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What Goes Into a Decision To Take Software From Proprietary To Open Source

Posted by samzenpus on from the open-it-up dept.

Lemeowski writes: It's not often that you get to glimpse behind the curtain and see what led a proprietary software company to open source its software. Last year, the networking software company Midokura made a strategic decision to open source its network virtualization platform MidoNet, to address fragmentation in the networking industry. In this interview, Midokura CEO and CTO Dan Mihai Dumitriu explains the company's decision to give away fours years of engineering to the open source community, how it changed the way its engineers worked, and the lessons learned along the way. Among the challenges was helping engineers overcome the culture change of broadcasting their work to a broader community.

45 comments

  1. When you're not making money from it anymore by Boss,+Pointy+Haired · · Score: 4, Insightful

    /thread

    1. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      /thread

      Sounds like a retirement home.

    2. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Karmashock · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This.

      The funniest open source projects from big companies I have seen have basically been fuck yous to competitors. "what's that? I'll make a competing product and give away for free!"...

      Think of all the big open source projects from blue chip companies and most of them have been motivated by a mixture of spite and contempt. Its kind of delightful in a dark way.

      --
      I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
    3. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yep - > this is the primary driver of open source. When it's your only thing going, then you have to sell advertising to make money, but hey, what the heck. Or if you are lucky, you can sell support for the freebie you created. If you have other business lines that make money - they are most likely in the hardware space - because software is everywhere and easy and hardware is, well, hard. The other use case for Open Source is if you don't value your time at all. Most developers grow up eventually and realize they have to pay the bills.

      Overall, opensource is nice and all, but no one really cares at the end of the day. If you cannot purchase licenses, then you really don't have a business in the first place if you cannot afford that minicule expense. And remember, software people that complain about licensing are rarely the purchasers - the salary and wages of keeping those IT people are far more than any small license fees. In a big company a $20M software license is nothing. But thanks for giving your stuff away - some of us use it to make money :)

    4. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Go fuck yourself, you capitalist scumbag.

    5. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      When I worked for a big consulting firm I was told that they made far more money from support than from development/products, so we basically gave that away for free with a support contract. Our software wasn't open source, but most of the time was provided free of charge for that very reason. Up front the contract looked like it would save the company money, but in the end it obviously was far more profitable for us. I believe this is the major drive behind open source, have the community maintain it for free, then charge support fee's to assist with the maintaining when poor or rich companies choose to adopt it. AC because I'm a coward.

    6. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Eat shit, you socialist pig.

    7. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yep - > this is the primary driver of open source. When it's your only thing going, then you have to sell advertising to make money, but hey, what the heck. Or if you are lucky, you can sell support for the freebie you created. If you have other business lines that make money - they are most likely in the hardware space - because software is everywhere and easy and hardware is, well, hard. The other use case for Open Source is if you don't value your time at all. Most developers grow up eventually and realize they have to pay the bills.

      Overall, opensource is nice and all, but no one really cares at the end of the day. If you cannot purchase licenses, then you really don't have a business in the first place if you cannot afford that minicule expense. And remember, software people that complain about licensing are rarely the purchasers - the salary and wages of keeping those IT people are far more than any small license fees. In a big company a $20M software license is nothing. But thanks for giving your stuff away - some of us use it to make money :)

      Nah, you're a scumbag. You could have literally skipped everything you said and just "But thanks for giving your stuff away - some of us use it to make money :)" But you did establish you were a scumbag before you said you were a scumbag. We get it.

      Apple did exactly that. They ripped BSD code and modified it and sold it, forcing users to buy proprietary hardware or no-go. There is also BSD code in Windows. eg. https://lwn.net/Articles/245805/

      Sure the jip see's (some unnamed sneaky culture) at Microsoft and Apple grabbed other programmer's work and re-sold what was free originally. BSD license is FREE license, just give props to the authors in the code. Here's the funny thing though. While Apple is somewhat acceptable as an OS, it is rendered by the smartest among us as "of little use". Maybe you buy one because you hire a hot MILF who knows fisher-price GUI apple OS's better than Windows. Linux does it all, already, better, and no sneak code because people can look at it. It is open source, and it's free. KDE on Linux is far cooler to use than Mac OSX. I use all. The CLI is still simply a bash shell by default. Same on Mac's as on Linux. You can change shells to anything except command prompt and powershell, which absolutely SUCK anyways.

