quality from the AdaCore service- 
> so they buy one licence of "5-seats"-
> on which they compile all other code regulary (especially before testing) 
> and from which they base their support requests. Does the licensing prevent 
> this? If this is allowed it must surely be bad for AdaCore business.

A quote from a recent paper by Jamie Ayre and Franco Gasperoni [1] says:

"How do we check that users do not exceed the subscription level they
purchased?  We don't, we trust our customers.  Trust builds trust."

And later in the same paper:

"AdaCore has seen steady growth over the 10 years since launch and
received several awards for strong financial performance.  From the
core staff of 3 at the time the company was created, AdaCore now has
over 40 permanent staff as well as several consultants and interns."

[1] http://oss2005.case.unibz.it/Papers/10.pdf

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.