From: "George C. Hawkins" To: "Paul A Morgan" Cc: , , Subject: Re: Future status of instantDB Date: Tue, 5 Jun 2001 19:36:48 +0100 [ To those CCed on this e-mail please see my (better argued) original e-mail included about half way down this e-mail ] I'm sorry Paul but I don't think that your response is in any way satisfactory. The fact remains that you led the community of users of instantDB to believe that it would be imminently open sourced - at least that would be how I would have read the statement "The intent is to Open Source InstantDB in the near future, and create the most popular Open Source Java RDBMS." found on the page: http://instantdb.enhydra.org/software/ I would like to hope these pages contained accurate information and not just (as you put it) the "mis-informed views" of Lutris employees. Peter Hearty the primary developer of instantDB certainly propagated the "mis-informed view" that instantDB was on the way to being open sourced. Even if your mailing lists are open it seems a shame you did not see fit to see if your employees were propagating incorrect information to the public and correcting them (in public on the mailing lists) so that everyone would have an accurate view of what was going on. I think your comments that "We have also been diligent at fixing problems, updating releases and providing good support. All of this comes at considerable expense that is many times more than any profit we have made from InstantDB and thus I would suggest that we have acted very altruistically towards the community!" are bizarre, self serving and completely irrelevant. The fact stands that you appear to have duped the community into developing against a product that you led them to believe would soon be open sourced and now you've decided differently. As I've said I'm not a rapid open source person - I will pay for software. However what I object to is being fooled by your company into developing against a product under what now appear to be false pretenses. Your comment that "Our long term intent with respect to opening sourcing InstantDB has not changed" is a rather poor get out clause - your company has lied to the community and apparently instantDB's chief developer Peter Hearty (or at the very least kept him ill informed), you've apparently gone "oh no we got our sums wrong, but hey it's OK we can just change the rules mid-game". ----- Original Message ----- From: "Paul A Morgan" To: "George C. Hawkins" Sent: Tuesday, June 05, 2001 3:06 AM Subject: Re: Future status of instantDB > > George, > > Thank you for your email and it is worthy of a more detailed > reply. > > Our long term intent with respect to opening sourcing InstantDB > has not changed. The timing on when this can happen is indeterminate > and thus we cannot in good conscience continue with the Enhydra.org > project. In retrospect it was posted as an Enhydra.org project > prematurely primarily because the Enhydra.org infrastructure we > created was very amenable to hosting a new project. During the past > year a thousand or so individuals and companies inquired as to the > ability to distribute InstantDB as part of their product. In every > case we granted the individuals full commercial distribution > permission. We have also been diligent at fixing problems, updating > releases and providing good support. All of this comes at considerable > expense that is many times more than any profit we have made from > InstantDB and thus I would suggest that we have acted very > altruistically towards the community! Going forward, InstantDB will > continue to be available under clear licensing terms and we will > continue to evolve the product. We will be most amenable to figuring > out mutually agreeable licensing terms for any parties that wish to > use InstantDB in commercial products. > > The open mail list discussions that we have always subscribed to > mean that many folks including current and former Lutris employees can > discuss their point of view and give their opinions on such topics as > the timing of releasing the source code. Such views are often > mis-informed and this is unfortunate. Any request for information that > has been made on the feedback@enhydra.org list to which I listen has > been given a consistent (and informed) answer to the open source > question, that being "I cannot give a date at this time". Some > companies have even purchased source code licenses when given the > accurate and honest facts. > > I hope this satisfies some of your questions and concerns. > > Regards, > > Paul. > > > -- > Paul A Morgan > Chief Technology Officer > Lutris Technologies, Inc. > 1200 Pacific Avenue, Suite 300 > Santa Cruz, CA 95060 USA > 831.460.7307; 831.471.9754 (fax) > http://www.lutris.com > http://www.enhydra.org > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "George C. Hawkins" > To: ; > Sent: Monday, June 04, 2001 5:58 PM > Subject: Future status of instantDB > >> First let me say I'm not a rapid open source fanatic, if companies >> want to develop and sell products using closed source that's fine >> with me (I'm composing this on Windows 2000 and I've no access to >> its source code but then I was never promised or expected such >> access). >> >> I do have a problem tho' with developing against something on the >> basis of a promise that it would eventually become open source and >> then having that promise broken. I hope this isn't the case with >> instantDB >> >> I'm not sure what instantDB's move from enhydra.org to Lutris >> central means (along with the package renaming to