Re: RE: [ANNOUNCE] XML/Ada 0.5 released

Re: RE: [ANNOUNCE] XML/Ada 0.5 released

[Ted Dennison]

In article <mailman.989219766.20003.comp.lang.ada@ada.eu.org>, Robert C. Leif,
Ph.D. says...
>I still believe that in the long run, a significant part of the Ada
>community could make a large amount of money by going beyond the outdated
>Free Software philosophy and pursuing an effective approach to assist

Personally, I'm not all that interested in making "a large amount of money" off
of Ada. What I'd like to do is increase the utility and usage of the language,
and trust that the rising tide raises all boats.

I'm not sure where you get "outdated" from. As near as I can tell, the Free
Software licenses are still quite effective at achieving their goals, when
appropriately used. Nothing has happened that I can see to make them obsolete.

The problem here, and David nailed this dead-on in a previous post, is that the
GPL simultaniously encourages further use of the GPL, and discourages use of the
environment in question. This is no new insight; its talked about at length in
the LGPL rationale. If there is no feasable alternative to the environment in
which the GPL'ed code exists, then the net effect is going to be positive (at
least from the perspective of someone who wants to see more GPL'ed code).
However, if there are lots of other alternatives, then the GPL just becomes a
poison pill. That is why the LGPL (and the GMGPL) exists.

In this case, there are certianly no cost (or low cost) alternatives to using
ACT's XML parser on most platforms, but they mostly involve not using Ada. Of
course that's the situation we had *before* the XML parser was released, so its
not like ACT is hurting Ada, they just aren't helping it as much as they could.
But considering that no *other* Ada compiler vendor has seen fit to release
GMGPL'ed code at all, there's no sense bashing ACT about this. 

---
T.E.D.    homepage   - http://www.telepath.com/dennison/Ted/TED.html
          home email - mailto:dennison@telepath.com

RE: [ANNOUNCE] XML/Ada 0.5 released

[dewar]

<<I still believe that in the long run, a significant part of the Ada
community could make a large amount of money by going beyond the outdated
Free Software philosophy and pursuing an effective approach to assist
startups. I have described this and created a first draft of a license (see
references below). Ada technology including ASIS has the unique capacity to
create a rear loaded licensing scheme which includes competitive forces.
This is an ideal condition for capitalizing on a unique software technology.
In short, many of us could make substantial amounts of money by producing
commercial products that work.
>>

You are welcome to follow this commercial path for yourself. Why not do so
if you think it will make money? We don't see it as viable, but
the marketplace is about completing viewpoints, and the nice thing about
the Free Software philsophy (I have no idea what you are referring to when
you use this phrase, but undoubtedly you are confused a
bit on what this means) is that it allows people like you to put
your money where your mouth is on this issue.

You should know by now that you are not going to persuade us to change
course in this respect. We are the only remaining successful Ada vendor
(as in a vendor whose primary product is Ada), and we think that is becayuse
we know how to persue the market. If you think you know better, give it
a try, and show everyone you are right :-)

RE: [ANNOUNCE] XML/Ada 0.5 released

[tmoran]

>I have no idea what you are referring to when you use this phrase,
>but undoubtedly you are confused a bit on what this means
  An interesting viewpoint.

>We are the only remaining successful Ada vendor (as in a vendor whose
>primary product is Ada), and we think that is becayuse we know how to
>persue the market.
  It would be interesting to hear your former competitor's views on
their reasons for abandoning the Ada compiler business.  In fact, is it
reasonable to call ACT an "Ada vendor" when it does not in fact "vend"
Ada compilers?  Isn't ACT a vendor of support services, specialized for
the GNAT compiler?

Re: RE: [ANNOUNCE] XML/Ada 0.5 released

[Ted Dennison]

In article <mLKJ6.43238$Jh5.41288061@news1.rdc1.sfba.home.com>, tmoran@acm.org
says...
>
>  It would be interesting to hear your former competitor's views on
>their reasons for abandoning the Ada compiler business.  In fact, is it
>reasonable to call ACT an "Ada vendor" when it does not in fact "vend"
>Ada compilers?  Isn't ACT a vendor of support services, specialized for
>the GNAT compiler?

I don't think its abandoned, so much as it is that everyone else also does other
stuff to pay the bills. At least, I hope that's the case. I hadn't heard
anything about Rational and Aonix abandoning their Ada products.

---
T.E.D.    homepage   - http://www.telepath.com/dennison/Ted/TED.html
          home email - mailto:dennison@telepath.com

Re: RE: [ANNOUNCE] XML/Ada 0.5 released

[tmoran]

> In article <mailman.989219766.20003.comp.lang.ada@ada.eu.org>, Robert C. Leif,
> Ph.D. says...
> >I still believe that in the long run, a significant part of the Ada
> >community could make a large amount of money by going beyond the outdated
> >Free Software philosophy and pursuing an effective approach to assist
>
> Personally, I'm not all that interested in making "a large amount of money" off
> of Ada. What I'd like to do is increase the utility and usage of the language,
  It's great than some people work to "increase the utility and usage of
the language" out of pure love, but if you want the result, and not
merely the process, then you should encourage help even from those who do
want, or need, "a large amount of money".  Over the long term, there are
a lot more of the latter than the former.

Re: [ANNOUNCE] XML/Ada 0.5 released

[Emmanuel Briot]

[On behalf of Robert Dewar]

Tom Moran asks

<<It would be interesting to hear your former competitor's views on
their reasons for abandoning the Ada compiler business.  In fact, is it
reasonable to call ACT an "Ada vendor" when it does not in fact "vend"
Ada compilers?  Isn't ACT a vendor of support services, specialized for
the GNAT compiler?
>>

Of course we sell Ada compilers. Just like Microsoft, we offer copyrighted,
licensed software together with support. Now it is true that we offer a
considerably less restrictive license, which is good for our customers
in many ways, and we certainly hope that our support is considerably
better than what Microsoft supplies :-)

But the basic business model is the same, if you buy our product you get
a nice box with manuals, CD ROM's and a license agreement. You also
get support included.

Now it is certainly true that our business model is MUCH more oriented to
giving high level support, but the fundamental model here is the same as
any other software business. Tom Moran's characterization definitely does
not correspond to our business model!

Robert Dewar
Ada Core Technologies

P.S. I do not know of other vendors "abandoning" the Ada business. Far from
it, all the ARA vendors report increasing business in the Ada market. What
distinguishes Ada Core Technologies is that we are, as far as I know, the
only Ada compiler vendor whose primary business is in the Ada market (and
I am happy to report that we can pay our bills just fine :-)

Re: RE: [ANNOUNCE] XML/Ada 0.5 released

[Marin David Condic]

I'd have to agree that insofar as there is "a large amount of money" to be
made doing something, there will be lots of people wanting to do it. Right
now, there are not millions of people wanting to program in Ada. If Dr.
Leif's "Ada Developers Cooperative License" were to gain a little momentum,
it might present an opportunity for many developers to make a few $$$. That
would probably encourage Ada usage.

MDC
--
Marin David Condic
Senior Software Engineer
Pace Micro Technology Americas    www.pacemicro.com
Enabling the digital revolution
e-Mail:    marin.condic@pacemicro.com
Web:      http://www.mcondic.com/


<tmoran@acm.org> wrote in message
news:cm6K6.1887$6v6.1802491@news1.rdc1.sfba.home.com...
>   It's great than some people work to "increase the utility and usage of
> the language" out of pure love, but if you want the result, and not
> merely the process, then you should encourage help even from those who do
> want, or need, "a large amount of money".  Over the long term, there are
> a lot more of the latter than the former.