      So is it just coincidence that Google, Amazon, top 500 companies in general, all supercomputers, governments, etc etc use Linux now? no. Linux is more secure, more stable, and free. It is also utmost easy to install. 10 mins. It is also utmost easy to use any basic office or any other IT functionality. It is also free as many times as you care to install it. You can also modify it to suit your needs at any time you care to, and even sell the modifications you make or give them away for free. You decide. This is why world-wide, IT has gone to Linux now. Windows 10 is a steaming pile of museum quality code. Monoliths suck, empires fall. This kid "nailed it" on Windows 10, albeit in his own way. Incoming chuckles for sure. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GU5uv28a3I

      So what else is new since I found a douche that has no clues? Nvidia is selling an Android (LINUX) device. It is priced in "it's own desired range" somehow magically between $100 Android HTPC's, and $400 consoles. It is cloud gaming, yes, on Linux. Am I the only one to think Nvidia are trashy for trying to pull off an Android cloud gaming device that is run on Linux (Android)? They neither have the functionality of the lower priced devices nor the functionality of the upper priced devices. They are in the middle "just selling junk". Many /.'ers already get the joke and why it's so douche. For those who don't, here.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVpOyKCNZYw

      So to scumbags like parent here, I give to you... the Torvalds salute. I have watched the entire playing out of this entire OS saga since befo

    8. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'll just add that most big businesses using Linux on x86 hardware were prior users of HPUX and Solaris and had large investments in UNIX before Linux. As the original poster, I've been thru it all since the "8bit" days as you call them. The big losers from the open source revolution were HP and Sun and many other smaller UNIX vendors. Sun's out of business now, and HP's having some big issues because no-one wants to pay up for their high dollar hardware. It's more about that than the OS. Apple was successful because they nailed the handheld phone hardware design - 99.99% of apple users care nothing of the OS. Linux hasn't won anything except helping profitable companies down scale their hardware and saving some hardware expense dollars. It's going cloud now, so OS is basically irrelevant at this point. As I said originally, no one really cares at the end of the day. Congrats on being a 'smart people'. Rage on bro!

    9. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Go fuck yourself, you capitalist scumbag.

      Eat shit, you socialist pig.

      Back to work you lazy proles!

    10. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by TheRaven64 · · Score: 2

      It's not always about spite, it's often defensive. If you're competing in one market and a competitor has a big advantage by having a near monopoly in a complementary market, then your best strategy is to commoditise their market and open source is usually a good way of doing this.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    11. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you love it, set it free once you're done your dirty thing with it!

    12. Re:When you're not making money from it anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'll just add that most big businesses using Linux on x86 hardware were prior users of HPUX and Solaris and had large investments in UNIX before Linux. As the original poster, I've been thru it all since the "8bit" days as you call them. The big losers from the open source revolution were HP and Sun and many other smaller UNIX vendors. Sun's out of business now, and HP's having some big issues because no-one wants to pay up for their high dollar hardware. It's more about that than the OS. Apple was successful because they nailed the handheld phone hardware design - 99.99% of apple users care nothing of the OS. Linux hasn't won anything except helping profitable companies down scale their hardware and saving some hardware expense dollars. It's going cloud now, so OS is basically irrelevant at this point. As I said originally, no one really cares at the end of the day. Congrats on being a 'smart people'. Rage on bro!

      "raging bro" checking back for a response. Here's a tip, there was no rage in my comment. Perhaps you are female and are emotionally confused, or, just "one of those type of guys". To label facts a rant is trending. Nice one. Did I summon flashbacks of abuse in your childhoood? Sorry about that.

