REBOL/View for commercial products
[1/9] from: g::santilli::tiscalinet::it at: 4-Dec-2000 13:27
I hope some guy at RT can give us an answer on this...
I know this is something that has been already discussed, so
forgive me if it is annoying for you.
I have been contacted to develop a couple of programs that could
be easily (and quickly!) done using REBOL/View (I'll need some
hack to print etc., but that is a secondary issue); I'd really
hate to do them in C++ or even worse Java.
The problem is: I cannot give to a costumer a program that will
expire. This problem has been stated already by a lot of people
here, and I think it really needs a solution!
I know that RT is busy now and can't give a date for /View 1.0.
But I'd be happy to be able to use the current version, even if it
contains bugs. It's easier to work around a bug in REBOL than to
code in other languages.
So my question is: would it be possible to *BUY* (at a reasonable
price) a version of REBOL/View (without support etc.) that does
not expire? I think my costumer would *REALLY* be interested in
REBOL/View because it could cut their costs substantially, so they
are very likely to invest money and time in this technology; but
they are also in need to develop some applications ASAP...
PLEASE, I'd need an answer ASAP. If it is no, it is another
oppurtunity lost for REBOL to enter the market... :-(
Thanks in advance,
Gabriele.
--
Gabriele Santilli <[giesse--writeme--com]> - Amigan - REBOL programmer
Amiga Group Italia sez. L'Aquila -- http://www.amyresource.it/AGI/
[2/9] from: gchiu:compkarori at: 5-Dec-2000 7:39
On Mon, 04 Dec 2000 13:27:13 +0100
Gabriele Santilli <[g--santilli--tiscalinet--it]> wrote:
> So my question is: would it be possible to *BUY* (at a
> reasonable
> price) a version of REBOL/View (without support etc.)
> that does
> not expire? I think my costumer would *REALLY* be
Why not build in the ability for your program to check for
updates for View, and then update itself?
--
Graham Chiu
[3/9] from: rchristiansen:pop:isdfa:sei-it at: 4-Dec-2000 13:11
I don't think you would be able to have a self-updateable /View script
since /View will not even launch if it is expired.
[4/9] from: brett:codeconscious at: 5-Dec-2000 10:42
More important is having a proper license. Hence Gabriele's question to RT.
Brett.
[5/9] from: carl:cybercraft at: 5-Dec-2000 18:41
The idea would be for the program to check the View archive on the
experimental page once a day to see if it's changed, and if so,
update View then. And just hope that RT updates the archive before
it expires and not after. (: Not sure how you'd go about getting
View to un-pack the archive though...
I don't think the above solution's good enough for a commercial
program though...
On 05-Dec-00, Ryan C. Christiansen wrote:
[6/9] from: gchiu:compkarori at: 5-Dec-2000 20:55
On Tue, 05 Dec 2000 18:41:12 +1200
Carl Read <[carl--cybercraft--co--nz]> wrote:
> The idea would be for the program to check the View
> archive on the
<<quoted lines omitted: 8>>
> commercial
> program though...
Netscape used to disable itself after a timed period, but
would allow you to go to their website to download the new
version. Did not stop people using it.
--
Graham Chiu
[7/9] from: g:santilli:tiscalinet:it at: 5-Dec-2000 13:25
Graham Chiu wrote:
> Why not build in the ability for your program to check for
> updates for View, and then update itself?
This is actually a possible solution. The problem would be to
extract the file from the archive etc. (you cannot usually
overwrite the executable that is currently running); but this way
the costumer is forced to be connected to the internet etc. (in
this particula case it wouldn't be a problem).
Anyway my costumer might just prefer to avoid using a product that
he doesn't know about *AND* that gives him unnnecessary troubles
(what if RT posts the update two days later than the expiration
date? what if rebol.com is down?)...
Regards,
Gabriele.
--
Gabriele Santilli <[giesse--writeme--com]> - Amigan - REBOL programmer
Amiga Group Italia sez. L'Aquila -- http://www.amyresource.it/AGI/
[8/9] from: dynalt:dynalt at: 5-Dec-2000 7:48
[9/9] from: rsnell:webtrends at: 5-Dec-2000 9:09
Another big problem I see with the automatic update approach
(whether the software in question has built-in expiration or not)
is that the developer may be left out of the loop for testing the
new version. Thus it is very possible that even if the updating
worked flawlessly, a new bug will have crept into the update
and the customer's application may very well start acting differently
or wrong - in a nasty, silent way.
The solution to this is have the developer maintain the auto-update
site and only post new /View (and new scripts for that matter) when
the developer has had a chance to do some unit testing.
In any case, having to do this simply to get around the expiration
problem seems wrong and I hope that RT will find a better solution for
you, Gabriele. Note that this affects many of us even with /Core as
we start using features not available in the released version.
Rodney
Notes
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