I don't think the ESME list is the place to have these conversations, particularly because I don't think ESME is relevant right now. As long as it's not clear what an ERP customer would do with ESME (and who would actually productize it), it's kind of a moot point.
As to "SAP's current partner program kills innovation from smaller companies and individual devs". That is a nice provocative statement, and I would agree that the burden of signing SAP legal requirements are high, but let's not forget that there is a flip side to this, which is that SAP customers are also demanding service level requirements for support etc that often individual developers can't fulfill. Also, open source is an issue; as long as there are lawsuits brought against entities that use open source, who is going to indemnify SAP customers that they don't have to worry about those lawsuits ? See http://bit.ly/6knHsr, for example, which is just a recent example related to violation of the copyright terms of GPL, but there are other examples like patent infringement lawsuits related to OS software as well. I am getting a little tired of the SAP bashing because apples are compared to oranges: An app store for iPhone is a place where consumers can buy stuff; it's a volume business and the requirements of running a game or a useful utility on an iPhone is obviously not as stringent as connecting something to an SAP system. There may be a volume business for SAP as well, like Flash islands for cool visualizations, but as long as there is no clear area where SAP can carve out a niche that can somehow justify lower barriers of entry, the requirements are the same. At the same time, there is a chicken-egg problem; individual developers will hardly let their creativity flow as long as there is not even an incentive to be creative. Happy to discuss further at a different place if anybody is interested. Best, Michael -----Original Message----- From: Richard Hirsch [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Wednesday, Jan 06, 2010 4:46 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: ESME as Micro App on EcoHub? @Mark: Can you find out exactly what Usman meant about certification of microapps? Is certification really not necessary? Would ESME qualify as a microapp? As Apache ESME, we probably couldn't place ESME on EcoHub. This wouldn't be possible, because we aren't a SAP partner. We - Apache ESME - probably aren't going to be able to change EcoHub's partner requirement. However, this fact doesn't mean that someone else who is an SAP Partner could take ESME, combine it with SAP-specific functionality and place it on the EcoHub. This should be our goal. The question is finding an SAP partner who would be willing to make such a commitment. D. On Wed, Jan 6, 2010 at 11:36 AM, Anne Kathrine Petterøe <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi Mark, > > I agree with Mrinal here. > Being a partner edge customer is no small barrier to cross. As partner edge > customer you are committed to a transaction of SAP software licenses, there > are program fees, in addition to ongoing requirements. The Extended Business > Program maybe yes. SAP's current partner program kills innovation from > smaller companies and individual devs in my opinion. The barrier for entry is > so high, there is no way a startup which bootstraps would be able to finance > it. Or are we missing something here? > > Furthermore we don't have any SAP specific code in ESME at the moment (it > doesn't even run on NetWeaver currently). > EcoHub might be interesting down the line though. > > Thanks, > Anne > > > On 6. jan. 2010, at 10.49, Mrinal Wadhwa wrote: > >> Hi Mark, >> >> From what I remember from Mentor discussions with the Ecohub team at TechEd >> given that you need to be a parter to be listed ..its a pretty high barrier >> .. are you saying there is a possibility to somehow make that work for ESME >> ? >> >> Thank you, >> Mrinal >> >> >> >> >> >> On Wed, Jan 6, 2010 at 6:52 AM, Finnern, Mark <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> Hi ESME folks, >>> >>> Talked to Usman at SAP today and he reminded me of the SAP Micro >>> Applications that are now offered on the SAP EcoHub: >>> http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/ecohub/enterprisemicroapps >>> >>> "Enterprise Micro Applications are a new breed of small applications >>> that simplify and extend enterprise application functionality specific >>> to a user's role and requirements." >>> >>> Usman told me, that these micro apps don't necessarily need to be >>> certified to be listed. I think you need to be a partner edge customer, >>> but it sounds to me like the barrier to play on EcoHub is much lower and >>> I would love to see ESME offered there. >>> >>> Let me know what you think, Mark. >>> Mark Finnern Chief Community Evangelist C +1 415/425/3296 E >>> [email protected] T http://twitter.com/finnern Mentors >>> http://sapmentors.sap.com >>> >>> >>> >>> > >