      Back to Re:When you're not making money from it anymore

      Yeah you brought some more tangents to the table as if you ran out of ritalin. I never bought a SPARC machine but multi booted Solaris x86 for a long time with many other OS's back then. I of course realize Solaris was a prior corporate sponsored OS. This is not news. Pricing for proprietary hardware was always elevated for both SPARC and PPC. Solaris is dodo bird. Apple let Intel into the walled garden perhaps before it's too late. If they didn't branch into portable device markets they would be dodo bird too.

      [Android (Linux heyyy) is better than any iPhone for sure]

      SO. What is the takeaway? What are the brass tacks? Linux. "As I said originally" Despite being stymied by other corporate dickheads eg. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVpOyKCNZYw ... Linux rose straight to the top where it sits *right now*. Honestly, I was loving BSD when Linux was still struggling with dependency hells and whatnot. I was hesitant to give Linux as much attention as I did BSD because BSD is frankly, such a smart OS. Funny how BSD is on our PS4's right now, and Mac OSX is of course a direct fork of BSD.

      As I said originally, no one really cares at the end of the day. Congrats on being a 'smart people'. Rage on bro!

      I could go on about how Windows sucks, everybody knows it already. Just Google it. But here you made a poisonous statement that has a tendency to trip up the not-so-smarts. So I am going to break it down.

      As I said originally - IT IS STILL FALSE
      no one really cares at the end of the day - IT IS STILL FALSE
      congrats on being a "smart people' - THANKS FOR POINTING OUT AN OBVIOUS TRUTH
      Rage on bro! - NO TRUTH TO IT AT ALL

      so. reference to previous false, reassert previous false under false implication that it wasn't false, toss in obviously true, then make inaccurate emotional analysis.

      And people are supposed to believe what you said, due to there being *some truth* to what you said. The only truth you said was "congrats on being a smart people".

      You're a douche for even having synapses that fire this way without enough sense to keep it to yourself.

      What you should have said to be right is:
      I guess I was wrong above, people DO care about what operating system they use on a computer. They care even more-so when it is a business decision. This is why large companies, search engines, governments, huge retailers such as Amazon, and even SLASHDOT are running on Linux. THEN you could have congratulated on being enlightened by somebody smarter than yourself. Then you could have said "woot, I am excited I learned something new today". - THEN, you would have been right.

      Maybe st

  2. When it has no value by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Once it has no value, it can either be discarded or open sourced.

    1. Re:When it has no value by jellomizer · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Normally products are released Open Source as that they are not part of their business model.
      If your business model is based on consulting, then for the most part it makes sense for most of your products that you make to be Open Source as you are not expecting to make money selling software, but consulting services.
      Even if your model is selling software, particular tools that you make are outside of your sales area. Say if you make Electronic Health Records as your core business, your Web Framework that you made, or tools that you use for searching data etc... You might want to Open Source.
      There is some advantages in Opening Source such systems.
      1. You might get some support outside the company to fix bugs, make improvements etc...
      2. Your company will get some good will for releasing the free tool.
      3. Your code may create a workforce trained in your system, so there is less training for new hires.
      4. You may be able to become the standard, vs trying to deal with a large sets of different methods all closed and expensive. You could kill your competition from you pet project.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    2. Re:When it has no value by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Say if you make Electronic Health Records as your core business, your Web Framework that you made, or tools that you use for searching data etc... You might want to Open Source.

      And the reason not everybody does it is because it is 2-sided. There is also the obvious disadvantage that you give your platform and tools -- that you have worked and spent effort to create -- to your competitors. Your competition could kill you thanks to you releasing your pet project. Sure you might create a workforce skilled in your system but *your system* is now *everybody's system* so you don't have that exclusive advantage.
      Yes you might get some free labor from the community in maintenance but you need to manage that too, there is an overhead there that may or may not be outweighed.

