Gobe Productive GPL Release In Danger

Elliot writes "Gobe, developers of Gobe Productive, a fast and lightweight office suite initally developed for the BeOS and later ported to Windows and Linux (which never made it past beta stage), announced in August that they would be open sourcing Gobe Productive under the GPL. Unfortunately, it appears that financial issues might prevent this from happening. A shame to see yet another wonderful piece of software [possibly] fail."

Comments

Gobe is/was awesome

[kannibal_klown]

I bought a copy shortly after slashdot posted an article about it. It was a great software package. It was lite and quick, a hell of a lot quicker than OpenOffice and StarOffice, and the interface was just... clean.

My favorite part was the ability to export to PDF so easily.

My only complaint was the Spreadsheet program wasn't as robust as some of the other packages out there, but it still worked.

I hope everything works out for them. Personally, I think this was one of the best office packages around.

Re:Gobe is/was awesome

[Big Mark]

It was designed for the BeOS, which was itself fast, lightweight and clean, so what did you expect?

OK, neither were fully-featured but they did everything 75% of people would ever need.

-Mark

flawed logic

[Anonymous Coward]

Blockquoth the page:

Our Take 2 This could be a great opportunity for the 3 major Linux distros, or any other OS maker, to differentiate itself from the competition by stepping up and helping out with the buyout of this software (even if it means no open sourcing). Surely, we do have OpenOffice and KOffice, but then again, the Linux distro next door has it too. Hey Linux executives that I know you are reading OSNews, think about it. Differentiate yourself from the competition, give an edge on why should I try your distro and not your competitor's. ;-)

But if they GPL it, their competitors get to have it too. And they'd need to GPL it to not be hypocrites and to make this worthwhile.

Let's face it. Open source is nice, but its economics are not as profitable as those of closed source software. That makes things tough.

This reminds me of the collective action problem. Open source software is a public good like the environment or national defense, since it is jointly supplied and cannot be denied to any single person. If it is supplied to one person, it is supplied to everyone. But since people are selfish, they often won't want to contribute to it.

So what can we do? I say we should fix copyright law so that it only works for seven years. After those seven years we can use the source code of the program.

Start a fund?

[chunkwhite86]

Perhaps they should start a fund, similar to what Blender did?

When Blender when under, they started a fund to which anyone could contribute (and I did.) Now their 3D modeling product is open source.

I wouldn't mind paying a few bucks to open the source.

Jubilation too early

[twener]

There it goes what some people already saw as future integrated Gnome Office.

If the company falls under...

[nlinecomputers]

..what is stopping them from releasing the code as GPL anyway? Is the code tied up as an asset that might be seized by a bank?

Thank goodness.

[Erpo]

I realize most people probably won't agree, but I'm incredibly thankful this thing didn't make it past the beta stage for linux and windows and might not be released under the gpl. I guess that might be considered a loss, as I'm sure it contains some great code that other OSS developers could use or draw from, but it will prevent anyone from finishing the port. In a software category like this (one that's so critical to broadened acceptance of linux on the desktop) I'm a firm believer that competition between products is actually a bad thing.

When all of the competitors in a market are OSS*, more product choice does not equal more freedom. That's kinda what the GPL is all about -- one person (or company) can't run off with the source and deprive the OSS community of the best piece of ______ software it ever had. On the contrary -- with the need normally satisfied by inter-product competition is taken resolved in another way, more product choice equals more confusion. Users like to get comfortable with a method for accomplishing a task and stick to it. "How do I create a new spreadsheet, again?" is not a question users want to have to ask more than once every five years; if they're forced to, they'll go back to what they were already comfortable with.

*The market I'm talking about is inclusion in linux distros. I'm well aware that MS Office is not OSS. ;)

Re:Thank goodness.

[istartedi]

more product choice equals more confusion

This is one of the major fallacies of Free Software/Open Source advocacy. Whenever presented with the argument that the GPL might tend to discourage entry and result in a public monopoly, the advocates always counter that "the user has the source so they can customize it".

Now, ask yourself how many times you've heard somebody say "I don't like the way this program does ______" and you could counter with "have you tried brand X? It does _____ differently".

Now, if there is no brand X, or if the only way to obtain brand X is to have it custom built to your specifications, how many SOHO users are going to learn C or hire a consultant to give their office suite a "different feel"? Slightly less than 1% of half of none of them. They will all be trapped because, while there will be some variations, fundamentally all suites will be the same.

