An idea for commercial support for D

[Joakim via Digitalmars-d]

On Friday, 9 January 2015 at 11:52:19 UTC, Dicebot wrote:
> You have already proposed this idea once and were explained in 
> great detail why it doesn't work.

You are right that I previously suggested in another thread that 
D use a hybrid model, but in that case I suggested that Walter 
sell a single paid compiler to go along with the official OSS 
one, while here I'm proposing that any random devs sell their own 
patches.  So yes, both use the same underlying idea of a hybrid 
model, but both are pitched at different audiences and are 
somewhat different approaches.

I don't remember any "great detail why it doesn't work," just 
ludicrous assertions like yours below that selling software is a 
stone-age relic.

> To be honest if something like this would ever happen my first 
> move would be to reach company leadership and discuss possible 
> full forking of D compiler as a simple matter of ensuring 
> business safety. This scheme introduces unacceptable amount of 
> risks for customer.

I see, so some outside devs selling patches to other companies 
poses "unacceptable" risk for your company.  Funny how such a 
stone-age relic move seems to have such an effect on you. ;) In 
essence, Sociomantic is already running a forked compiler, D1, as 
it isn't publicly maintained anymore, so I'm not sure what the 
difference is or why we should care what you do.

> Selling of software in any for is a relict of stone age and we 
> must help it get forgotten.

Funny, how does Sociomantic make money again?  Oh right, by 
selling access to their closed-source software.  I guess because 
it's on a server and the business logic doesn't run on the 
customer's device, that's _completely_ different from "selling of 
software." ;)  Or maybe Sociomantic is about to open source all 
their code and go pure FOSS!  I look forward to the announcement.

> At the same time offering more commercial support is something 
> very desired for business and something I'd like to see 
> extended. Right now pretty much only available option is to 
> reach Walter personally and agree on some contract with 
> DigitalMars which is both limited by manpower of a single 
> person and not advertised in any way.

I have no doubt that you'd rather someone worked for you for 
peanuts on a support contract, rather than making more money off 
a productized D compiler.  But what you should consider is the 
latter is likely better for D and your preferred approach is not 
preferred by everybody else.

> This is same issue as one that was mentioned when discussing 
> vibe.d - having clearly communicated option to get a paid 
> support to fix any issues you may encounter is possible 
> deal-breaker for anyone considering risks of putting bet on D 
> for next project.

Perhaps Sonke will be interested in providing such paid support.  
Or perhaps he's more interested in creating a product using 
vibe.d, whether it runs on the server or the users' premises, and 
making much more money that way. :)