      The problem is the advantages aren't concrete -- admittedly nor are the disadvantages -- so its a gamble, it could help you or it could come back to bite you. Companies rarely take significant risks unless there is a decent chance of a significant payoff, that's what for-profit companies are for.

    3. Re:When it has no value by TheRaven64 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The best things to open source in this scenario are the things that you would buy from a third party, if you trusted the supplier enough. For proprietary software, a second source is almost always impossible. For hardware, it's often quite difficult, depending on the component. Switching from Intel to AMD is quite easy in a lot of cases, switching from a Qualcomm SoC to a Samsung one is more effort. Switching other components can be very hard. Service companies are a lot easier (switching from one law or accounting firm to another is much easier than retooling a production line).

      Apple's involvement with LLVM is quite a good example here. Their ecosystem absolutely depends on high-quality compilers existing for OS X and iOS. With Classic MacOS and early versions of OS X, they outsourced this to Metrowerks, who produced quite a competent IDE and set of tools. Then Metrowerks, their sole supplier, was bought by Freescale and development on the Mac versions basically disappeared. They had some involvement in GCC development inherited from NeXT, but GCC was problematic for IDE integration (the parser is designed in such a way that it's impossible to use for syntax highlighting, for example - it does constant folding very early so you can't differentiate 4 and 2+2 in the source). They decided that they needed to bring compiler development in-house, but it was a lot cheaper to do so as part of an open source ecosystem. Apple now contributes something like 40% of the code to LLVM and that vast majority of what other people do directly benefits them, so they're effectively halving their costs. And, of course, giving away the IDE and compiler tools for free (rather than charging, as Metrowerks did) makes people more likely to start developing for Apple platforms.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  3. Desperation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    When times are desperate desperate things are what man does.

    Rock On!

  4. When you want others to fix your bugs for free by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    EOM

    1. Re:When you want others to fix your bugs for free by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      EOM

      Mod parent +5 Insightful!

  5. Midokura is for cows. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    You are all cows. Cows say moo. MOOOOOOOO! MOOOOOOOOO! Moooooo cows MOOOOOO! Moo say the cows. YOU COWS!!

  6. To score points by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    When you realize it is useless but want to score points with the OSS community.

  7. These "points" are worthless! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    No, that's not the reason. Nobody in the corporate world really gives a fuck about "scoring points with the OSS community". Like it or not, this community is absolutely tiny. Furthermore, the people involved with it typically have no real say in any business matters of any importance. Just look at GitHub. A huge majority of the projects on there are from teenagers, hobbyists, and chronically unemployed high school or college dropouts. These people aren't signing multi-million dollar software or hardware purchase contracts! No pun intended, but it's totally pointless to try to score "points" with these people! These "points" are totally worthless! No corporation will waste its resources on something so petty and useless.

    1. Re:These "points" are worthless! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, that's not the reason. Nobody in the corporate world really gives a fuck about "scoring points with the OSS community". Like it or not, this community is absolutely tiny. Furthermore, the people involved with it typically have no real say in any business matters of any importance. Just look at GitHub. A huge majority of the projects on there are from teenagers, hobbyists, and chronically unemployed high school or college dropouts. These people aren't signing multi-million dollar software or hardware purchase contracts! No pun intended, but it's totally pointless to try to score "points" with these people! These "points" are totally worthless! No corporation will waste its resources on something so petty and useless.

      Dude, that was a joke. Nobody in the business world cares about the "OSS community".

    2. Re:These "points" are worthless! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sometimes it's hard to tell here. Some people here actually think that the OSS community has some importance.

    3. Re:These "points" are worthless! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Is there even any real "open source community"? I would expect that the people that contribute most come from the original companies that make the particular open source software. Then there is the general crowd who try various Linux distros and never touch the source but only run binaries compiled by someone else.

    4. Re:These "points" are worthless! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The majority of people with any sort of code project aren't signing multi-million dollar software contracts

      What a shock

  8. The Internet Archive by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They're the authority on what proprietary software becomes "open source".

