Hi brian

It is really great to see that Squeak suits your company needs. Do not 
forget that it is really important is to help
also Squeak by providing bug fixes, and improvements.

I wish you the best.

Stef


On Thursday, May 22, 2003, at 05:18 PM, Brian Brown wrote:

> Let me weigh in from a little different perspective...
>
> The company that I work for is buying into Squeak lock, stock and 
> barrel. I did and incredible amount of research into 
> languages/platforms with regards to our commercial needs and Squeak 
> meets or exceeds our expectations and needs.
>
> We currently have 8+ commercial products and several more that have 
> been phased out or are in the development phase... all of the previous 
> development has been done in MS Visual Basic and MS Active Server 
> Pages. Those products were and are not meeting the needs of the 
> company on several levels, most notably:
>
> Code management and reuse/maintainability
> Platform support (read non-windows and even capabilities on PocketPC 
> platforms)
> Stability
> Multimedia functionality
> Community (with a brain that is)
>
> It has been pointed out that Squeak has some rough edges... I would 
> say no more so, even less so, than any commercial system I have used. 
> With commercial systems, you are limited to what the vendor has put 
> into their product and the community has no say in the direction of 
> that product, effectively limiting the audience and innovation in a 
> serious way. (Please note that I have never used commercial Smalltalk, 
> Squeak is my first and only foray into the Smalltalk world).
>
> (disclaimer: I am a huge Open source advocate and have successfully 
> used OS products in major commercial applications in 3 different 
> companies.)
>
> In terms of community support, this has got to be the best I've ever 
> seen, hands down. In terms of getting specific bits of Squeak 
> polished, or adding new functionality to Squeak, as has been stated by 
> Tim Blanchard and others, there is a Plethora of highly talented (and 
> I mean HIGHLY) designers and programmers that are willing to consult 
> regardless of the domain.
>
> We currently have one such person on retainer and have started talking 
> to another one about a specific project. So far we are ecstatic.
>
>
> .... in the end, we have taken a very calculated risk in starting to 
> move all of our development to Squeak, but I have less concern for our 
> success than at any time in the past :)
>
> ... and where else do you get to see Tim Rowledge's sig lines?
>
> Brian
>
>