* and visual library once again @ 2005-10-20 17:29 Szymon Guz 2005-10-20 18:38 ` Pascal Obry 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-20 17:29 UTC (permalink / raw) Hi, I know that I asked some time ago about that but it was so long ago that I thought that maybe something changed from that time: what visual library is available for using in Ada programs in (not only) windows ? Another thing is that I got lost in the debate about new GNAT licence, so could anybody describe in 3 sentences what is wrong with GNAT (I know - the GPL licence, but is that all? ) and is there any free compiler for Windows ? (oh, I forgot - and for Mac). regards Szymon Guz ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-20 17:29 and visual library once again Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-20 18:38 ` Pascal Obry 2005-10-20 21:01 ` Szymon Guz 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Pascal Obry @ 2005-10-20 18:38 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Szymon Guz Szymon, > I know that I asked some time ago about that but it was so long ago that > I thought that maybe something changed from that time: what visual > library is available for using in Ada programs in (not only) windows ? GtkAda is a cross-platform (GNU/Linux, Windows and OS/X) > Another thing is that I got lost in the debate about new GNAT licence, > so could anybody describe in 3 sentences what is wrong with GNAT (I know > - the GPL licence, but is that all? ) and is there any free compiler for > Windows ? (oh, I forgot - and for Mac). Nothing wrong. It just depends on what you want to do with it. Pascal. -- --|------------------------------------------------------ --| Pascal Obry Team-Ada Member --| 45, rue Gabriel Peri - 78114 Magny Les Hameaux FRANCE --|------------------------------------------------------ --| http://www.obry.net --| "The best way to travel is by means of imagination" --| --| gpg --keyserver wwwkeys.pgp.net --recv-key C1082595 ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-20 18:38 ` Pascal Obry @ 2005-10-20 21:01 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-20 21:04 ` Pascal Obry 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-20 21:01 UTC (permalink / raw) Pascal Obry napisał(a): > Szymon, > > >>I know that I asked some time ago about that but it was so long ago that >>I thought that maybe something changed from that time: what visual >>library is available for using in Ada programs in (not only) windows ? > > > GtkAda is a cross-platform (GNU/Linux, Windows and OS/X) thnx > > >>Another thing is that I got lost in the debate about new GNAT licence, >>so could anybody describe in 3 sentences what is wrong with GNAT (I know >>- the GPL licence, but is that all? ) and is there any free compiler for >>Windows ? (oh, I forgot - and for Mac). > > > Nothing wrong. It just depends on what you want to do with it. > sure, I want to sell my programs ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-20 21:01 ` Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-20 21:04 ` Pascal Obry 2005-10-20 21:09 ` Szymon Guz 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Pascal Obry @ 2005-10-20 21:04 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Szymon Guz Szymon, > sure, I want to sell my programs No problem to sell whatever. Pascal. -- --|------------------------------------------------------ --| Pascal Obry Team-Ada Member --| 45, rue Gabriel Peri - 78114 Magny Les Hameaux FRANCE --|------------------------------------------------------ --| http://www.obry.net --| "The best way to travel is by means of imagination" --| --| gpg --keyserver wwwkeys.pgp.net --recv-key C1082595 ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-20 21:04 ` Pascal Obry @ 2005-10-20 21:09 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-20 21:21 ` Pascal Obry 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-20 21:09 UTC (permalink / raw) Pascal Obry napisał(a): > Szymon, > > >>sure, I want to sell my programs > > > No problem to sell whatever. > > Pascal. > right, but the GPL licence isnt't what I need, and that't why I'm asking if really using GNAT the program have to be on the GPL licence. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-20 21:09 ` Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-20 21:21 ` Pascal Obry 2005-10-21 2:19 ` Steve Whalen 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Pascal Obry @ 2005-10-20 21:21 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Szymon Guz Szymon, > right, but the GPL licence isnt't what I need, and that't why I'm asking > if really using GNAT the program have to be on the GPL licence. I pretty well understood what you wanted ;), but note that there is so much confusion on this issue. All I have replied to you is just what you have asked. You want to sell your program, no problem with GNAT GPL. Pascal. -- --|------------------------------------------------------ --| Pascal Obry Team-Ada Member --| 45, rue Gabriel Peri - 78114 Magny Les Hameaux FRANCE --|------------------------------------------------------ --| http://www.obry.net --| "The best way to travel is by means of imagination" --| --| gpg --keyserver wwwkeys.pgp.net --recv-key C1082595 ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-20 21:21 ` Pascal Obry @ 2005-10-21 2:19 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 3:08 ` Larry Kilgallen ` (3 more replies) 0 siblings, 4 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-21 2:19 UTC (permalink / raw) > Szymon, > > > right, but the GPL licence isnt't what I need, and that't why I'm asking > > if really using GNAT the program have to be on the GPL licence. > > I pretty well understood what you wanted ;), but note that there is so > much confusion on this issue. All I have replied to you is just what you > have asked. You want to sell your program, no problem with GNAT GPL. > Yes he can sell his program under the GPL license (as required by GNAT GPL). But it is important to remind anyone asking such a question that they can sell the program ONLY if they give a copy of the source code to the customer they sell it to (including the right of that customer to give the source and binary to anyone else they want per the GPL). That's a pretty big difference for most people who "sell their programs". It can lead to the immediate termination of your ability to sell any other copies of the program to anyone else in many markets. I'm actually a big supporter of the GPL and look forward to the day (5 to 100 years from now) when all (non-classified) computer programs will be GPL'd or it's future equivalent. However, in the present, there are a lot of people for whom selling a program under the GPL would be commercial suicide. If they need the income from the program to survive, that is a pretty big problem. Steve ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 2:19 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-21 3:08 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 7:52 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-21 10:43 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 4:02 ` tmoran ` (2 subsequent siblings) 3 siblings, 2 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-21 3:08 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <1129861178.782874.87870@g43g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>, "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> writes: >> Szymon, >> >> > right, but the GPL licence isnt't what I need, and that't why I'm asking >> > if really using GNAT the program have to be on the GPL licence. >> >> I pretty well understood what you wanted ;), but note that there is so >> much confusion on this issue. All I have replied to you is just what you >> have asked. You want to sell your program, no problem with GNAT GPL. >> > > Yes he can sell his program under the GPL license (as required by GNAT > GPL). > > But it is important to remind anyone asking such a question that they > can sell the program ONLY if they give a copy of the source code to the > customer they sell it to (including the right of that customer to give > the source and binary to anyone else they want per the GPL). That's a > pretty big difference for most people who "sell their programs". It can > lead to the immediate termination of your ability to sell any other > copies of the program to anyone else in many markets. It is not a problem for anyone who actually sells their software. It is a problem for those who follow the customary practice of Microsoft, Symantec, Computer Associates and actually _license_ their software rather than selling it. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 3:08 ` Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-21 7:52 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-21 13:48 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 10:43 ` Steve Whalen 1 sibling, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-21 7:52 UTC (permalink / raw) Larry Kilgallen napisał(a): > In article <1129861178.782874.87870@g43g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>, "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> writes: > >>>Szymon, >>> >>> >>>>right, but the GPL licence isnt't what I need, and that't why I'm asking >>>>if really using GNAT the program have to be on the GPL licence. >>> >>>I pretty well understood what you wanted ;), but note that there is so >>>much confusion on this issue. All I have replied to you is just what you >>>have asked. You want to sell your program, no problem with GNAT GPL. >>> >> >>Yes he can sell his program under the GPL license (as required by GNAT >>GPL). >> >>But it is important to remind anyone asking such a question that they >>can sell the program ONLY if they give a copy of the source code to the >>customer they sell it to (including the right of that customer to give >>the source and binary to anyone else they want per the GPL). That's a >>pretty big difference for most people who "sell their programs". It can >>lead to the immediate termination of your ability to sell any other >>copies of the program to anyone else in many markets. > > > It is not a problem for anyone who actually sells their software. > > It is a problem for those who follow the customary practice of > Microsoft, Symantec, Computer Associates and actually _license_ > their software rather than selling it. do you mean that this is a bad practice ? ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 7:52 ` Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-21 13:48 ` Larry Kilgallen 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-21 13:48 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <dja6ia$2vtd$1@node1.news.atman.pl>, Szymon Guz <alpha@skynet.org.pl_WITHOUT> writes: >>>But it is important to remind anyone asking such a question that they >>>can sell the program ONLY if they give a copy of the source code to the= > >>>customer they sell it to (including the right of that customer to give >>>the source and binary to anyone else they want per the GPL). That's a >>>pretty big difference for most people who "sell their programs". It can= > >>>lead to the immediate termination of your ability to sell any other >>>copies of the program to anyone else in many markets. >>=20 >>=20 >> It is not a problem for anyone who actually sells their software. >>=20 >> It is a problem for those who follow the customary practice of >> Microsoft, Symantec, Computer Associates and actually _license_ >> their software rather than selling it. > > do you mean that this is a bad practice ? I mean the (presumed) practice of denizens of comp.lang.ada saying "sell my software" when they really mean "license my software" is certainly bad. But I suppose this meta-interchange is good, proving once again that English is not a strongly typed language. The Truth will set you Free. