Posted: Mon Apr 10, 2006 5:44 am Post subject: Re: OpenOffice.org and money
Eric Bachard wrote:
Hi,
Interesting thread...
For the one not aware : Openoffice .org project is working on this, doing a native port (using Carbon/Cocoa first).
Hi Eric,
Any change in the status of your project since the last time I asked in these forums (around Christmas 2005, as I recall)? I didn't get an answer back then.
When can we expect to see any evidence (or even the faintest glimmer of hope) that a native version is anywhere near being capable of running natively on a Mac any time soon.
Back on topic here, I think the experience of the MacGimp project may be worth looking at. The developers make a sound economic argument here which might act as a model.
In similar way as NeoOffice brings an easy-to-install open source office suite to the Mac masses, MacGimp brings the Gimp image editor in an easy to install package for the Mac masses. Their pricing structure is displayed here. I have no idea whether the economic needs are similar on the two projects but it may be worth Patrick exchanging ideas with the developers to see if there's anything to learn from their approach?
If MacGimp is the second most popular garphics suite after PhotoShop (as the developers claim) and NeoOffice is the second most popular office suite after M$ Office on the Mac (according to some), maybe there could be some synergy there - even some co-branding to be explored?
Just wild thoughts, maybe. _________________ Ray Saunders
World Scout Bureau
Please remain proffesional if you wish to post on this board. As you provide no support for your product here, I would ask that you do not solicit donations as well.
synergy, co-oping, all these would be great. however, as someone who has tried, it is not going to happen.
patrick is not going to abandon three years of work to join the openoffice.org group, and pavel and some of the openoffice.org programmers have adamantly stated that they will only work on the 'openoffice.org' brand of the program.
so it is an impass. In the end, competition will be good, i think.
Posted: Mon Apr 10, 2006 9:10 am Post subject: competition ?
Jake,
Well, AFAIK, Competition is based on fair rules
I have other things to do, and I'm not interested : what you propose is destructive, and quite dangerous.
Just for see the consequences of what you wrote, imagine the situation. Means : what I propose above is something hypothetic of course ...
Rule 0 : In case of a "competition", lie is not authorized (remember, only fair behaviour), and NeoOffice project woul'd be forced to change some things, like :
1) remove all " OpenOffice.org " we can read into NeoOffice site. (We'd do the same on porting project): do your own marketing.
2) stop to pretend NeoOffice is OpenOffice.org** , assuming Neo is a fork
**As a fork, NeoOffice cannot be OpenOffice.org : this only leads to confuse end users
3) put the list of Neo contributions for OpenOffice.org code since 1 year (I'm nice). Means : code we can integrate it into OpenOffice.org...
... are you still sure that's what you want ?
BTW : when you write Neo is built on Main OOo, and not on Mac porting effort : it doesn't make sense... Official 2.0 (X11) uses obviously HEAD.. if all can use 2.0 code, this is because we (porting project) are fixing bugs and all since a bit less than two years, not because Neo project helped us.
Just an example : for Mac Intel porting ? What did Neo project ?
The answer is : nothing.
What I read about Universal Binary : this is "trivial" to build UB. Of course it isn't. Just ask Microsoft why MS Office is not ready for Mac Intel...
Posted: Mon Apr 10, 2006 9:21 am Post subject: Re: about money for free projects
guest wrote:
Hi,
Why only send money to NeoOffice project, and not OpenOffice ?
Just curious :
- OpenOffice.org represents 98 to 99% of the code used to build NeoOffice,
True.
guest wrote:
- What is (are ?) NeoOffice project contribution(s) to OpenOffice code (2.0) , since august 2004) ?
None. This is because none of the fixes that Patrick came up with could be used with OpenOffice.org 2.0 in their native form. However, the file locking fix was picked up by Mox and adapted to OpenOffice.org 2.0 and should be incorporated into the 2.0.3 release.
guest wrote:
- NeoOffice did nothing for Mac Intel port, e.g. fix the bridge ...
