The NeL engine is a very powerful engine and could have been the framework behind a lot of open-source MMORPGs. The problem is that it is only meagerly documented. Nevrax nearly abandoned the community (with a couple exceptions of developers from within helping us in their spare time) so none of this documentation was ever updated and completed. Recently they converted to a wiki and some of us have been putting together documentation ourselves. One of the big issues, that opening Ryzom up would help with, is that there is a lot of code that makes no sense without context. An example that I use frequently is the NLLIGO module. Nevrax refers to this as "legos for landscape." Ligoscape is a module for rapid development of landscape/levels. Only about 10% of this module is really documented (and only self-documented through code and examples of usages in the NLSOUND library) and the pieces that make this module shine - notably the pieces that take the "legos" and generate the landscape you as a player see - are contained in the closed source tools. Opening these tools up would empower existing (and new) NeL projects as well as encourage the ongoing improvement and development of the tools.
As a member of the NeL community this effort signifies great hope for me and my project. We've been in the NeL community and contributing bugfixes and updates to the engine that runs Ryzom for over 3 years. The community has supplied the engine more than 1k bugfixes in the 6 year lifespan of the GPL'd version of the engine and all of this with dwindling interest in the community from the company, as Olivier Lejade stated. For more than 2 full years we were next to ignored by the company (except for the wonderful support and help from Vianney Lecroart and Olivier Cado) but we continued.
Between this thread and the threads raging on the ryzom.com forums I'm surprised at the treatment this idea has been getting from the user community and others considering the numerous contributions we, the open-source movement, have already made towards this game.
Whether Xavier's group can maintain a viable commercial entity doesn't matter. By contributing funds to his group you're not helping him buy Ryzom - you're helping everyone buy Ryzom. Any person here, with some expertise and financial backing, could run their own commercial version of Ryzom if it were GPL'd.
A lot of comments have been made about the "chaos" of opening up Ryzom. Hundreds of players contributing code and compromising the integrity of the codebase, etc. A lot of projects do very well if they have a strong maintainer, a bright core team and very well founded peer-review practices. We submitted over 1k patches (as I stated earlier) to Nevrax and we never once compromised the integrity of the end-product. Dozens, if not hundreds, of people contribute to the OGRE but it still remains a strong, viable open-source project which is being used extensively in the commercial arena because Steve (Sinbad) is a good maintainer. Likewise with Linux and Linus.
As far as the financial probability of Xavier's group managing servers - I can't say whether he has put a lot of thought into that or not. But by pledging and helping Xavier's group buy and open Ryzom you won't have to rely on Xavier alone to run a Ryzom shard. If Xavier cannot manage to do this Ryzom does not die with him (much like it may die with Nevrax) - anyone will be fully able to take up the torch, commercial or free.
Olivier, thank you for your post, it means a lot to us in the community that you started so many years ago.
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The NeL engine is a very powerful engine and could have been the framework behind a lot of open-source MMORPGs. The problem is that it is only meagerly documented. Nevrax nearly abandoned the community (with a couple exceptions of developers from within helping us in their spare time) so none of this documentation was ever updated and completed. Recently they converted to a wiki and some of us have been putting together documentation ourselves. One of the big issues, that opening Ryzom up would help with, is that there is a lot of code that makes no sense without context. An example that I use frequently is the NLLIGO module. Nevrax refers to this as "legos for landscape." Ligoscape is a module for rapid development of landscape/levels. Only about 10% of this module is really documented (and only self-documented through code and examples of usages in the NLSOUND library) and the pieces that make this module shine - notably the pieces that take the "legos" and generate the landscape you as a player see - are contained in the closed source tools. Opening these tools up would empower existing (and new) NeL projects as well as encourage the ongoing improvement and development of the tools.
As a member of the NeL community this effort signifies great hope for me and my project. We've been in the NeL community and contributing bugfixes and updates to the engine that runs Ryzom for over 3 years. The community has supplied the engine more than 1k bugfixes in the 6 year lifespan of the GPL'd version of the engine and all of this with dwindling interest in the community from the company, as Olivier Lejade stated. For more than 2 full years we were next to ignored by the company (except for the wonderful support and help from Vianney Lecroart and Olivier Cado) but we continued. Between this thread and the threads raging on the ryzom.com forums I'm surprised at the treatment this idea has been getting from the user community and others considering the numerous contributions we, the open-source movement, have already made towards this game. Whether Xavier's group can maintain a viable commercial entity doesn't matter. By contributing funds to his group you're not helping him buy Ryzom - you're helping everyone buy Ryzom. Any person here, with some expertise and financial backing, could run their own commercial version of Ryzom if it were GPL'd. A lot of comments have been made about the "chaos" of opening up Ryzom. Hundreds of players contributing code and compromising the integrity of the codebase, etc. A lot of projects do very well if they have a strong maintainer, a bright core team and very well founded peer-review practices. We submitted over 1k patches (as I stated earlier) to Nevrax and we never once compromised the integrity of the end-product. Dozens, if not hundreds, of people contribute to the OGRE but it still remains a strong, viable open-source project which is being used extensively in the commercial arena because Steve (Sinbad) is a good maintainer. Likewise with Linux and Linus. As far as the financial probability of Xavier's group managing servers - I can't say whether he has put a lot of thought into that or not. But by pledging and helping Xavier's group buy and open Ryzom you won't have to rely on Xavier alone to run a Ryzom shard. If Xavier cannot manage to do this Ryzom does not die with him (much like it may die with Nevrax) - anyone will be fully able to take up the torch, commercial or free. Olivier, thank you for your post, it means a lot to us in the community that you started so many years ago.