lutris.org). >> Particularly after looking at page >> >> http://www.lutris.com/products/projects/index.html >> >> Previously instantDB's licensing was undefined but it was made clear >> by Peter Hearty and others at Lutris and Enhydra that it would soon >> become a fully open source project. >> >> The link above now refers to a special license available for the >> source code. If you follow the licensing link on the same page >> you're told "We understand that some [technologies], for example >> InstantDB, are highly valuable as separate standalone technologies >> and therefore we are able to offer cost-effective and fully >> supported commercial ISV/OEM licensing." >> >> There is no mention whatsoever of the long promised open source >> version and the available download is being made available to >> "Evaluators & Educators" and "Lutris Customers" - this sounds like >> purchasers, would be purchasers and the educational community to me, >> no mention of the community that contributed bug reports, etc. over >> the last year or so to instantDB in the belief that it would be an >> open source rather than commercial product (or that both an open >> source and commercial product, featuring support etc., would be >> available side by side). >> >> If you'd looked (before the instantdb.enhydra.org site was taken >> down) at pages such as the following you'd have felt pretty >> confident that if you started working against instantDB an open >> source version would soon be available. >> >> http://instantdb.enhydra.org/software/index.html >> >> > Lutris Technologies purchased InstantDB in April of 2000. The >> > intent is to Open Source InstantDB in the near future, and >> > create the most popular Open Source Java RDBMS. >> >> >> http://instantdb.enhydra.org/software/cvs/index.html >> >> > Lutris Technologies purchased InstantDB in April of 2000. The >> > intent is to Open Source InstantDB in the near future, and >> > create the most popular Open Source Java RDBMS. Once that >> > process has been completed, this page will lead you to the CVS >> > tree for InstantDB. >> >> >> The subject of the lack of appearance of such an open source version >> was a common topic on the instantdb@enhydra.org mailing list and we >> were continuously reassured that it was on its way right up until >> recently: >> >> Keith Bigelow - 15 Jan 2001 >> >> > We're hoping for Q2/01. InstantDB over the past few quarters >> > has been integrated into the Enhydra Enterprise architecture, >> > and this integration has delayed our ability to bring the >> > product fully open source. With the completion of the >> > integration, we expect to see it released under the EPL or a >> > variant of the EPL. >> >> >> Keith Bigelow - 22 Jan 2001 >> >> > We have legal commitments with IBM, Nortel and other global >> > companies that have licensed InstantDB from Lutris. Thus, there >> > should be no concern regarding either our commitment to the >> > product or to the open source process for the product later this >> > year [target Q2/early Q3]. >> >> >> Peter Hearty - 2 Feb >> >> > I'm currently focusing all my efforts on readying InstantDB for >> > its first open source version. >> >> >> Peter Hearty - 28 April >> >> > Glad your finding IDB a useful tool. As to the source code? >> > Lutris has us all waiting with baited breath... I'm honestly as >> > much in the dark about that as everyone else. >> >> The last message dated 28 April, only a month ago, where Peter >> refers to being "in the dark" I believed meant he was in the dark >> about a date for instantDB going open source NOT about whether it >> would or not - this being a now well established fact. >> >> The contents of the main Enhydra CVS repository still contain just >> the class files from the previous, i.e. last Enhydra, version of >> instantDB: >> >> http://enterprise.enhydra.org/software/cvs/cvsweb.cgi/Projects/EnhydraOrg/platforms/EE/services/Jdbc/modules/InstantDB/ >> >> The link on the Lutris documentation page to the license is >> currently broken: >> >> http://www.lutris.com/products/projects/instantDB/software/license/instantDB.html >> >> Lutris has had the benefit of many developers working against >> instantDB, tracking down and submitting bug reports and making other >> useful contributions all for free on the basis that they were >> contributing to what would ultimately be an open source project and >> that they would eventually get to see (and contribute to via CVS) >> the source for this product. >> >> This is something many of them would not have done if instantDB had >> been marked as a close source project - WHICH IT WAS NOT. >> >> I really hope I'm taking this all wrong and that Lutris hasn't duped >> lots of developers into using and contributing to instantDB under >> false pretenses. I look forward to clarification from Lutris and >> Enhydra. >> >> Yours, >> >> >> George C. Hawkins >> >> PS as the instantdb.enhydra.org site has been taken down some people >> might like to see my extract of the site (taken from a Web cache >> snapshot), containing any pages that contained the words "open" and >> "source" or "opensource". I haven't had time to weed out any >> irrelevant pages (ones with "open" somewhere and "source" somewhere >> else entirely) but any evidence people need should be there. Catch >> it there before it disappears in a Soviet style rewrite of history >> (only joking Lutris guys I suspect you're good guys and this'll all >> be sorted out): >> >> http://instantdb.tripod.com/ >> >> Or if you live a pre HTTP/1.1 world: >> >> http://members.tripod.com/~instantdb/