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 3:08 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 7:52 ` Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-21 10:43 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 13:50 ` Larry Kilgallen 1 sibling, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-21 10:43 UTC (permalink / raw) Larry Kilgallen wrote: > In article <1129861178.782874.87870@g43g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>, "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> writes: ... > > But it is important to remind anyone asking such a question that they > > can sell the program ONLY if they give a copy of the source code to the > > customer they sell it to (including the right of that customer to give > > the source and binary to anyone else they want per the GPL). ... > > It is not a problem for anyone who actually sells their software. > > It is a problem for those who follow the customary practice of > Microsoft, Symantec, Computer Associates and actually _license_ > their software rather than selling it. OK, I'll bite. Why does it matter whether a programmer "licenses" a program to customers or "sells" it? I think the distinction relevant to whether or not the GPL creates a "problem" for a programmer, is whether or not the programmer sells a proprietary program (closed source to the world, whether or not source is shipped with the binary). If the program being sold must be proprietary (not "open source") in order to keep competitors (or customers) from eliminating your income stream, then the GPL is a problem, whether you "license" the software or "sell" it. Yes the Microsofts of the world tend to license software instead of selling it, but they have everything in common with a one person programming shop which "sells" their program, if both must remain "proprietary" in order to stay in business. GPL programs are also "licensed" for a cost of $0 and compliance with the terms of the GPL, which specifically precludes truly proprietary programs if you transfer them (via sale OR licensing) to other people or companies (you can write and use proprietary programs as long as you keep it inside your company and don't sell it to others). If Microsoft compiled the next version of their "Office" suite with AdaCore's GNAT GPL compiler, their market would dry up the day after they shipped the first copy and someone else got the source under the GPL and compiled it and released it to the world. Same thing would happen to a one programmer shop in many markets. Steve ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 10:43 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-21 13:50 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 13:54 ` Hyman Rosen 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-21 13:50 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <1129891429.987102.321970@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>, "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> writes: > Larry Kilgallen wrote: >> In article <1129861178.782874.87870@g43g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>, > "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> writes: > ... >> > But it is important to remind anyone asking such a question that they >> > can sell the program ONLY if they give a copy of the source code to the >> > customer they sell it to (including the right of that customer to give >> > the source and binary to anyone else they want per the GPL). > ... >> >> It is not a problem for anyone who actually sells their software. >> >> It is a problem for those who follow the customary practice of >> Microsoft, Symantec, Computer Associates and actually _license_ >> their software rather than selling it. > > OK, I'll bite. Why does it matter whether a programmer "licenses" a > program to customers or "sells" it? If you "sell" a program, the customer can make copies and "sell" it to others. If you "license" software, like both GPL adherents and Microsoft do, the recipient can only make use of the software within boundaries stipulated by the license. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 13:50 ` Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-21 13:54 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-21 16:29 ` Larry Kilgallen 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-21 13:54 UTC (permalink / raw) Larry Kilgallen wrote: > If you "sell" a program, the customer can make copies and "sell" it > to others. Of course that isn't true. If someone sells you a book, you cannot make copies and sell those to others. Why do you think a program is different? ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 13:54 ` Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-21 16:29 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 18:19 ` Hyman Rosen 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-21 16:29 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <1129902844.300659.188970@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com>, "Hyman Rosen" <hyman.rosen@gmail.com> writes: > Larry Kilgallen wrote: >> If you "sell" a program, the customer can make copies and "sell" it >> to others. > > Of course that isn't true. If someone sells you a book, > you cannot make copies and sell those to others. Certainly you can. Harper & Row does that all the time after they buy a book from the author. Perhaps you are thinking of "sell a copy of a book". Can you suggest a common contract we can all examine that says it "sells a copy of software" rather than "licenses" it ? ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 16:29 ` Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-21 18:19 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-25 22:01 ` Björn Persson 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-21 18:19 UTC (permalink / raw) Larry Kilgallen wrote: > Certainly you can. Harper & Row does that all the time after > they buy a book from the author. They don't buy a book. They buy the right to make copies, which otherwise is restricted to the copyright holder. In many cases the contract specifies circumstances under which the publisher will lose that right and it will revert back to the author. > Perhaps you are thinking of "sell a copy of a book". No. When I go to a bookstore and make a purchase, no one makes a copy of a book. There are piles and cases of books available, and I pick one up and buy it. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 18:19 ` Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-25 22:01 ` Björn Persson 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Björn Persson @ 2005-10-25 22:01 UTC (permalink / raw) Hyman Rosen wrote: > Larry Kilgallen wrote: >>Certainly you can. Harper & Row does that all the time after >>they buy a book from the author. > > They don't buy a book. They buy the right to make copies, which > otherwise is restricted to the copyright holder. In many cases > the contract specifies circumstances under which the publisher > will lose that right and it will revert back to the author. > >>Perhaps you are thinking of "sell a copy of a book". > > No. When I go to a bookstore and make a purchase, no one makes a > copy of a book. There are piles and cases of books available, and > I pick one up and buy it. This is what happens when we take words like "buy" (or "steal") that apply to material objects, and try to use them on information such as software or literature. The book example makes the confusion extra visible because "book" can denote both a material object, a bound sheaf of pages, and a piece of information, a literary work. Everybody knows what buying a material book means. What it means to buy a literary work is a lot less clear. -- Bj�rn Persson PGP key A88682FD omb jor ers @sv ge. r o.b n.p son eri nu ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 2:19 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 3:08 ` Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-21 4:02 ` tmoran 2005-10-21 6:54 ` Hyman Rosen ` (2 more replies) 2005-10-21 7:00 ` Martin Dowie 2005-10-21 18:26 ` Simon Wright 3 siblings, 3 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: tmoran @ 2005-10-21 4:02 UTC (permalink / raw) >I'm actually a big supporter of the GPL and look forward to the day (5 >to 100 years from now) when all (non-classified) computer programs will >be GPL'd or it's future equivalent. However, in the present, there are The economists point out that to the extent programs are "public goods" the market will undersupply them, leaving it to government or other organizations not guided by the market to pay programmers. So 5 to 100 years from now programmers will be employees of government or other large institutions/organizations? ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 4:02 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-21 6:54 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2005-10-21 9:58 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 17:01 ` Björn Persson 2 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-21 6:54 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: > So 5 to 100 years from now programmers will be employees of > government or other large institutions/organizations? I would think that we don't have to wait. Isn't this already the case now? ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 6:54 ` Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2005-10-23 2:42 ` Hyman Rosen 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: tmoran @ 2005-10-22 5:38 UTC (permalink / raw) > > So 5 to 100 years from now programmers will be employees of > > government or other large institutions/organizations? > > I would think that we don't have to wait. > Isn't this already the case now? Perhaps they've been eliminated in your neighborhood, but here (Silicon Valley) there are still some programmers working at small start-ups. Some species try to persevere instead of adapt. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-23 2:42 ` Hyman Rosen 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 2:42 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: > Perhaps they've been eliminated in your neighborhood Yep. New York City. The financial industry gets 'em all. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 4:02 ` tmoran 2005-10-21 6:54 ` Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-21 9:58 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 14:55 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-21 17:01 ` Björn Persson 2 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-21 9:58 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: > >I'm actually a big supporter of the GPL and look forward to the day (5 > >to 100 years from now) when all (non-classified) computer programs will > >be GPL'd or it's future equivalent. However, in the present, there are > The economists point out that to the extent programs are "public goods" > the market will undersupply them, leaving it to government or other > organizations not guided by the market to pay programmers. So 5 to 100 > years from now programmers will be employees of government or other large > institutions/organizations? Between 5 and 50 years from now hopefully we'll have a gradual transition to more "shared" code as businesses realize it's to their advantage to spend less on code that does NOT differentiate their business (i.e. all the utility stuff like compilers and word processors and accounting systems and inventory systems, etc.). The only people business will pay to program will be working on the relatively short list of things that actually give one company competitive advantage over another. Some of this "shared code" will be written by paid programmers for various forms of consortium that companies pay to develop and enhance the commodity infrastructure software because they can't gain competitive advantage from spending their own money on it. Between 50 and 100 years from now there will be a massive deflationary cycle as powerful computers combined with cheap electricity and increasingly capable robots eliminate the cost of "labor" from the economy. Since the price performance of robots will begin to follow that of the computers that drive them, all the basics (food, clothing, shelter) will have their costs driven down toward zero. At some point the government will tax the robots and pay everyone $500 a month which will be more than enough to live on. You will be able to choose to program, or to watch TV, or to garden, or to serve others, or do nothing, just like in Star Trek <g>. Then programming will mostly be done by people who do it because they love it, because nobody has to work just to survive. This projection of course comes with a money back guarantee <g>. Steve P.S. Also, the economics of software are very different from other economics, because the cost of production is zero (i.e. once a program is written it can be shared and/or run by an unlimited number of people or companies for no additional cost). -- "In an efficient market, price equals marginal cost. Marginal cost of software: zero." ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 9:58 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-21 14:55 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-21 16:51 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov ` (2 more replies) 0 siblings, 3 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Bob Spooner @ 2005-10-21 14:55 UTC (permalink / raw) "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:1129888684.681335.230450@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... > tmoran@acm.org wrote: > > >I'm actually a big supporter of the GPL and look forward to the day (5 > > >to 100 years from now) when all (non-classified) computer programs will > > >be GPL'd or it's future equivalent. However, in the present, there are > > The economists point out that to the extent programs are "public goods" > > the market will undersupply them, leaving it to government or other > > organizations not guided by the market to pay programmers. So 5 to 100 > > years from now programmers will be employees of government or other large > > institutions/organizations? > > Between 5 and 50 years from now hopefully we'll have a gradual > transition to more "shared" code as businesses realize it's to their > advantage to spend less on code that does NOT differentiate their > business (i.e. all the utility stuff like compilers and word processors > and accounting systems and inventory systems, etc.). The only people > business will pay to program will be working on the relatively short > list of things that actually give one company competitive advantage > over another. Some of this "shared code" will be written by paid > programmers for various forms of consortium that companies pay to > develop and enhance the commodity infrastructure software because they > can't gain competitive advantage from spending their own money on it. > And just what differentiates the business of a software company such as Microsoft? > Between 50 and 100 years from now there will be a massive deflationary > cycle as powerful computers combined with cheap electricity and > increasingly capable robots eliminate the cost of "labor" from the > economy. Since the price performance of robots will begin to follow > that of the computers that drive them, all the basics (food, clothing, > shelter) will have their costs driven down toward zero. At some point > the government will tax the robots and pay everyone $500 a month which > will be more than enough to live on. You will be able to choose to > program, or to watch TV, or to garden, or to serve others, or do > nothing, just like in Star Trek <g>. Then programming will mostly be > done by people who do it because they love it, because nobody has to > work just to survive. This sounds a lot like the predictions of about 40 years ago that with automation, etc. the biggest problem we would have now would be what to do with all the extra spare time. And yet the average person is working more hours now. > > This projection of course comes with a money back guarantee <g>. > > Steve > > P.S. Also, the economics of software are very different from other > economics, because the cost of production is zero (i.e. once a program > is written it can be shared and/or run by an unlimited number of people > or companies for no additional cost). > The cost of _distribution_ is very low. The cost of production, that is development, of software, especially _good_ software, is high. Very few companies are willing to make the kind of investment it takes to produce good software. That's one of the reasons Ada isn't more widely used. > -- > > "In an efficient market, price equals marginal cost. Marginal cost of > software: zero." > Only if the development cost can be amortized over an infinite number of sales or licences or support contracts. Otherwise price does not equal marginal cost and the development cost is highly relevant. Bob ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 14:55 ` Bob Spooner @ 2005-10-21 16:51 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov 2005-10-21 22:01 ` Jeffrey R. Carter 2005-10-23 6:31 ` Steve Whalen 2 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Dmitry A. Kazakov @ 2005-10-21 16:51 UTC (permalink / raw) On Fri, 21 Oct 2005 10:55:40 -0400, Bob Spooner wrote: > "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> wrote in message > news:1129888684.681335.230450@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... >> Between 50 and 100 years from now there will be a massive deflationary >> cycle as powerful computers combined with cheap electricity and >> increasingly capable robots eliminate the cost of "labor" from the >> economy. Since the price performance of robots will begin to follow >> that of the computers that drive them, all the basics (food, clothing, >> shelter) will have their costs driven down toward zero. At some point >> the government will tax the robots and pay everyone $500 a month which >> will be more than enough to live on. You will be able to choose to >> program, or to watch TV, or to garden, or to serve others, or do >> nothing, just like in Star Trek <g>. Then programming will mostly be >> done by people who do it because they love it, because nobody has to >> work just to survive. Depends on the definition of "survive." I bet, people storming Spain borders in Africa differ on this mater with you. So would you with the people living 100 years later. > This sounds a lot like the predictions of about 40 years ago that with > automation, etc. the biggest problem we would have now would be what to do > with all the extra spare time. And yet the average person is working more > hours now. Because, probably the only one thing Marx was right about, is that in these $500 only the amount of time spent by *human* beings counts. We trade with other humans, we don't with automata! And we are trading our lives for the lives of the others... -- Regards, Dmitry A. Kazakov http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 14:55 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-21 16:51 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov @ 2005-10-21 22:01 ` Jeffrey R. Carter 2005-10-23 6:31 ` Steve Whalen 2 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Jeffrey R. Carter @ 2005-10-21 22:01 UTC (permalink / raw) Bob Spooner wrote: > The cost of _distribution_ is very low. The cost of production, that is > development, of software, especially _good_ software, is high. Very few > companies are willing to make the kind of investment it takes to produce > good software. That's one of the reasons Ada isn't more widely used. If we compare SW to HW, we find in HW that a design is created, prototyped, and one or more production exemplars are created by the designers. The item then goes into production, and the produced items are distributed. In SW, a design is created and a production exemplar is created by the designers. The SW then goes into production, which is the process of burning and boxing CDs, packaging the SW for download from the net, or the like. So far, very similar to HW. The cost of designing the SW and creating that production exemplar is high, but the cost of production is not. SW development is a design activity, not a production activity. > Only if the development cost can be amortized over an infinite number of > sales or licences or support contracts. Otherwise price does not equal > marginal cost and the development cost is highly relevant. This is of course true. -- Jeff Carter "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!" Monty Python's Flying Circus 22 ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 14:55 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-21 16:51 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov 2005-10-21 22:01 ` Jeffrey R. Carter @ 2005-10-23 6:31 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-23 11:27 ` Jeffrey R. Carter 2005-10-24 12:52 ` Bob Spooner 2 siblings, 2 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-23 6:31 UTC (permalink / raw) Bob Spooner wrote: > "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> wrote in message > news:1129888684.681335.230450@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... > > Between 50 and 100 years from now there will be a massive deflationary > > cycle as powerful computers combined with cheap electricity and > > increasingly capable robots eliminate the cost of "labor" from the > > economy. Since the price performance of robots will begin to follow > > that of the computers that drive them, all the basics (food, clothing, > > shelter) will have their costs driven down toward zero. At some point > > the government will tax the robots and pay everyone $500 a month which > > will be more than enough to live on. You will be able to choose to > > program, or to watch TV, or to garden, or to serve others, or do > > nothing, just like in Star Trek <g>. Then programming will mostly be > > done by people who do it because they love it, because nobody has to > > work just to survive. > > This sounds a lot like the predictions of about 40 years ago that with > automation, etc. the biggest problem we would have now would be what to do > with all the extra spare time. And yet the average person is working more > hours now. > 40 years ago such predictions were pipe dreams based on hoped for breakthroughs in various technologies. That was before "Moore's law" was understood, and before having several decades of increases in the power and price performance of computers. We now have significant evidence that the increase in computing power and cost effectiveness is on an exponential, not a linear curve into the future. Even if we only assume a linear increase in the power of computing available (doubling every 18 months or so) in a few decades, computers will