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Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

ziglang.org

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Re: Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

#11

Post by chriseidhof »

pjmlp wrote: post #5
nindalf wrote: post #3

Probably the strangest part of this is a person trying to sell a paid version of a compiler. Did that person miss the boat by 30 years? All mainstream programming languages today are free and open source. Programming languages are platforms that thrive only when they're widely adopted. The community that adopts it builds the libraries and ecosystem necessary for it to be viable. You can't possibly build a new platfor…

There are plenty of commercial compilers available. Embedded platforms, Apple (100€£$/year), Windows, PGI/CUDA, IBM/xlc,game consoles,....

Apple's Xcode is a free download, the Swift compiler is open source. However, to become an "official" developer on the Apple platforms and publish apps you do need a paid developer account.

Re: Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

#12

Post by brian_herman__ »

nindalf wrote: post #3

Probably the strangest part of this is a person trying to sell a paid version of a compiler. Did that person miss the boat by 30 years? All mainstream programming languages today are free and open source. Programming languages are platforms that thrive only when they're widely adopted. The community that adopts it builds the libraries and ecosystem necessary for it to be viable. You can't possibly build a new platfor…

Yeah, even Microsoft has Visual Studio Community Edition which is Free! https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/vs/community/

Re: Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

#14

Post by pjmlp »

chriseidhof wrote: post #11
pjmlp wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are plenty of commercial compilers available. Embedded platforms, Apple (100€£$/year), Windows, PGI/CUDA, IBM/xlc,game consoles,....

Apple's Xcode is a free download, the Swift compiler is open source. However, to become an "official" developer on the Apple platforms and publish apps you do need a paid developer account.

Hence commercial.

Re: Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

#15

Post by pjmlp »

brian_herman__ wrote: post #12
nindalf wrote: post #3

Probably the strangest part of this is a person trying to sell a paid version of a compiler. Did that person miss the boat by 30 years? All mainstream programming languages today are free and open source. Programming languages are platforms that thrive only when they're widely adopted. The community that adopts it builds the libraries and ecosystem necessary for it to be viable. You can't possibly build a new platfor…

Yeah, even Microsoft has Visual Studio Community Edition which is Free! https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/vs/community/

"If you are not an enterprise (defined below), then up to 5 of your individual users can use visual studio community concurrently to develop and test your applications.

An “enterprise” is any organization and its affiliates who collectively have either (a) more than 250 PCs or users or (b) one million U.S. dollars (or the equivalent in other currencies) in annual revenues, and “affiliates” means those entities that control (via majority ownership), are controlled by, or are under common control with an organization."

Re: Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

#16

Post by CyberRabbi »

Dork1234 wrote: post #6
CyberRabbi wrote: post #2

This is why you always use GPL

Re branding a MIT license software and selling a commercial version is a good thing if done correctly. Clearly Zen is not providing any added value. The key takeaway from this is you don't sign contracts with overly aggressive business executives. I also think Non-competes should be almost completely banned for most employees.

The key takeaway for me is that a third party is able to use thousands of manhours of someone else’s labor as a basis for their closed source product without having to share their enhancements or pay a dime.

If zig were licensed GPL, the zig foundation would be able to sell permissive licenses to companies that don’t want to share source as a way to fundraise.

Re: Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

#17

Post by bumblebritches5 »

pjmlp wrote: post #5
nindalf wrote: post #3

Probably the strangest part of this is a person trying to sell a paid version of a compiler. Did that person miss the boat by 30 years? All mainstream programming languages today are free and open source. Programming languages are platforms that thrive only when they're widely adopted. The community that adopts it builds the libraries and ecosystem necessary for it to be viable. You can't possibly build a new platfor…

There are plenty of commercial compilers available. Embedded platforms, Apple (100€£$/year), Windows, PGI/CUDA, IBM/xlc,game consoles,....

what?

Xcode is free lmao.

Even a certificate you can get for free.

Disturting on the Mac/iOS App Store is the only thing that costs $100 a year (and btw it's dollars, so fix your sign)

Re: Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

#18

Post by cultus »

pjmlp wrote: post #14
chriseidhof wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's Xcode is a free download, the Swift compiler is open source. However, to become an "official" developer on the Apple platforms and publish apps you do need a paid developer account.

Hence commercial.

It makes sense for Apple though, because what the devs are really paying for is access to Apple's closed-source ecosystem, not the tooling itself. This company has no such market power; why would anyone want to pay for Zen, when it has no established ecosystem or audience?

Re: Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

#19

Post by bumblebritches5 »

chriseidhof wrote: post #11
pjmlp wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are plenty of commercial compilers available. Embedded platforms, Apple (100€£$/year), Windows, PGI/CUDA, IBM/xlc,game consoles,....

Apple's Xcode is a free download, the Swift compiler is open source. However, to become an "official" developer on the Apple platforms and publish apps you do need a paid developer account.

Xcode dev here, I have a certificate with a free account.

You only need to pay for it if you distribute your app on the app store.

Re: Statement Regarding the Zen Programming Language

#20

Post by tl »

CyberRabbi wrote: post #2

This is why you always use GPL

Taking the story at face value: Zen lied to customers and the community, hired a developer away from Zig, and that developer cannot work on Zig now due to an NDA.

GPL violations are not unknown. Would Zen have really cared about breaking the license? Would legal mechanisms work fast enough to limit damage?

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