What kind of freedom and choice is that?

This will be a real shame

[X-Nc]

I bought and used gobeProductive on BeOS and also got the WinXX version. I was egerly waiting for the Linux port. Many have already asked the question "Why another Office Suite?". Well, as good as the existing open and commercial office products are they still aren't as smooth and easy as gobeProductive. It doesn't do everything MS Office does but (and follow me on this) it does 100% of the 80% od Office that 95% of the people actually use. And it does that piece better than MS Office and even OpenOffice.

Right now I have on my Linux laptop; Applix Anywhere 2.2, HancomOffice 2, SOT Office (OpenOffice repackeged by SOT), Koffice, and what I call a "best of breed" combination suite of Gnumeric/Scribus DTB/AbiWord/HTMLDOC/Ted. Of these, Applix was the best. Unfortunatly the company has killed it. HancomOffice looks like it might have potential but it's not yet there. OO, and it's like, is very good and makes a great MS Office clone. Unfortunatly it brings with it all the baggage that that intails. gobeProductive was a hope of mine. Sadly, it seems that once again, superior technology loses out.

It is a pitty

[herveb]

Gobe Productive is a very elegant and potent product. And the Gobe team seemed to be a very nice group of people (I exchanged emails with some of them). I used Productive on both BeOS and MS-Windows and it is a great job while being fast and very compact. The next version could have added functionalities like support for XML file format that could have really brought it the point that it meets the needs of 80% of the users. It is unfortunate that this product is going to disappear. Well, it shows once again that the impact of Microsoft behavior does not lead to more innovation (like Productive) and more choices for the consumers but to their alienation (and I am not arguing about MS-Office value but who really needs all its functionalities?).

Re:It's not going to fail...

[Ty]

This is complete assinine bullshit. Although office is a good suite of software, but it remains dominent because of a monopoly. Ask any corporation why they use MS Office. The top two answers will be: 1. Because everyone else does and we need it for easy document exchange. 2. It is too costly to retrain our staff.

Re:It's not going to fail...

[inode_buddha]

I'm going to call you on your comment about mindshare and monopoly power.

A recent conversation with my production supervisor strongly reveals the power of mindshare through market dominance:

(me) "Hey, could you recommend some tips to learn about databases in general?"

(him) "You mean Access?"

(me) "Nah, just general database concepts"

(him) "Access is easy"

*rest of conversation snipped because it makes my brain hurt*

Now, why do you think Office owns the Mac productivity market? Think again.

BTW, I use OpenOffice on Linux (personal preference). In most work environments this probably isn't going to fly, simply because anything that is not 100% MS is "nonstandard"
and therefore risky (aka not desirable).

On a slightly related note, it's interesting how many companies seem to want all the guarantees without having to offer any ("I hereby disclaim thee, O liability!") and of course, if you actually read and understand ie, EULA's you'll notice how they disclaim as much as possible.

All of which makes me wonder why the fsck am I paying them?

Just speaking from personal experience.

Re:There's a reason

[Twirlip of the Mists]

OK, so you're a chef, and your knowledge is limited to personal desktop computing. That's your context, correct?

Not precisely. Before the bubble burst, I spent about 15 years in the computer industry. I was a field engineer, an operator, a system admin, a consultant, an engineer, a manager, and finally an executive. But the last business venture burned me out so hard I decided to just take a pass on the whole thing and open a restaurant. That was earlier this year.

Reading back through your posts is sickening.

I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over.

My wife wrote her dissertation in Word because I couldn't simplify SGML enough

My girlfriend wrote hers, in molecular genetics, in Word too, but not for the same reason. She did it because she liked Word just fine. I don't remember how many pages hers was-- something in the 300 range, like yours-- but she didn't have anything like the problems you described. Citations, tables of contents and figures, pagination; all worked perfectly.

Perhaps you guys were doing something wrong?

ask yourself how many people really want to get their computer advice from a chef?

I don't recall offering any advice. Just opinion. And my opinion is that Office would never have become the dominant product in its market if it were as bad as you say it is. The conclusion, therefore, is that it's nowhere near as bad as you say it is. The only outstanding question, then, is why you think so poorly of it.