[REBOL] Re: Reference docs for View
From: geza67:freestart:hu at: 9-Jul-2001 6:52
Hello Rod,
> As a paying owner of View/Pro I will make an official request
> to RT for proper docs on View and let the list know the response.
Maybe I am too pessimistic about the business world (hey, I am living
in an ex-communist country ;-))) ), but I imagine three alternatives
upon your official request to RT:
1. A list of on-line resources which have been put together _mostly_ by REBOL
activists (e.g. paying _consumers_ of REBOL) not the company itself. (Well,
the company's HOWTO topic collection is growing but is sufficient for a
showup only, not for as real, solid reference materials.)
2. A nice "cool-down" message: "We are working on it 0-24h !!!" ;-)))
3. Well, they won't say that, merely _think_ : "What do you expect for
fifty bucks ... ???" (/View/Pro)
/Command being also cheap for a professional tool. Nevertheless,
external library support is included in ALL of the free, open source
scripting languages (well, WHY hasn't the growing ambitious
REBOL community including me opt for Perl or Python --- it is another story,
though... :-)) ) and it is a sneaky marketing politics, making the
self-containing "hermetic" version of REBOL free and the
system-connectable
one THE product. It would have been more fair
that they include shell access in the public version and release the
industry-strength
ODBC interface in the commercial version.
It is wise that encryption is included not in the free but in the
payware /Pro versions, but the toy-level sound support as a companion ... ;-))
I am very cautious about REBOL's future. Carl et al are wonderful
people, opened a whole new dimension of programming, turning
atavistic paradigms 180 o , but their marketing strategy and efforts
to "spread the Word" is ultimately questionable. The world's programming
society is moving from proprietary toward open source, relentlessly
seeking independence from commercial suppliers. I am really expecting
that some day an open source REBOL project (hey, what is with OSCAR
???) will _compete_ with (but not _strand_ !) RT's implementation.
With this kind of attitude of RT REBOL will never boom as some
worthless hypes (like J*va) succeeded both in profit and intellectual
terms.
Sorry for my spicy tongue ;-) but I WANNA use REBOL and WOULD pay for
a complete implementation, i.e. program + full comprehensive
(electronic) _DOCS_ !
--
Best regards,
Geza mailto:[geza67--freestart--hu]
