In a message dated 2/9/2006 7:18:17 AM Mountain Standard Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
So you think open sourcing Delphi would be a good deal? NOT! Take a
look at how
the TP controls have languished over the last couple of years. Bugs
aren't
being fixed, upgrades to other versions of Delphi aren't being done.
I don't
think that you have fully thought this out.
i have to agree. open source projects that succeed do so through a
dedicated core of developers.. and i cant think of a case where there
isnt money in it for them. but Delphi has been sidelined, by Microsofts
marketing and OS dominance, by language competition and the advent of
the world wide web as a significant working platform, and a host of
other reasons. i cant see enough like-minded develpers suddenly finding
each other on such short notice. and its not just a matter of wanting to
pitch in; fthe open source sucvcess stories are few compared to the
overall olume of (often brilliant) prrojects, simply because enthusiasm
tends to follow personal needs and interests, not so much the overall
robustness of a product.
and open source isnt immune from schisms between different camps of
programmers, or between coders and marketers (im thinking of
mambo/joomla, the several-years-running besat opensource project which
recently forked over these kinds of issues). open sourse is pretty hairy
on the inside, its gems not withstanding.
i think that stockholders and the management teams they favor are not
well suited to support highly fertile but not wildly profitable products
like IDEs. i had my fears the day Phillipe Kahn took Borland public, and
ive got that i-told-you-so feeling now. rapid innovation destabilizes
markets and increases investment risk across a wide range.. and
investors know this instincively. i dont think thats an anti-capitalist
observation by the way, its just the way it is; its a capitalistic
analysis based on rationality, not preference. creativity is hard to
sustain and control. and sometimes, nothing but its absence can create
the forces and circumstances necessary to recreate it. the core dev
teams of open source products in many ways resemble, in structure when
not in fact, a privtely-held company. i think there are compelling
reasons for that.
im one of those people who had hopes that Kylix/CLX could help Linux
achieve desktop status, but that was several years ago, and CLX was
obviously not given the attention that could have made this possible.
and no way thats going to happen now, unless Inprise, uh i mean Borland,
is willing to parcel out the tools seperately to different buyers.. yeah
right. just saying, wouldnt it be nice? they would have to form a
consortium, but it could be worth their while.. ths is the only (but
unlikely) scenario that i can see where the dev stable could continue to
thrive. open source might be a part of that picture, but not the whole
story.
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