Re: [boost] [simd] Hardware support

Subject: Re: [boost] [simd] Hardware support
From: Andrey Semashev (andrey.semashev_at_[hidden])
Date: 2017-04-08 14:14:51

On 04/08/17 16:55, Niall Douglas via Boost wrote:
>>> Down the line, I hope to have some of my Boost libraries come with an
>>> open source edition with acceptable performance and guarantees, and
>>> commercial editions with much superior performance and guarantees. I
>>> think this would be a healthy development for Boost, if not pushed into
>>> silliness.
>>
>> While I respect the will to commercialize people's work, I wouldn't want
>> Boost to become an advertisement platform. Authors coming with their
>> libraries to Boost should be committed to provide a fair and proper
>> support of their libraries (i.e. those versions of their libraries that
>> entered Boost). That includes adding features to their libraries that
>> have demand in the community and are also present in commercial versions
>> of their libraries.
>>
>> When that is not the case, I would rather prefer such libraries not be
>> accepted into Boost. They can still be opensource and offered as a trial
>> to the full product, but they should not be associated with Boost, IMO.
>
> I know what you mean.
>
> But consider this. Imagine I make a toy key-value store and hand it over
> to Boost. It works well enough for most people. I then invest twelve
> months full time work into a serious key-value store which has been
> exhaustively tested in many major storage designs for correctness,
> costing me at least $150,000 to develop.
>
> I think it's highly unreasonable to expect that serious key-value store,
> even if 100% API compatible but just faster and better in every way to
> the toy store, to be released as open source until the cost of
> developing it is recouped from commercial licences.
>
> After all, the toy edition is good enough. It works. It just will come
> with no guarantees that it won't eat your data, and it will probably be
> quite slow.

I can understand if you want to keep certain features in the 
closed-source version to return the costs and make profit. But that 
shouldn't impede the Boost version from evolving. If that feature has 
high demand, I would expect it to eventually appear in the open-source 
version. If soneone offers a patch implementing that feature, I would 
expect you to give a fair consideration of it, even if it makes things 
differently to your closed-source code. What I wouldn't expect or want 
to see is the author referring the community to the commercial version 
instead.

I'd like to make myself clear. I'm absolutely not against people making 
money on the software they write. But at the same time, if those people 
come to Boost I think they should be aware and committed to Boost and 
open-source community. If there is a chance of a conflict between making 
profit and commitment to opensource, I'd rather them avoid that conflict 
by not coming to Boost in the first place.