I think it would be good if the current state of the application deployment and runtime licensing are revisited and clarified.

I am an application developer and Revelation is a database vendor. In order for both of us to be successful I need to be able to create and market competitively viable applications with your products, or else you die and I either die or choose someone else's products. (I would probably select the latter option.) That is the economic reality. No new applications being developed=revenues shrink.

On the other hand if the product is good (which IMO it is), and terms of use encourage new customers and applications revenues will grow and we all prosper. With the shakeout in the MV community in recent years an environment that is friendly to new customers and encourages application growth is essential, else we ALL need new jobs.

As someone from the outside looking in, let me share some observations. These are not meant to criticize, but are intended to help us all improve our situations, so please take my observations to heart.

In ancient times when a city came under seige and things got really bad, they sometimes resorted to eating their children.

A couple of years ago I looked at OI with an application in mind. Technically, OI was a viable choice and would have done what I wanted. Not perfect, but quite viable.

Then I looked into licensing and runtime restrictions, and some heated discussions between RTI and the developers. I was horrified! My word, I said, they are already eating their children!

Runtimes I found were so crippled that a viable application could not be deployed because it could not even programatically manage its own files. To the legalistically minded this would technically be "application creation" and was forbidden. There were insane sounding discussions on not adding useful functions to the RT's to make them saleable, lest one be prosecuted.

Since the crippled applications were not marketable it appeared RTI was cannibalizing it's dwindling network of developers for revenues. The guy named Kurt would just coldly suggest all applications be sold with development licenses. I'm sure that brought in some revenues short term, but it also made many potential applications economicaly impractical, and IMO killed many, many sales that you will never know about.

Something appeared dreadfully wrong, and I decided NOT to use OI. The NAZI approach to licensing was just a little scary. (No I don't like software piracy either, but that is NOT the way to deal with it!)

One thing this product needs is developer friendly licensing and runtimes that give end users as much VALUE as possible without giving them real development capabilities. The resulting applications must be saleable or there will be no sales!

I understand at least informally some of this has been fixed, BUT if you go to Licensing on this website the old verbage is still there, and it tells potential customers to go away. Especially the part about reporting names and addresses of people getting the single user RT's (which were likely just demo's anyway.) Maybe it could use an update?

I am taking a look again because I understand that Mike is one of "us", and I expect that this will become a developer friendly company again. I would really like to see all of us succeed in the coming years, and that will require teamwork.

Great work on the 32 bit OI!

Jim,

I strongly agree that developer deployment needs to be reasonable. And I do believe the current licensing is reasonable.

Funny though, I never noticed that the web page has not been updated.

I personally will be purchasing a DRSDP (Development Ready Server Deployment Pack ). It appears to be the smart way to go. The runtime only restictions are not the way I want to go. Although to save money, maybe someone might want to go that way. So, calculating… $1,500 works subscription and the DRSDP $1,295.00 totaling to $2,795.00 seems to be ok. And currently there are savings specials.

I gotta say that once "Mike" changed the licensing restrictions, I am very pleased. Also I gotta say that the 32-bit upgrade was very big too.

Jim-

The licensing wasn't changed informally; it was changed for real. I thought we had changed the wording on all the pages- and we missed some.

I too, as a developer, felt that the runtime licensing was too restrictive- that's why it was one of the first thing we changed when we took over.

Thanks for the heads up- the website will be updated shortly.

Thanks-

Mike Ruane

Ahhh… Nice to see we are on the same wavelength.

Regarding the issue of dev ready or runtime deployment, it depends on the nature of the application one is contemplating. In the case of a *very* vertical app, possibly for a single client, there is probably enough money involved that deployment cost is a non-issue, so just go with the DRSDP.

However in the case of apps that are designed for resale into a more horizontal market, competive pressures are more intense. You may also not even want users to be able to mess with the program. Also, the extra costs could totally price it out of an otherwise viable opportunity.

I know Revelation apps have traditionally been targeted at the prior category, but IMO a major opportunity for what I call "niche horizontal apps" is missed. Lets face it, the MV community could benefit from some more exposure

IMO the free single user runtimes value is in generating exposure. Generally single user deployments of apps are not significant revenue generators anyway. In most cases where significant customer resources exist to interest us network ready copies will be involved and money flows down our food chain.

Single user versions whether they be free downloads of a restricted version on our websites, or are sold at nominal cost with no support obligation attached, are great EXPOSURE generators. Lets face it, EXPOSURE is one thing the MV community needs most. Why not make a petty "Powered by Revelation" logo a common sight?

So you see there is some business sense behing my interest in seeing fully useable runtime copies that cannot be used for development, but also do not tie the hands of the developer as far as making a really great app. Having to include development copies because the runtime couldn't do even basic file manipulation tasks shut RTI out of the very market that could have generated the most new deployments even if at a lower price per seat. When a DRSDP is more appropriate for the circumstance developers know which to use.

The new improved runtimes would seem now viable, though I don't see the benefit of having file ops restricted at all. There was NO WAY anyone could do development work with an AREV runtime, and if someone were so cheap as to try to do so they weren't a desireable customer anyway.

Those of you who have developed OI apps already, please tell me truthfully: Can you deploy adequately functional apps with the runtimes with the relaxed restrictions now?

I am trying to determine this, because it makes a big difference in the marketability of an app I am considering. It may still be viable if dev copies are required, but the market would be MUCH smaller.

We always should do a feasibiliy analysis before writing code, and I'm doing mine.

Thanks for your thoughts,

Jim

I'll add my two cents worth…

In my current vertical marketplace, I have two classes of users / purchasers:

1. Small essentially mom-pop customers whose tech resource is the person who knows where the on/off switch is. When something needs fixing, if my app is even remotely involved, we the the call. Well over 50% of our tech support issues have nothing to do with our software whatsoever, but are mostly related to "infrastructure" issues. In this case, the current expanded runtime license works pretty well since about the only general problem is a broken index and installing upgrades.

2. Customers who are affiliated with larger entities, typically hospitals in my market. In this case we are generally not nagged with the problems in #1, above, but their corporate culture demands that a non-modifiable environment won't fly. In this case, we sell a single-user, development-ready copy. In this case, we can use PcAnywhere to do required maintenance / changes / fixes. There is no in-house customer development involved at all. In fact our software license would invalidate our support if such action is taken.

Anyway, the long and short of it is that there are two strategies we use.

Don Miller

C3 Inc.

We'd fall into the "you can develop a shrink wrap with the new runtime license" camp. The ability to Copy_table effectively means you can do your year end wrapup routines effectively and the ability to expose GFE fixing and reindexing means we can maintain in the field.

We can see times when a single user development copy might be handy but for a true "shrink wrap" it should be fine!

The Sprezzatura Group

World Leaders in all things RevSoft

Jim-

I'm pretty sure that developers can deploy completely usable and maintainable applications with the current Runtime licensing.

If a client does need to make changes that require devlopment copies, these can be installed and reside with the Runtime and it all works out.

I'm pretty sure you meant 'pretty Powered by OpenInsight', not petty.

Actually, we do have a Powered by OpenInsight logo.

Thanks-

Mike

Everyone, thanks for your comments. They were what I was hoping to hear.

Yes, Mike, a "pretty" Powered by Revelation logo would be my preference! (SP!)

Thanks again for your thoughts.

Jim

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