  9. Open source is garbage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Open source means garbage software. The features and quality assurance are usually terrible.

    1. Re:Open source is garbage by Demonoid-Penguin · · Score: 2

      Open source means garbage software. The features and quality assurance are usually terrible.

      Right on dude! That's why IBM is a flash in the pan money losing company. Google is just a bubble waiting to burst.

      I could go on - but you beat me to it. How's the football coaching applications going? Any decent offers from the big league yet?

    2. Re:Open source is garbage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Actually, I think both your examples prove his point.

      IBM makes about 57% of its revenue from services, not software. About 25% is from software, and as far as I know, the software that they are making money from is *not* open source.

      Google doesn't even have a product that it sells. It makes more than 90% of its revenue by giving away mediocre content for free and then attaching advertising to it. They were able to implement the holy grail of the Internet Biz Model - the Internet as TV (free content with paid advertising - the content doesn't have to be good because no one is actually paying for it). Google does not make money from the software itself.

      So I guess we should say "thank you" for providing two excellent examples of how companies only give away software when it is not a source of revenue for them.

    3. Re:Open source is garbage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Um, Google's search engine and the infrastructure around it (above the OS level) is all closed source. You bet they'd send serious lawyers after anyone who tried to leak it, Aaron Swartz style.

      But they did release google test (unit test framework) as open source! Yippeeeee!!!!!

    4. Re:Open source is garbage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Um, Google's search engine and the infrastructure around it (above the OS level) is all closed source. You bet they'd send serious lawyers after anyone who tried to leak it, Aaron Swartz style.

      But they did release google test (unit test framework) as open source! Yippeeeee!!!!!

      Super Duper! Yippppeeee!! has become part of the language of Slashdot!

    5. Re:Open source is garbage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whose point? GGP was a troll saying FOSS sucks. Isn't it kind of obvious that you can't both sell a digital good and give people permission to give away unlimited copies?

    6. Re:Open source is garbage by Demonoid-Penguin · · Score: 1

      Dear coward

      Actually, I think both your examples prove his point.

      Which prove only that you don't get the point. IBM wasn't making money from software - but they relied on software to make money on hardware. By using Open Source they greatly reduced costs. Don't let that stop you from building strawmen from the straws you're grasping at - 'cause you know so much more that one of less than half a dozen companies on the planet that has been in continuous profit for over a century.

      Google doesn't even have a product that it sells. It makes more than 90% of its revenue by giving away mediocre content for free and then attaching advertising to it.

      Bullshit - where do you think they get their income from - the fucking internet fairies? Their product is targeted advertising. They use Open Source to build their systems - and Open Source to create the mediums that allow them to target their ads.
      Again, you either fail to grasp the point, or are being wilfully obtuse and deceitful. Given the way you are so quick to deploy straw man and (brain-damaged) ad crumenam arguments the latter is most likely.
      The desperate attempt to rescue an unsupportable position by deploying argumentum ad crumenam is particularly telling. Those that actually know business will be quick to tell you that profit is result of margins and reducing cost is a key element.
      Your use of mediocre is also telling. In that you need to resort to sophistic argument in the hope of enlisting the unwary. (your logic is false, but the unwary may take mediocre as proven and fail to recognise what follows is dependant upon it being true).
      If the "product" (you paint with such a broad brush) is so mediocre why all the whining from those that complain they depended on it - when it's withdrawn? Is Android another failure? Would Google hold their current market position if they based their company on proprietary products?

      So I guess we should say "thank you" for providing two excellent examples of how companies only give away software when it is not a source of revenue for them.

      Reality check. Your delusion is not shared. It's the bottom-line that counts when calculating whether the use of and/or support of Open Source is a business failure - and by all counts you are patently and demonstrably wrong.

      tl;dr? If you do this for free - get a life. If you're a paid shill - you work for idiots that make bad investments.