be easily be able to do much of the "work" humans do even _without_ the kinds of breakthroughs in artificial intelligence that were prerequisites for the predictions of 40 years ago. I agree with Marvin Minsky's thesis that we are NOT likely to get computers to be significantly "smarter" by the use of artificial intelligence (from his book of about 1971). But the staggering amounts of computing power that will be readily available very cheaply a few decades from now _will_ make it relatively easy to automate tasks that are currently impractical (not by emulating the way humans think, but by brute force). Much the way the DARPA challenge of having an autonomous vehicle drive itself over 100 miles through rough desert terrain was solved: not by elegant software, but by practical engineering and brute force computing. In the time-frames I was referring to (50 to 100 years from now), the power of today's most powerful weather simulation super computers will fit inside a hollowed out grain of sand. > The cost of _distribution_ is very low. The cost of production, that is > development, of software, especially _good_ software, is high. Very few > companies are willing to make the kind of investment it takes to produce > good software. That's one of the reasons Ada isn't more widely used. > > -- > > > > "In an efficient market, price equals marginal cost. Marginal cost of > > software: zero." > > > Only if the development cost can be amortized over an infinite number of > sales or licences or support contracts. Otherwise price does not equal > marginal cost and the development cost is highly relevant. > > Bob But development cost is NOT production cost. The economics ARE different. Every kind of significant endeavor has high design and development costs (i.e. building the first working production quality prototype). Only computer software has a production / distribution cost that is for all practical purposes $0. There has never been a comparable phenomenon. That's the big difference over the long run. 50+ years from now the cost of design and development of "infrastructure" software will be amortized over large populations in the same way current infrastructure (like highways or the Internet) is paid for. Doesn't matter whether it's a "government" spreading the development costs (many highways) or a company (the U.S. telecoms companies for the Internet in the U.S.). Steve ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 6:31 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-23 11:27 ` Jeffrey R. Carter 2005-10-23 21:41 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-24 12:52 ` Bob Spooner 1 sibling, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Jeffrey R. Carter @ 2005-10-23 11:27 UTC (permalink / raw) Steve Whalen wrote: > Even if we only assume a linear increase in the power of computing > available (doubling every 18 months or so) in a few decades, computers Doubling every 18 months is not a linear increase. -- Jeff Carter "I unclog my nose towards you." Monty Python & the Holy Grail 11 ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 11:27 ` Jeffrey R. Carter @ 2005-10-23 21:41 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-24 3:14 ` Jeffrey R. Carter 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-23 21:41 UTC (permalink / raw) Jeffrey R. Carter wrote: > Steve Whalen wrote: > > > Even if we only assume a linear increase in the power of computing > > available (doubling every 18 months or so) in a few decades, computers > > Doubling every 18 months is not a linear increase. Quite right. I was trying to keep a post that was already too long from getting longer. Obviously I meant that we are seeing a rate of growth in computing performance that when plotted on an exponential graph, is not a straight line, but an accelerating curve. My point is that even ignoring the growth in the rate of growth, we will have extraordinarily powerful computers available for very little money 50 to 100 years from now. Since you chose to pick on my "linear increase", I take it you disagree with my basic premise that we will have stunningly powerful and inexpensive computers available 50 to 100 years from now? Steve ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 21:41 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-24 3:14 ` Jeffrey R. Carter 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Jeffrey R. Carter @ 2005-10-24 3:14 UTC (permalink / raw) Steve Whalen wrote: > Quite right. I was trying to keep a post that was already too long from > getting longer. Obviously I meant that we are seeing a rate of growth > in computing performance that when plotted on an exponential graph, is > not a straight line, but an accelerating curve. I guess I misread it. > Since you chose to pick on my "linear increase", I take it you disagree > with my basic premise that we will have stunningly powerful and > inexpensive computers available 50 to 100 years from now? Not at all. With nanotechnology we should have something the same volume as a sheet of bond paper that contains billions of simple processors. The main issue is that we'll be dealing in massive parallelism, so we need people comfortable with it, and a language with safe, high-level concurrency features. -- Jeff Carter "I spun around, and there I was, face to face with a six-year-old kid. Well, I just threw my guns down and walked away. Little bastard shot me in the ass." Blazing Saddles 40 ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 6:31 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-23 11:27 ` Jeffrey R. Carter @ 2005-10-24 12:52 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-25 7:23 ` Steve Whalen 1 sibling, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Bob Spooner @ 2005-10-24 12:52 UTC (permalink / raw) "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:1130049078.633311.55000@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... > > <snip> Much the way the DARPA > challenge of having an autonomous vehicle drive itself over 100 miles > through rough desert terrain was solved: not by elegant software, but > by practical engineering and brute force computing. In the time-frames > I was referring to (50 to 100 years from now), the power of today's > most powerful weather simulation super computers will fit inside a > hollowed out grain of sand. > I think you would be surprised at the elegance of some of the artificial intelligence techniques that are used. Where I work, we do research on and with autonomous vehicles. The brute force approach simply doesn't work. Bob ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-24 12:52 ` Bob Spooner @ 2005-10-25 7:23 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-25 14:20 ` Bob Spooner 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-25 7:23 UTC (permalink / raw) Bob Spooner wrote: > "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> wrote in message > news:1130049078.633311.55000@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... > > > > <snip> Much the way the DARPA > > challenge of having an autonomous vehicle drive itself over 100 miles > > through rough desert terrain was solved: not by elegant software, but > > by practical engineering and brute force computing. In the time-frames > > I was referring to (50 to 100 years from now), the power of today's > > most powerful weather simulation super computers will fit inside a > > hollowed out grain of sand. > > > I think you would be surprised at the elegance of some of the artificial > intelligence techniques that are used. Where I work, we do research on and > with autonomous vehicles. The brute force approach simply doesn't work. > > Bob I'm sorry. I didn't mean to denigrate or downplay the work being done in the field (or the work that was done for the DARPA challenge). I'm not at all surprised that there is some very elegant work in AI being done for autonomous vehicles. Doing the kind of hard work you do was considered unnecessary and "brute force" by many AI pundits of the 1960's who were going to (within 10 years!) emulate the human brain in a computer and then just have the computer brain learn do any task a human could do. Marvin Minsky's book I referred to was basically saying that was b.s. and wasn't going to happen (which I agree with, then and now). About every 10 years or so someone from the AI community says something similar... That's the crowd I was thinking of, to whom anything other than putting a human brain in a computer and letting it figure out how do something, is "brute force"(I'm oversimplifying again: it was quite a battle for $$ and research grants and reputation and ego: thankfully that never happens any more <g>). We may get closer to being able to emulate a human brain in a hardware computer in 100 years, but I suspect that most if not all of the "useful" AI work that will power the robots and such I was talking about, will come from the kind of work you do. I still think we should continue to learn from the brain, but I think trying to program a hardware computer to emulate how a human brain works isn't going to magically make a "smart" computer. I just hope Ada (or it's successor) is still around in an hundred years and being used for the more critical components of the robots we entrust our life to. Ironically the last time I did any serious robotics about 10+ years ago, Forth was my language of choice for the task at hand due to memory and hardware constraints. I guess that's a part of the point I was trying to make: "hardware constraints" are beginning to disappear, and will have disappeared completely in 100 years. Steve ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-25 7:23 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-25 14:20 ` Bob Spooner 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Bob Spooner @ 2005-10-25 14:20 UTC (permalink / raw) "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:1130224998.944468.133100@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... > Bob Spooner wrote: > > "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> wrote in message > > news:1130049078.633311.55000@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... > > > > > > <snip> Much the way the DARPA > > > challenge of having an autonomous vehicle drive itself over 100 miles > > > through rough desert terrain was solved: not by elegant software, but > > > by practical engineering and brute force computing. In the time-frames > > > I was referring to (50 to 100 years from now), the power of today's > > > most powerful weather simulation super computers will fit inside a > > > hollowed out grain of sand. > > > > > I think you would be surprised at the elegance of some of the artificial > > intelligence techniques that are used. Where I work, we do research on and > > with autonomous vehicles. The brute force approach simply doesn't work. > > > > Bob > > I'm sorry. I didn't mean to denigrate or downplay the work being done > in the field (or the work that was done for the DARPA challenge). I'm > not at all surprised that there is some very elegant work in AI being > done for autonomous vehicles. > > Doing the kind of hard work you do was considered unnecessary and > "brute force" by many AI pundits of the 1960's who were going to > (within 10 years!) emulate the human brain in a computer and then just > have the computer brain learn do any task a human could do. Marvin > Minsky's book I referred to was basically saying that was b.s. and > wasn't going to happen (which I agree with, then and now). > > About every 10 years or so someone from the AI