Commercial Smalltalks deserve our support too (Was: www.squeak.org finally updated)

Franz Josef Konrad fjk at sava-systeme.de
Mon Jul 4 14:58:26 UTC 2005


David T. Lewis schrieb:
> On Mon, Jul 04, 2005 at 08:50:32AM +0200, Franz Josef Konrad wrote:
> 
>>- I was impressed what Squeak can deliver *today* for some of my 
>>business needs. But there is no central entry point (or I haven’t found) 
>>where I could find all the answers to my questions on the web. Probably 
>>somebody else would have give up searching soon (or immediately).
> 
> 
> Regardless of one's point of view regarding Squeak for commercial
> purposes, I think it's a good thing to support the commercial
> Smalltalks. 
100% agree.

For example, a Seaside business application can be
> delivered on either VisualWorks or Squeak. It takes nothing away
> from Squeak at all if you recommend VisualWorks for a project like
> this, and you can of course refer to the very professional-looking
> Cincom web site.
> 
> In my opinion it would be very bad for Squeak to be seen as a
> competitor to the commercial systems, and very good for Squeak if
> the commercial systems grow in credibility thanks to the positive
> contributions of the Squeak community.
Isn't this a hen egg problem? What's easier to achieve? Growing Squeak 
or growing the commercial Smalltalk systems first?
> 
> Dave

I don't see Squeak as a competitor to the commercial Smalltalk systems. 
I want to see low barriers for people to use Smalltalk doing business. 
And with a free product like Squeak you have an attractive choice.

If it is possible to grow the the number of people who use Squeak it 
will IMO automatically raise the number of people who will use a 
commercial Smalltalk systems. If you believe this isn't possible then of 
course you will have a cannibalism effect that Squeak takes market share 
from the commercial systems. But perhaps I'm too optimistic?!

Dave, so would you argue not to use Squeak for business projects? Using 
a commercial Smalltalk system instead?

regadrs,
Franz Josef





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