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Can Proprietary Language Teams Succeed By Going Open Source?
JerkyBoy writes "RunRev maintains the proprietary LiveCode programming environment. Those familiar with HyperCard on the Mac would feel quite at home using the environment to produce simple applications, and possibly more, although the programming language it incorporates has a few significant shortcomings (e.g., true object orientation). But it is a very versatile environment, currently claiming support for Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS, Android, and server-side scripting. For us NOOBs who could never find the time to learn C++ and something like the wxWidgets or QT toolkits, it seems like a pretty good deal. Recently RunRev has done something interesting, however, and that is to create a Kickstarter campaign to move the environment to open source (~500K lines of code, ~700 files). The way that they describe it, it sounds like there will be a commercial version and an open-source version of the environment (hopefully not cripple-ware), and they are asking for money to do this. But I want to know: what are their chances of success with this model? How in the world can they make enough money to maintain their programmers and overhead while giving the environment away? In other words, if a company like RunRev announces that they are moving to an open-source model, should you become more interested or less interested in their product?"
Microsoft's wide portfolio of products may allow a little cross-subsidisation (mild understatement), which is not really an option for a one-product firm as described in this story.
Also the Express editions might be considered loss-leaders: you start with the basics and eventually you need the full-blown paid product. It doesn't seem like this firm is differentiating its offerings in such a way.
Indeed. For example, interestingly, the standard template library (STL) used in many C++ projects is actually a move away from object orientation.
Anyway, I just had a peek at some sample LiveCode source, and noticed that sometimes it approaches human language. For example:
delete the last char of tFilesWithPaths
So, perhaps LiveCode is a move back towards the COBOL days?
If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
Object orientation is a tool, unfortunately most programming languages treat it as if was a religion.
Paying to get something nice open sourced is a good thing.
Paying to have a stripped down IDE and language open sourced... not so much.
If you want to learn programming, use JavaScript, Python, or Ruby; they're free, easy-to-use, and they scale up to real problems.
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systemd is Roko's Basilisk.