community says something > similar... That's the crowd I was thinking of, to whom anything other > than putting a human brain in a computer and letting it figure out how > do something, is "brute force"(I'm oversimplifying again: it was quite > a battle for $$ and research grants and reputation and ego: thankfully > that never happens any more <g>). > > We may get closer to being able to emulate a human brain in a hardware > computer in 100 years, but I suspect that most if not all of the > "useful" AI work that will power the robots and such I was talking > about, will come from the kind of work you do. I still think we should > continue to learn from the brain, but I think trying to program a > hardware computer to emulate how a human brain works isn't going to > magically make a "smart" computer. > > I just hope Ada (or it's successor) is still around in an hundred years > and being used for the more critical components of the robots we > entrust our life to. Ironically the last time I did any serious > robotics about 10+ years ago, Forth was my language of choice for the > task at hand due to memory and hardware constraints. I guess that's a > part of the point I was trying to make: "hardware constraints" are > beginning to disappear, and will have disappeared completely in 100 > years. > > Steve > Well, I don't think that hardware constraints will ever completely disappear. That's because of what I call "Spooner's law of computing" which says that computing power generates the need for more computing power. Bob ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 4:02 ` tmoran 2005-10-21 6:54 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-21 9:58 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-21 17:01 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Björn Persson @ 2005-10-21 17:01 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: > The economists point out that to the extent programs are "public goods" > the market will undersupply them, leaving it to government or other > organizations not guided by the market to pay programmers. So 5 to 100 > years from now programmers will be employees of government or other large > institutions/organizations? What definition of "organization" are you using if you can say that Red Hat is a large organization but Microsoft isn't? -- Bj�rn Persson PGP key A88682FD omb jor ers @sv ge. r o.b n.p son eri nu ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 17:01 ` Björn Persson @ 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2005-10-25 20:51 ` Björn Persson 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: tmoran @ 2005-10-22 5:38 UTC (permalink / raw) >What definition of "organization" are you using if you can say that Red >Hat is a large organization but Microsoft isn't? Nobody said either of those things. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-25 20:51 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-25 22:16 ` tmoran 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Björn Persson @ 2005-10-25 20:51 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: >>What definition of "organization" are you using if you can say that Red >>Hat is a large organization but Microsoft isn't? > > Nobody said either of those things. I'll explain my reasoning. You wrote the following: > The economists point out that to the extent programs are "public goods" > the market will undersupply them, leaving it to government or other > organizations not guided by the market to pay programmers. You divided producers of software into two categories: category A, "the market", and category B, "government or other organizations not guided by the market". You also spoke of programs that are "public goods". As you wrote that in response to Steve's words about GPL'd programs, you obviously meant "public goods" to mean free software. You claimed that category A will not supply free software, that only category B will pay programmers to produce free software. Red Hat is a company that pays programmers to produce free software, so by that criterion it fits in category B. It can clearly not be in category A, because supplying free software is the heart of its business. As Red Hat isn't a government agency I have to conclude that it's an "other organization not guided by the market". As an example from category A, someone who produces software but not free software, I chose Microsoft. So, surprised that Red Hat isn't part of the market and knowing that there are several differences between Red Hat and Microsoft, I ask: Which difference causes Red Hat to be classified as an "organization not guided by the market" and Microsoft as part of "the market", and what definitions of "organization" and "market" make that possible? Or would you place Microsoft in category B also, and if so, will you please mention an example from category A? -- Bj�rn Persson PGP key A88682FD omb jor ers @sv ge. r o.b n.p son eri nu ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-25 20:51 ` Björn Persson @ 2005-10-25 22:16 ` tmoran 2005-10-25 23:14 ` Björn Persson 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: tmoran @ 2005-10-25 22:16 UTC (permalink / raw) > > The economists point out that to the extent programs are "public goods" > ... > You also spoke of programs that are "public goods". As > you wrote that in response to Steve's words about GPL'd programs, you > obviously meant "public goods" to mean free software. "Public goods" is a technical economics term, not a reference to GPL or "Free software". From "Principles of Economics" by Ruffin and Gregory: "Public goods are characterized by nonrival consumption and nonexclusion." My use of a program does not detract from your ability to use it (nonrivalrous), and it is relatively difficult to exclude "free riders" from use of the program without paying for it (nonexclusion). ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-25 22:16 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-25 23:14 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-26 0:14 ` tmoran 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Björn Persson @ 2005-10-25 23:14 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: > "Public goods" is a technical economics term, not a reference > to GPL or "Free software". I don't care whether it's a technical economics term or a martian politics term. You used it about GPL'd programs. I still want to know how Red Hat isn't part of the market. Right now your economic theory resembles a map that disagrees with the terrain. I still hope to get an enlightening explanation, but if I don't get one I'm likely to trust reality and conclude that the map is wrong. -- Bj�rn Persson PGP key A88682FD omb jor ers @sv ge. r o.b n.p son eri nu ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-25 23:14 ` Björn Persson @ 2005-10-26 0:14 ` tmoran 2005-10-26 22:11 ` Björn Persson 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: tmoran @ 2005-10-26 0:14 UTC (permalink / raw) > > The economists point out that to the extent programs are "public goods" > > the market will undersupply them, leaving it to government or other > > organizations not guided by the market to pay programmers. > > "Public goods" is a technical economics term, not a reference > > to GPL or "Free software". > I don't care whether it's a technical economics term or a martian > politics term. You used it about GPL'd programs. Actually, I didn't use it about GPL'd programs. Note that the original sentence did not mention GPL, but did say "economists point out", which was intended to convey the information that the following quoted phrase was one that economists use, eg, a technical (though found in any introductory econ textbook) economics term. As you said about words in another thread >This is what happens when we take words like "buy" (or "steal") that >apply to material objects, and try to use them on information such as It's important to try to clarify the particular meaning of a word or phrase. If someone understands it to have a different meaning, much heat and little light will ensue. > I still want to know how Red Hat isn't part of the market. I see various Red Hat products listed in Yahoo Shopping, and you tell me they pay their in-house programmers, so they sound to me like part of the market. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-26 0:14 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-26 22:11 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-26 23:46 ` OT: was " tmoran 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Björn Persson @ 2005-10-26 22:11 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: >>> "Public goods" is a technical economics term, not a reference >>>to GPL or "Free software". > >>I don't care whether it's a technical economics term or a martian >>politics term. You used it about GPL'd programs. > > Actually, I didn't use it about GPL'd programs. You used it to draw a conclusion, like so: Steve: In 5 to 100 years all programs will be GPL'd. economists: Only [category B] will pay programmers to produce public goods programs. Tom: So in 5 to 100 years programmers will be employees of [category B]? (Statements condensed for clarity.) There's a hidden assumption in that argument, namely that "GPL'd" is a subset of "public goods". If GPL'd programs aren't public goods, then your conclusion about who will pay programmers is invalid. > As you said about words in another thread > >>This is what happens when we take words like "buy" (or "steal") that >>apply to material objects, and try to use them on information such as The thought has indeed crossed my mind that maybe the term "public goods", or the economic theory you referenced, is only relevant to material goods. -- Bj�rn Persson PGP key A88682FD omb jor ers @sv ge. r o.b n.p son eri nu ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* OT: was Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-26 22:11 ` Björn Persson @ 2005-10-26 23:46 ` tmoran 2005-10-27 23:40 ` Björn Persson 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: tmoran @ 2005-10-26 23:46 UTC (permalink / raw) > Steve: In 5 to 100 years all programs will be GPL'd. > economists: Only [category B] will pay programmers to produce public > goods programs. > Tom: So in 5 to 100 years programmers will be employees of [category B]? > (Statements condensed for clarity.) No. Not "only [category B] will pay programmers so all programmers will be employed by [category B]" but rather: >> The economists point out that to the extent programs are "public goods" >> the market will undersupply them, leaving it to government or other >> organizations not guided by the market to pay programmers. > There's a hidden assumption in that argument, namely that "GPL'd" is a > subset of "public goods". If GPL'd programs aren't public goods, then > your conclusion about who will pay programmers is invalid. To not be a "Public Good", it would have to either be exclusive - easy to control who gets a copy, or rivalrous - if you have it, it will be less valuable to me (a CIA cryptography program for instance). Offhand I can't think of an example of GPLing such a program. Further, I said "the market will undersupply", not "the market will supply zero, so only non-market orgs will supply". Note, BTW, that Microsoft's anti-piracy efforts are an attempt to raise exclusiveness, so their programs are not "Public Goods". > The thought has indeed crossed my mind that maybe the term "public > goods", or the economic theory you referenced, is only relevant to > material goods. The classic example of a "public good" is national defense. If I get more, it doesn't mean you get less so it's nonrivalrous, and it's very difficult to exclude you from the benefit provided to me. Hardly a "material good". I suggest spending some time with a good intro econ textbook. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: OT: was Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-26 23:46 ` OT: was " tmoran @ 2005-10-27 23:40 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-28 2:30 ` tmoran 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Björn Persson @ 2005-10-27 23:40 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: > >>There's a hidden assumption in that argument, namely that "GPL'd" is a >>subset of "public goods". If GPL'd programs aren't public goods, then >>your conclusion about who will pay programmers is invalid. > > To not be a "Public Good", it would have to either be exclusive - easy > to control who gets a copy, or rivalrous - if you have it, it will be less > valuable to me (a CIA cryptography program for instance). Offhand I can't > think of an example of GPLing such a program. But I'm sure you *can* think of some examples of GPL'd programs, and those will then have to fall into the "public goods" category. Hence, by your own reasoning, GPL'd programs *are* (a subset of) public goods, which is perfectly consistent with your calling Steve's GPL'd programs public goods. > Further, I said "the market > will undersupply", not "the market will supply zero, so only non-market > orgs will supply". True, but the sentence continued "leaving it to government or other organizations not guided by the market to pay programmers." That sounds like the market would not pay programmers to any significant extent. -- Bj�rn Persson PGP key A88682FD omb jor ers @sv ge. r o.b n.p son eri nu ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: OT: was Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-27 23:40 ` Björn Persson @ 2005-10-28 2:30 ` tmoran 2005-10-30 0:20 ` Björn Persson 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: tmoran @ 2005-10-28 2:30 UTC (permalink / raw) not(Public Goods) implies not(GPL) (a) is logically equivalent to (GPL) implies (Public Goods) (b) so if (a) is true, ie there are no counterexamples, then (b) is true ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: OT: was Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-28 2:30 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-30 0:20 ` Björn Persson 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Björn Persson @ 2005-10-30 0:20 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: > not(Public Goods) implies not(GPL) (a) > is logically equivalent to > (GPL) implies (Public Goods) (b) > so if (a) is true, ie there are no counterexamples, then (b) is true Precisely, and you say you can't think of any counterexamples. Why, then, did you claim that when you wrote "public goods" in your response to Steve's words about GPL'd programs, you did not use the term about GPL'd programs? What other, public goods but non-GPL'd, programs did you talk about? -- Bj�rn Persson PGP key A88682FD omb jor ers @sv ge. r o.b n.p son eri nu ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 2:19 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 3:08 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 4:02 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-21 7:00 ` Martin Dowie 2005-10-21 14:18 ` Marc A. Criley 2005-10-21 18:26 ` Simon Wright 3 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Martin Dowie @ 2005-10-21 7:00 UTC (permalink / raw) Steve Whalen wrote: > But it is important to remind anyone asking such a question that they > can sell the program ONLY if they give a copy of the source code to the They only have to give a copy if the customer asks for a copy... ...I've got the source code for OpenOffice sitting kicking around my drive somewhere - but it's of no use to me! Cheers -- Martin ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 7:00 ` Martin Dowie @ 2005-10-21 14:18 ` Marc A. Criley 2005-10-21 15:53 ` Jean-Pierre Rosen 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Marc A. Criley @ 2005-10-21 14:18 UTC (permalink / raw) Martin Dowie wrote: > Steve Whalen wrote: > >> But it is important to remind anyone asking such a question that they >> can sell the program ONLY if they give a copy of the source code to the > > > They only have to give a copy if the customer asks for a copy... > > ....I've got the source code for OpenOffice sitting kicking around my > drive somewhere - but it's of no use to me! Which actually has some serendipitous relevance to comp.lang.ada denizens. I can package up a commercial version of my application, compiled with GNAT GPL, and put the source code on the CD, along with all the GPL required notification files. I then sell this to customers. My customers now have the Ada source code, so what? Unless they're knowledgeable Ada programmers, they're hardly likely to find the source code itself of any use to them. While we'd all like Ada to be much more popular, the lack of popularity is almost as good (or bad, depending on your perspective :-) as having proprietary code, since the majority of the IT industry doesn't do Ada. Yes, a customer has the right to distribute my application under the terms of the GPL. But what they paid for was easy and direct access to the latest and greatest version, technical support, and immediate access to upgrades. No one they distribute it to will have any of those benefits, and if my app gives my customer a competitive edge, they're hardly likely to pass it around. I'm also free to _request_ that they not distribute the app (the GPL does not preclude doing this), and that if they choose to distribute anyway it will negatively impact our future business relationship. -- Marc A. Criley -- McKae Technologies -- www.mckae.com -- DTraq - XPath In Ada - XML EZ Out ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 14:18 ` Marc A. Criley @ 2005-10-21 15:53 ` Jean-Pierre Rosen 2005-10-21 18:14 ` Marc A. Criley 2005-10-21 18:52 ` Martin Dowie 0 siblings, 2 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Jean-Pierre Rosen @ 2005-10-21 15:53 UTC (permalink / raw) Marc A. Criley a �crit : > I'm also free to _request_ that they > not distribute the app (the GPL does not preclude doing this), and that > if they choose to distribute anyway it will negatively impact our future > business relationship. > No, you are not. The definition of "free software" makes it very clear that you are allowed to redistribute it freely. Note that ACT *never* tells something like this. They say that GAP is "intended" for education, or that Gnat Pro is "higly recommended" for professional software, but they are very careful never to tell explicitely something to the effect that it could not be redistributed - this would be against the GPL. The formulation is however designed to induce Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt... -- --------------------------------------------------------- J-P. Rosen (rosen@adalog.fr) Visit Adalog's web site at http://www.adalog.fr ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 15:53 ` Jean-Pierre Rosen @ 2005-10-21 18:14 ` Marc A. Criley 2005-10-21 18:52 ` Martin Dowie 1 sibling, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Marc A. Criley @ 2005-10-21 18:14 UTC (permalink / raw) Jean-Pierre Rosen wrote: > Marc A. Criley a �crit : > >> I'm also free to _request_ that they not distribute the app (the GPL >> does not preclude doing this), and that if they choose to distribute >> anyway it will negatively impact our future business relationship. >> > No, you are not. The definition of "free software" makes it very clear > that you are allowed to redistribute it freely. Yes, I _am_ right...and so are you :-) I posed this specific question to the FSF to get a clear answer. Brett Smith from the Free Software Foundation Licensing Team replied that "There is nothing in the license to prevent this [threatening to withhold future support if the customer distributes the product]; in fact, Red Hat does exactly this with customers of their support services. This is not quite the same thing as placing restrictions on the software -- after all, the customers are still legally able to exercise their rights under the GPL." I added the portion in [brackets] to clarify exactly what "this" referred to. Go to the source, Jean-Pierre! :-) -- Marc A. Criley -- McKae Technologies -- www.mckae.com -- DTraq - XPath In Ada - XML EZ Out ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 15:53 ` Jean-Pierre Rosen 2005-10-21 18:14 ` Marc A. Criley @ 2005-10-21 18:52 ` Martin Dowie 1 sibling, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Martin Dowie @ 2005-10-21 18:52 UTC (permalink / raw) Jean-Pierre Rosen wrote: > Marc A. Criley a �crit : > >> I'm also free to _request_ that they not distribute the app (the GPL >> does not preclude doing this), and that if they choose to distribute >> anyway it will negatively impact our future business relationship. >> > No, you are not. The definition of "free software" makes it very clear > that you are allowed to redistribute it freely. > > Note that ACT *never* tells something like this. They say that GAP is > "intended" for education, or that Gnat Pro is "higly recommended" for > professional software, but they are very careful never to tell > explicitely something to the effect that it could not be redistributed - > this would be against the GPL. The formulation is however designed to > induce Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt... Really? I've got an email here containing: "That's of course allowed, but we would prefer you avoid this, ..." ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 2:19 ` Steve Whalen ` (2 preceding siblings ...) 2005-10-21 7:00 ` Martin Dowie @ 2005-10-21 18:26 ` Simon Wright 2005-10-21 20:11 ` Szymon Guz 3 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Simon Wright @ 2005-10-21 18:26 UTC (permalink / raw) "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> writes: > I'm actually a big supporter of the GPL and look forward to the day > (5 to 100 years from now) when all (non-classified) computer > programs will be GPL'd or it's future equivalent. In the environment I work in, there would IMO be no problem; since the government agency that is purchasing the product requires full source delivery anyway! ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 18:26 ` Simon Wright @ 2005-10-21 20:11 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-21 20:47 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-23 3:44 ` Steve 0 siblings, 2 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-21 20:11 UTC (permalink / raw) Simon Wright napisał(a): > "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> writes: > > >>I'm actually a big supporter of the GPL and look forward to the day >>(5 to 100 years from now) when all (non-classified) computer >>programs will be GPL'd or it's future equivalent. > > > In the environment I work in, there would IMO be no problem; since the > government agency that is purchasing the product requires full source > delivery anyway! sure, but for me the problem with GPL looks like this: If I want to create a very good program I need to employee some programmers so I have costs. Of course I want to get the money back, so I want to sell the program many times to get enough money (ok I want to sell the licence or whatever, I had $200000 of costs and I sell the program for $200 per copy, so I have to sell at least 1000 copies to earn 0 on that). If I sell the program on the GPL licence client can sell the program cheaper than me many many times, so how can I get my money back (and how can I earn on the program). regards Szymon Guz ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 20:11 ` Szymon Guz @ 2005-10-21 20:47 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran ` (3 more replies) 2005-10-23 3:44 ` Steve 1 sibling, 4 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-21 20:47 UTC (permalink / raw) Szymon Guz wrote: > sure, but for me the problem with GPL looks like this: > > If I want to create a very good program I need to employee some > programmers so I have costs. ... If I sell the program on the GPL > licence client can sell the program cheaper than me many many times, > so how can I get my money back (and how can I earn on the program). You need to arrange to get the money ahead of time. The way to do this is to get prospective users of the program to put up the money to fund your development. Then when the work is done, everyone gets the program. GNAT itself is a perfect example of this. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 20:47 ` Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2005-10-22 12:06 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-23 2:41 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-22 7:56 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov ` (2 subsequent siblings) 3 siblings, 2 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: tmoran @ 2005-10-22 5:38 UTC (permalink / raw) "Hyman Rosen" <hyman.rosen@gmail.com> said: >You need to arrange to get the money ahead of time. The way to do >this is to get prospective users of the program to put up the money >to fund your development. Then when the work is done, everyone gets >the program. GNAT itself is a perfect example of this. If I can get the funding, I'll work on creating for free release an OS much better than Windows, a suite of software apps much better than Office, and a seamless communication system much more user friendly than the current VOIP systems. Can I count on you putting up part of the money to fund this development? ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-22 12:06 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-23 2:41 ` Hyman Rosen 1 sibling, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-22 12:06 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <ELednarllbH4TcTeRVn-hg@comcast.com>, tmoran@acm.org writes: > "Hyman Rosen" <hyman.rosen@gmail.com> said: >>You need to arrange to get the money ahead of time. The way to do >>this is to get prospective users of the program to put up the money >>to fund your development. Then when the work is done, everyone gets >>the program. GNAT itself is a perfect example of this. > If I can get the funding, I'll work on creating for free release an > OS much better than Windows, a suite of software apps much better than > Office, and a seamless communication system much more user friendly than > the current VOIP systems. Can I count on you putting up part of the money > to fund this development? If it meets my needs, including: not being "Unix-like" allowing use of DECnet rather than IP Bell-Lapadula mandatory access controls with Biba extensions By the way, I don't have much money to contribute, and the other folks who are similarly situated have vastly different requirements. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2005-10-22 12:06 ` Larry Kilgallen @ 2005-10-23 2:41 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-23 6:35 ` tmoran 1 sibling, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 2:41 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: > If I can get the funding, I'll work on creating for free release an > OS much better than Windows, a suite of software apps much better than > Office, and a seamless communication system much more user friendly than > the current VOIP systems. Can I count on you putting up part of the money > to fund this development? Of course not. Those are not projects with a realistic hope of being funded, except by idiots. You will notice that such projects have not been produced by proprietary companies either - various attempts have all fallen by the wayside. If you want to be funded, you will need smaller projects, in an area where you have proven expertise as demonstrated by previous successes, for people who have an immediate and urgent need for the thing you will be making. Again using GNAT as an example, the same team at NYU had already produced a validated Ada interpreter using SETL. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 2:41 ` Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 6:35 ` tmoran 2005-10-23 6:49 ` Hyman Rosen 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: tmoran @ 2005-10-23 6:35 UTC (permalink / raw) > If you want to be funded, you will need smaller projects, in an > area where you have proven expertise as demonstrated by previous > successes, for people who have an immediate and urgent need for > the thing you will be making. By those criteria Christopher Columbus would never have been funded. If that kind of funding was a requirement (since an entrepreneur couldn't self-fund in the hopes of later profit), no technical genius who wasn't also a masterful salesman would ever get off the ground. That's kind of limiting to progress. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 6:35 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-23 6:49 ` Hyman Rosen 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 6:49 UTC (permalink / raw) tmoran@acm.org wrote: > By those criteria Christopher Columbus would never have been funded. If you can believe his Wikipedia entry, Columbus got his funding based on erroneous estimates of the Earth's size, estimates which were correctly disbelieved by contemporaneous experts. He was also an experienced sailor, navigator, and trader by the time he got his commission. And if there hadn't been a new continent in the way, his entire expedition would have perished. > no technical genius who wasn't also a masterful salesman would ever > get off the ground. That's kind of limiting to progress. No. That simply means that such a technical genius should find a masterful salesman with whom to team up. That's not exactly unheard of. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 20:47 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran @ 2005-10-22 7:56 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov 2005-10-23 2:32 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-23 5:34 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-24 12:56 ` Bob Spooner 3 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Dmitry A. Kazakov @ 2005-10-22 7:56 UTC (permalink / raw) On 21 Oct 2005 13:47:02 -0700, Hyman Rosen wrote: > Szymon Guz wrote: >> sure, but for me the problem with GPL looks like this: >> >> If I want to create a very good program I need to employee some >> programmers so I have costs. ... If I sell the program on the GPL >> licence client can sell the program cheaper than me many many times, >> so how can I get my money back (and how can I earn on the program). > > You need to arrange to get the money ahead of time. The way to do > this is to get prospective users of the program to put up the money > to fund your development. Then when the work is done, everyone gets > the program. GNAT itself is a perfect example of this. But the point is, let me reassert it: I want to make some other people working for me, and sell the result of their work as if it were mine. GPL makes it difficult. -- Regards, Dmitry A. Kazakov http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-22 7:56 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov @ 2005-10-23 2:32 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-23 8:43 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 2:32 UTC (permalink / raw) Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote: > But the point is, let me reassert it: > I want to make some other people working for me, and sell the result of > their work as if it were mine. GPL makes it difficult. Why? The contract between you and your employees has nothing to do with how you license the software they produce. When you hire your employees, just have them sign the standard industry contract that whatever they produce (whether only on company time or altogether is one variation here) while employed by you is yours, and they retain no rights to it. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 2:32 ` Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 8:43 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Dmitry A. Kazakov @ 2005-10-23 8:43 UTC (permalink / raw) On Sun, 23 Oct 2005 02:32:14 GMT, Hyman Rosen wrote: > Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote: >> But the point is, let me reassert it: >> I want to make some other people working for me, and sell the result of >> their work as if it were mine. GPL makes it difficult. > > Why? The contract between you and your employees has nothing to do > with how you license the software they produce. When you hire your > employees, just have them sign the standard industry contract that > whatever they produce (whether only on company time or altogether > is one variation here) while employed by you is yours, and they > retain no rights to it. OK, you and Dennis mean that employees should be excluded from GPL. It might be possible, but it would mean exactly that GPL could not be applied for trading/exchange between employer and employee. That's a systematic problem. To have it really working it should function in all cases including ones when parties have different weights. So far, both GPL and *software selling* perform poorly. Software quality fails to keep pace with growing complexity... -- Regards, Dmitry A. Kazakov http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 20:47 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2005-10-22 7:56 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov @ 2005-10-23 5:34 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-23 6:14 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-24 12:56 ` Bob Spooner 3 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-23 5:34 UTC (permalink / raw) Hyman Rosen wrote: > > You need to arrange to get the money ahead of time. The way to do > this is to get prospective users of the program to put up the money > to fund your development. Then when the work is done, everyone gets > the program. GNAT itself is a perfect example of this. GNAT would be a "perfect" example only if AdaCore were still respecting the wishes of the people who put up the money (the DOD), who insisted on the GMGPL for the runtime libraries of the GNAT compiler. As it is, AdaCore has made a perfectly legal "move", but one which I think disrespects the intentions of the origins of GNAT, and certainly the intentions of the "venture capitalists" who gave them their start. Steve ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 5:34 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-23 6:14 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-23 7:39 ` Steve Whalen 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 6:14 UTC (permalink / raw) Steve Whalen wrote: > GNAT would be a "perfect" example only if AdaCore were still respecting > the wishes of the people who put up the money (the DOD), who insisted > on the GMGPL for the runtime libraries of the GNAT compiler. They received a contract for a project and they fulfilled it. Whatever wishes may be involved are irrelevant. And actually, the original contract was deliberately for less than the whole of the Ada standard precisely to avoid damaging the business of other Ada vendors. If anything, by releasing a GPL-only runtime, AdaCore is honoring that original intent. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 6:14 ` Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 7:39 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-23 9:31 ` Hyman Rosen 0 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-23 7:39 UTC (permalink / raw) Hyman Rosen wrote: > Steve Whalen wrote: > > GNAT would be a "perfect" example only if AdaCore were still respecting > > the wishes of the people who put up the money (the DOD), who insisted > > on the GMGPL for the runtime libraries of the GNAT compiler. > > They received a contract for a project and they fulfilled it. > Whatever wishes may be involved are irrelevant. And actually, > the original contract was deliberately for less than the whole > of the Ada standard precisely to avoid damaging the business of > other Ada vendors. If anything, by releasing a GPL-only runtime, > AdaCore is honoring that original intent. I agree that AdaCore fulfilled the contract and are free to do what they want. I understand that the new Ada 2005 compiler can be considered "freer" from the perspective of the software. However the new Ada 2005 compiler is "less free" from the perspective of the _user_ of the software, since it cannot be used to produce proprietary, closed source, non-GPL software. I disagree that "they are honoring that original intent" since the original intent to protect the other Ada vendors was accomplished by the limited size of the investment made by the DOD. It was also a very clear intent of both the DOD and the GNAT developers to have GNAT be an Ada compiler capable of producing proprietary closed source programs. An even more important "intent" of the GNAT project was to help popularize Ada even though the DOD was dropping it's "Ada mandate". I agree that "Whatever wishes may be involved are irrelevant.". They are legally irrelevant. They are NOT irrelevant to the future of Ada as a language. AdaCore by it's actions is directly contradicting many statements made by the AdaCore founders here on comp.lang.ada over the last 5 to 10 years. Their statements (many quite impassioned) showed they understood the power of having a free, high quality, up to date, easily installed Ada compiler capable of producing proprietary software as a means of proselytizing the Ada language. AdaCore at the time also pointed out that since they had to package up the software for their supported customers anyway, releasing the "public" versions was NOT an issue of cost. Since AdaCore hasn't explained _why_ they changed from GMGPL to GPL in the runtime for their "free" compiler, they've created unnecessary FUD about the Ada language. Whether they did it in an attempt to get more $$$ or they are bowing to pressure from other Ada vendors, or exactly why they did it, is also irrelevant. But the change _does_ hurt the Ada language, which may not be dead, but it sure isn't growing in popularity outside of the universe of those who already know it's value. Helping to kill a dying language was NOT the DOD's intent when it dropped the "Ada mandate" and created the GNAT project. Steve ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-23 7:39 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-23 9:31 ` Hyman Rosen 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 9:31 UTC (permalink / raw) Steve Whalen wrote: > But the change _does_ hurt the Ada language, which may not be dead, > but it sure isn't growing in popularity outside of the universe of > those who already know it's value. Perhaps that's because most of the programmers who are using Ada use it to create proprietary programs. That means that the users of those programs don't know or care what in language they're written, because they never see the sources. Now that programs compiled by GNAT GPL must be licensed under the GPL if they're to be distributed, perhaps those users will begin using Ada themselves once they see the beauty of the Ada code which is being delivered to them. Anyway, if someone feels really strongly about this, then he or she can fork the GMGPL version. That happened with gcc and with X Window, so there's no reason it can't happen here. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 20:47 ` Hyman Rosen ` (2 preceding siblings ...) 2005-10-23 5:34 ` Steve Whalen @ 2005-10-24 12:56 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-24 13:08 ` Jean-Pierre Rosen 3 siblings, 1 reply; 65+ messages in thread From: Bob Spooner @ 2005-10-24 12:56 UTC (permalink / raw) "Hyman Rosen" <hyman.rosen@gmail.com> wrote in message news:1129927622.825849.56200@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... > > You need to arrange to get the money ahead of time. The way to do > this is to get prospective users of the program to put up the money > to fund your development. Then when the work is done, everyone gets > the program. GNAT itself is a perfect example of this. > Whenever I've done that, the company that paid for the development insisted on ownership of the software for themselves. Bob ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-24 12:56 ` Bob Spooner @ 2005-10-24 13:08 ` Jean-Pierre Rosen 0 siblings, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Jean-Pierre Rosen @ 2005-10-24 13:08 UTC (permalink / raw) Bob Spooner a �crit : > "Hyman Rosen" <hyman.rosen@gmail.com> wrote in message > news:1129927622.825849.56200@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com... > >>You need to arrange to get the money ahead of time. The way to do >>this is to get prospective users of the program to put up the money >>to fund your development. Then when the work is done, everyone gets >>the program. GNAT itself is a perfect example of this. >> > > Whenever I've done that, the company that paid for the development insisted > on ownership of the software for themselves. > AdaControl is a counter-example. Initial development paid for by Eurocontrol, then released as free software with shared ownership between Eurocontrol and Adalog. -- --------------------------------------------------------- J-P. Rosen (rosen@adalog.fr) Visit Adalog's web site at http://www.adalog.fr ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
* Re: and visual library once again 2005-10-21 20:11 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-21 20:47 ` Hyman Rosen @ 2005-10-23 3:44 ` Steve 1 sibling, 0 replies; 65+ messages in thread From: Steve @ 2005-10-23 3:44 UTC (permalink / raw) [-- Warning: decoded text below may be mangled, UTF-8 assumed --] [-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1423 bytes --] >"Szymon Guz" <alpha@skynet.org.pl_WITHOUT> wrote in message > >news:djbids$1o1e$1@node3.news.atman.pl... >Simon Wright napisa�(a): >> "Steve Whalen" <SteveWhalen001@hotmail.com> writes: >> >> >>>I'm actually a big supporter of the GPL and look forward to the day >>>(5 to 100 years from now) when all (non-classified) computer >>>programs will be GPL'd or it's future equivalent. >> >> >> In the environment I work in, there would IMO be no problem; since the >> government agency that is purchasing the product requires full source >> delivery anyway! > >sure, but for me the problem with GPL looks like this: > >If I want to create a very good program I need to employee some programmers >so I have costs. Of course I want to get the money back, so I want to sell >the program many times to get enough money (ok I want to sell the licence >or whatever, I had $200000 of costs and I sell the program for $200 per >copy, so I have to sell at least 1000 copies to earn 0 on that). If I sell >the program on the GPL licence client can sell the program cheaper than me >many many times, so how can I get my money back (and how can I earn on the >program). Don't sell software. Sell software support. Include a manual and subscription based support and your customers will get more value by obtaining the software from you. It seems to be working well for AdaCore. Steve (The Duck) >regards >Szymon Guz ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 65+ messages in thread
end of thread, other threads:[~2005-10-30 0:20 UTC | newest] Thread overview: 65+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed) -- links below jump to the message on this page -- 2005-10-20 17:29 and visual library once again Szymon Guz 2005-10-20 18:38 ` Pascal Obry 2005-10-20 21:01 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-20 21:04 ` Pascal Obry 2005-10-20 21:09 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-20 21:21 ` Pascal Obry 2005-10-21 2:19 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 3:08 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 7:52 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-21 13:48 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 10:43 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 13:50 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 13:54 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-21 16:29 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-21 18:19 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-25 22:01 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-21 4:02 ` tmoran 2005-10-21 6:54 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2005-10-23 2:42 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-21 9:58 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-21 14:55 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-21 16:51 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov 2005-10-21 22:01 ` Jeffrey R. Carter 2005-10-23 6:31 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-23 11:27 ` Jeffrey R. Carter 2005-10-23 21:41 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-24 3:14 ` Jeffrey R. Carter 2005-10-24 12:52 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-25 7:23 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-25 14:20 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-21 17:01 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2005-10-25 20:51 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-25 22:16 ` tmoran 2005-10-25 23:14 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-26 0:14 ` tmoran 2005-10-26 22:11 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-26 23:46 ` OT: was " tmoran 2005-10-27 23:40 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-28 2:30 ` tmoran 2005-10-30 0:20 ` Björn Persson 2005-10-21 7:00 ` Martin Dowie 2005-10-21 14:18 ` Marc A. Criley 2005-10-21 15:53 ` Jean-Pierre Rosen 2005-10-21 18:14 ` Marc A. Criley 2005-10-21 18:52 ` Martin Dowie 2005-10-21 18:26 ` Simon Wright 2005-10-21 20:11 ` Szymon Guz 2005-10-21 20:47 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-22 5:38 ` tmoran 2005-10-22 12:06 ` Larry Kilgallen 2005-10-23 2:41 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-23 6:35 ` tmoran 2005-10-23 6:49 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-22 7:56 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov 2005-10-23 2:32 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-23 8:43 ` Dmitry A. Kazakov 2005-10-23 5:34 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-23 6:14 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-23 7:39 ` Steve Whalen 2005-10-23 9:31 ` Hyman Rosen 2005-10-24 12:56 ` Bob Spooner 2005-10-24 13:08 ` Jean-Pierre Rosen 2005-10-23 3:44 ` Steve
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