Hi, I think that, as with Apache, one should simply continue to allow the open source community to evolve jboss as they see fit. Any enhancements that an add-on vendor has developed will generally be incorporated over time by the community unless a better methodology/strategy is found to be appropriate. Further, an open source implementation is generally a better solution as any improvement is (theoretically) debated within a developer community. If you're _very_ reluctant to start working on a Free competing add-on if a vendor one is available then it's more than likely that you have already bought a commercial j2ee server. For instance, if someone suddenly announced that they had an add-on for Tomcat 4 or failover, would you buy the add-on and then accept that you cannot immediately enhance the code to deal with a pressing project requirement. One of the great things about opensource (and jboss in particular) is that everything is visible and totally configurable, and supported by a team of guys that know their stuff and can fix things in a jiffy. My experiance with commercial products is that they need to go through a QA which only happens in cycles and can take forever - I recently tried to get an enhancement done for the Sun Bandwidth Manager and it took them six months to tell me that they weren't going to do it. Best regards Nick Ole Husgaard wrote: > > Hi, > > Nice to hear your thoughts on this. Mostly they make sense > to me, but I have a few points and questions: > > 1) > Does it really make commercial sense for an add-on vendor > to commit to giving up the exclusive rights to their > product after 18 months? > If I read you correctly, all they get in return is another > sales channel (JBoss web site) during these 18 months. > > 2) > Will the JBoss project bind itself to adding the source > from the vendor add-on after 18 months? > I think that could be a problem, if something better > under LGPL turned up during the 18 month period. > > 3) > As JBoss is under the LGPL license, you cannot legally > forbid any third-party from creating a competing add-on, > and distributing it with JBoss. > If a third-party is distributing such an add-on under the > LGPL license, this raises some questions to me: > - Will CVS commit (and thus inclusion of the Free add-on > in JBoss) be refused, due to your agreement with the > commercial vendor? Will it also be refused if the Free > add-on has significantly better performance or more > features? > - If the third-party is involved with the JBoss project, > and distributes the competing Free add-on seperately, > will that have any consequences, such as JBoss CVS R/W > revocation? > Personally, I would be _very_ reluctant to start working > on a Free competing add-on, as I think we should try to > respect the support for JBoss that commercial vendors > show by selling add-ons (even if no agreement between > JBoss and the vendor), BUT: If I need the functionality > of the vendor add-on and it has significant bugs that > are not fixed, or the vendor add-on is not updated so I > have to go back to a 12 month old JBoss version to make > it work, I _might_ consider creating a competing Free > add-on. > > I think it is important that we get these issues sorted > out now, to avoid trouble later on. > > Best Regards, > > Ole Husgaard. > > marc fleury wrote: > > > > Dear Community, > > > > You may have heard things about JBoss and the add-on market, you may have > > been in touch with me about this subject, this may be the first time the > > subject comes to your attention. > > > > In brief, independently of JBoss, some of you have been developing > > proprietary add-ons to JBoss, for individual sale. JBoss's position > > regarding this development effort is the following: > > > > As a whole, we support the add-on development effort. JBoss must balance > > two, occasionally competing goals--offering a top quality Open Source Server > > and rewarding its developers. These two conditions are interdependent and > > involve a delicate balancing act, the center of which is compromise. In > > simple terms, if a top-quality, Open Source JBoss does not exist, the add-on > > market is worthless. Similarly, if our developers do not feel adequately > > rewarded for their association with JBoss, JBoss the Open Source server will > > cease to exist in any relevant manner. > > > > To the extent to which the add-on effort compensates our developers for > > their work, we wholeheartedly support it. In fact, we are developing the > > software infrastructure to enable add-on sales from the JBoss site and we > > are having our lawyer draw up a legal contract to legally sanction such > > retailing. That being said, we remain committed to Open Source. In order to > > protect the viability of JBoss and to ensure that top-quality code continues > > to go into JBoss, all add-on developers wishing to sell from our site will > > be required to sign an 18-month clause. > > > > In short, this 18 month clause will give JBoss the add-on code in trust for > > 18 months, during which time JBoss will not be allowed to exploit the code > > in any manner. After 18 months, we will require that the original add-on > > code be LGPL licensed. > > > > Before you start complaining, I remind you that nothing would prevent any of > > you from selling an "enhanced, updated" version of your add-on 18 months > > later. For the duration of the 18-month contract, we would simply require > > patches on the old version of the code in trust, ensuring that it continued > > to work with the head version of JBoss. This 18-month clause also protects > > you, the developers. Without it, the more relevant and successful your > > add-on, the higher the risk you run that JBoss would independently write its > > own version into the Open Source product, thereby obsoleting your work. > > > > This is all about social contract. Yes, you do give up some individual > > rights to function as part of a community. However, if the community is > > successful, the individual members receive advantages greater than those > > they could achieve on their own. > > > > kind regards, > > > > _________________ > > Marc Fleury, Ph.D > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > _________________ > > > > ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> > > Small business owners... > > Tell us what you think! > > http://us.click.yahoo.com/vO1FAB/txzCAA/ySSFAA/W4wwlB/TM > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> > > > > To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > > > > > > Your use of Yahoo! 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