This could easily degrade into a 'religious' discussion so I'll leave it with these points.
Clearly I'm not in favour of web based licensing. If I insert the Alibre distribution disk that came with the software I purchased a few years ago not surprisingly that version will no longer run. After all, 3D Systems bought it. The name changed to Geomagic. Licenses are no longer available. Buy a new copy. The VisualCAM MecSoft plugin is being discontinued but at least the VisualCAM dongle will continue to work with the existing dongled version of the Geomagic software. Stuck in time but at least workable while I have WIN-7 systems. Until the dongle fails. I have a Quickbooks software package I had not yet installed and a year later finally decided I really should change my accounting system. Guess what. That software won't install anymore either. Too old and the on line licensing has changed. No problem. Just buy the latest for $. So if I sound bitter it's because the promises and testimonials of great support and ease of use vanish with the change in ownership or model of a company. I won't be buying MACH4. I spent a day re-aligning my CNC router because suddenly MACH3 and the USB SS decided to run the Z axis past then end of the table. A Windows Reboot made the problem go away. So now I'm looking seriously at LinuxCNC. I don't expect LinuxCNC to be any better but at least if it happens in 5 years the licensing model won't prevent me from fixing it. Five years from now MACH4 sales may be so poor that the company just vanishes or is bought by a single supplier who drives it in a different direction. John > yes, The license is tied to a PC, but a hobby user is allowed up to 5 > licenses per year. If your machine croaks you use the web site to issue > a new license and the automated system mails it to you in minutes. There > is no wait for a person to respond. As long as you are under 5 licenses > its quick and easy. > > ron ginger > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list Emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