But I already read an Intel version will be provided
That is because the NeoOffice.org project is concentrated on the largest amount of Mac users, those with PPC machines. This allows us to work on one item at a time. OpenOffice.org has at least ten times the number of developers and some of them do so as a full time occupation and are paid to do so (I know of at least two of them that are on Sun's payroll.)
guest wrote:
OpenOffice project does concern only volunteers, none is paid, and when a change is made into OpenOffice code, Neo can use it. The opposite is never true, because of the license...
Ahem, the word bullsh*t applies here. OpenOffice.org enjoys the sponsorship of Sun and several other companies. NeoOffice does not. As far as the license issue, this is because the GPL REQUIRES you to bring back to the source any changes. The Lesser GPL does not. I've read through both licenses and had a legal group look at them. All I have to do is make the source available, if you ask for it. There is no requirement that I 'give back' any changes. And lastly, NeoOffice started when the SISSL was in effect which required you to give up your rights to Sun. If I were making a living, which Patrick does, with a software product, I would NEVER give that right to someone else.
guest wrote:
Is it really fair ?
I think you live in a different world than I do, because I learnt a long time ago that this life is not going to be, and never will be 'fair'.
patrick is not going to abandon three years of work to join the openoffice.org group, and pavel and some of the openoffice.org programmers have adamantly stated that they will only work on the 'openoffice.org' brand of the program.
Well, really the biggest issue working within OpenOffice would be the same as the current topic: earning a living do this work within OpenOffice.org is even more difficult than doing it under NeoOffice. While Eric's team puts a lot of time into their work, they are part-time volunteers and earn their living elsewhere so they are not nearly dependent on donation revenue as NeoOffice is.
So why can't NeoOffice live off part-time volunteers? Good question. If NeoOffice required only the same amount of development labor as an OpenOffice.org X11 port, NeoOffice would not need a full-time programmer and could exist with part-time volunteers like OpenOffice.org X11 currently does. However, the "little bit of code" that Eric refers to required 2 years of full-time work to create, test, and fix. That 'little bit of code" is, unfortunately, one of the key portions of the OpenOffice.org code and is not a trivial amount of code for anyone. Yes, it is only 1% of the entire OpenOffice.org code, but it is still a very large amount of code for one or two people and, in my experience, it cannot be done without working full-time on it. Working full-time means you need to quit your job and figure out how to pay for it.
With NeoOffice donations, you know that it is going directly to support NeoOffice infrastructure and to support me and Ed's work. More importantly, Ed and I are assured of getting any donations that you give. What does this mean? It means that there is no "middle-man" that controls the donations. Even I worked with OpenOffice.org and you could donate directly to the Mac work, I would still have to beg the keepers of the donations to give me some of it. In other words, if I worked in OpenOffice.org there would be no guarantee that your donations would be used to fund my work or, for that matter, Mac work at all.
the thing is this: you cannot take away openoffice.org. it is open source. you don't have that authority. sun doesn't have that authority. the code is and will always be availible.
the only way you could make neooffice go away is to make a better product. competition is good because it drives people to make their products better. in the end, the consumer wins because they have choice.
i know the fact that neooffice exists upsets you. and i am sorry for that. but remember, it was someone in your exact position who started it. they had their reasons, and i hope one day you understand them.
Until then, I plan to use, support, and donate to BOTH neooffice and openoffice.org.
the thing is this: you cannot take away openoffice.org. it is open source. you don't have that authority. sun doesn't have that authority. the code is and will always be availible.
Good point. Also note that the same is true of NeoOffice. Although Sun chooses not to use our GPL code, GPL ensures that anyone can copy, modify, and restributed our code.
The "early access" fee will not change that. Instead, the early access fee is really just an add on service.
Posted: Mon Apr 10, 2006 11:03 am Post subject: difference between use and be
jake,
You are confused. I perfectly understand the difference between use sources from a free software (a good thing of course), create derivative products with them, and use sources from a free software, modify it, but continue to say we are the previous one.
License has changed, code is modified
=> NeoOffice is not OpenOffice.org, and has not to claims be OpenOffice.org for Mac.