    7. Re:Open source is garbage by Demonoid-Penguin · · Score: 1

      Dear coward

      Um, Google's search engine and the infrastructure around it (above the OS level) is all closed source.

      Is their no limit to your bullshit? Go back to writing 9/11 and Illuminati conspiracies - there is little secret about what Google uses for their search engine and infrastructure ('cause they Open Source it and publicise it regularly), only the implementation is considered company property. You rely on the lazy who won't check your claims - and the stupid who'll believe that because you offer no proof it must be a conspiracy is a sure sign of bullshit.
      Most /. readers won't fall for that tired cireulus in probando. "Google relies on proprietary software - but they'll sic their lawyers on anyone who reviews it" - as there's no proof that your bullshit is true - the gullible might believe you. Telling that your desired audience needs to be gullible.

      It's a tiny audience that'll believe that warm feeling is not you pissing in their pocket - the rest either work for Google, have worked for Google, use Google source code for themselves - or know someone who does. Presuming that everyone who reads /. is as ignorant as you ain't a good start to your career as a shill/troll.

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  11. first rule of open source... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...don't talk about why you went open source.

  12. OSS Thread by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    OSS thread, twenty comments, four of them from non-AC. Choo choo, here come the shill train.

    1. Re:OSS Thread by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OSS thread, twenty comments, four of them from non-AC. Choo choo, here come the shill train.

      systemd wastes resources and creates a system that is too big (ala Windoze). Linux pre-systemd was a lean efficient programming system. After systemd it has teh same bloat and waste as Windoze.

    2. Re:OSS Thread by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OSS thread, twenty comments, four of them from non-AC. Choo choo, here come the shill train.

      systemd wastes resources and creates a system that is too big (ala Windoze). Linux pre-systemd was a lean efficient programming system. After systemd it has the same bloat and waste as Windoze.

      systemd can be configured just as well as sysvinit.

    3. Re:OSS Thread by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      OSS thread, twenty comments, four of them from non-AC. Choo choo, here come the shill train.

      systemd wastes resources and creates a system that is too big (ala Windoze). Linux pre-systemd was a lean efficient programming system. After systemd it has the same bloat and waste as Windoze.

      systemd can be configured just as well as sysvinit.

      Stuff from http://www.zdnet.com/article/linus-torvalds-and-others-on-linuxs-systemd/:

      "Systemd flies in the face of the Unix philosophy: 'do one thing and do it well,' representing a complex collection of dozens of tightly coupled binaries1. Its responsibilities grossly exceed that of an init system, as it goes on to handle power management, device management, mount points, cron, disk encryption, socket API/inetd, syslog, network configuration, login/session management, readahead, GPT partition discovery, container registration, hostname/locale/time management, and other things. Keep it simple, stupid.”

      Because systemd puts so many of a program's eggs in one system basket, systemd's critics argue that "there are tons of scenarios in which it can crash and bring down the whole system. But in addition, this means that plenty of non-kernel system upgrades will now require a reboot. Enjoy your new Windows 9 Linux system!”

  13. Re:timberland pas cher 2015 nike tn pas cher franc by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    How the h**l do shoes have anything to do with the failings of systemd?

  14. We still need to give credit where the credit is d by Taco+Cowboy · · Score: 2

    But we need to give credit for companies that open source their products, even if those products are no longer bringing in $$$ for them

    There have been times I wrote to software companies asking them to open source their truly obsolete products, such as compilers that run on OS/2, just so that younger generations, at least those who are curious enough to look at the source, could learn a thing or two how a compiler works

    They refused

    Of course they have all their rights to refuse to open up the source codes of their long obsolete software - and what I am saying is that no matter what, we still need to give due credit to the companies which open sourced their products, no matter for what reason they do so

    --
    Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
  15. Dramatic Shift by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I am working on a project that has recently been released as open source. The reason for it I believe is that the company felt it needed to change their sales model in order to reach more users. The aim here is the get the return off licensing fees.