Looking at Neo site, this is the first thing we can read : this is not fair
Posted: Mon Apr 10, 2006 11:26 am Post subject: Re: difference between use and be
Eric Bachard wrote:
License has changed, code is modified
=> NeoOffice is not OpenOffice.org, and has not to claims be OpenOffice.org for Mac.
Looking at Neo site, this is the first thing we can read : this is not fair
Sorry Eric, but Sun does not have ownership of the OpenOffice.org name. OpenOffice.org is not trademarked and is not trademarkable so anyone can call their product OpenOffice.org if they want to. RedHat and Novell have been calling their forks OpenOffice.org for that last few years.
Don't like this situation? I suggest you contact Sun's OpenOffice.org senior managers as they are the people who chose to use a non-trademarkable name for their product. I had direct conversations with Jonathan Schartz at Sun last year and, not surprisingly, your issue was not one that was ever raised by Jonathan or his senior managers. Accordingly, for me it is not an issue.
BTW, you know that you can solve all of these issues by simply finishing the native port that you promised to the world last September. Finish your port and NeoOffice will no longer have a reason to exist. IIRC, you said something about it being available for testing in late 2006. Or has your schedule slipped?
Congratulations! I mean it. That gives you a way to keep out people from polluting the name by sending out bogus versions. I think OOo has very little to fear from NeoOffice in that sense. You must agree that Patrick has been very conscientious in keeping the product stable.
Still, NeoOffice is an OSX native derivative.
I grant you, the opening headline on http://www.neooffice.org/ may be skirting the borders of trademark legality in the strictest sense. It is, however, functionally true. 1.8 million downloads per year seem to agree (though I do not know how many get the X11 versions)..
I can also see why the
Quote:
NeoOffice the main development project for making OpenOffice.org to run natively on MacOS X.
bit would upset you. But I think we can promise you that once your volunteers release a stable, almost function-complete version that does not require X11, this bit will be changed to reflect your accomplishments.
If anyone has an alternative wording for the opening pages that still says NeoOffice brings what you need from OpenOffice to the Mac, is catchy and trademark safe, I would be happy to support it. I honestly see why Eric feels bad about this and we should do what we can to be as accurate as possible.
Best wishes,
Oscar _________________ "What do you think of Western Civilization?"
"I think it would be a good idea!"
- Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
Only in the United States and only as far as the trademark law allows.
FWIW, yes Patrick can add Openoffice.org® to his letter. What this does basically is prevent anyone (including 'us') from marketing OpenOffice.org. However, it does not stop folks from marketing derivative works, which NeoOffice® is.
Your point? None. OpenOffice.org is not trademarked in many other countries. This prevented the folks in Brazil, for instance, from marketing OpenOffice.org products.
At this point you are picking nits in this conversation. All that does is aggravate folks and leads to a spirit of discordenance.
Here is what I see, Eric. Please take this as constructive critism from a friend and not an enemy.
You are upset at the pace of progress of the Aquafied version of OpenOffice.org. I know this pace as I visit the CWS often. NeoOffice is a functioning product. It is soon to be upgraded to use OpenOffice.org® 2.0.2 code. I know, I built it this weekend. It needs a few 'tweeks' and it will be ready. It is nowhere near a perfect Aqua product, but it exists and works. Where is the Aqua version that you promised would be ready in 'a few months' when it was announced last fall? See, this is what upsets people. Yes, I said it would take a FEW YEARS to get an Aqua version ready. See, Eric, I have thirty years of experience working with computers and I work daily in the real environment of having to support users. One NEVER makes a statement that a product will be ready by a certain date unless they have a working functional beta that is undergoing tests.
Here is what the bottom line is: You have your project and Patrick has his livelihood invested in NeoOffice. I'll give you an analogy:
Investment in a Western Breakfast:
You - Chicken, donated eggs, will not feel it if the eggs are not used.
Patrick - Pigg, died so that you may have bacon and sausage. Definately will feel it if you don't decide to have bacon today as it gets to live another day.
So, if OpenOffice.org® were to 'die' tomorrow, you could find something else to do with your spare hours, as could I. Patrick on the other hand, would have to look for a job and would deeply mourn the loss of NeoOffice® and OpenOffice.org®.
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