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RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

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Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#21

Post by halestock »

rdtsc wrote: post #16

It seems new users and people who saw the ease of querying, distribution, good docs, solid architecture jumped on board. Lots of HN articles were written. The technology is really solid. Come to think of it, don't recall seeing a single negative RocksDB article on HN, ever. However databases are hard and they are a bit like operating systems. They are so important that people expect them to have a long track record o…

Interesting that you make the comparison to operating systems, since Linux is open and completely free and doesn't have a big company behind it. (Granted, I think the big difference is that Linux doesn't have as many competitors as exist for DBs today.)

Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#22

Post by gamesbrainiac »

the_common_man wrote: post #19

Open Source is really just a check mark in a list of things required for developer tools these days. It doesn't sell a product by itself. What people pay for these days in primarily service and not the software. If you want to sell software, the only place left is the enterprise. Enterprise sales is really about networking and connecting and not whether a product is technically good. This is also why I am worried abo…

I think service is crucial. Although there are plenty of strong open source projects out there, that have large communities, they really aren't businesses. I mean, you don't see the PSF trying to sell you some proprietary stuff.

Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#23

Post by gamesbrainiac »

anindha wrote: post #8

Other successful companies have used this business model. Mobile is the most common use case for a real-time DB. They didn't provide good iOS and Android integration. Technically Rethink is superior to Firebase, but Firebase is more successful.

I believe the thinking was that rethinkdb would always sit behind an API, and if you think about it, its not a bad assumption.

Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#24

Post by alexbanks »

thesmallestcat wrote: post #9
paulsutter wrote: post #4

To understand what happened to RethinkDB, you want to contrast it with MongoDB. RethinkDB is amazing software and a real breakthrough. And the audience of deep thinking people who can really leverage the event model is ... limited. Today. MongoDB is no breakthrough, but there are legions of people who just want to plug something together with PHP or Node. Given what they're doing, it works fine. I sincerely hope Reth…

For those not "in the know," what capability is that? Everything I hear implies a focus on ease of use: Easy replication/distribution, JS API, single number type (float64), usefulness when teaching novices, etc.

RethinkDB's niche is allowing a service to listen for changes to a dataset. As in, your Node application could listen for published events by Rethink, rather than your Node application long-polling the dataset for changes. "Real Time" data analytics can then be performed.

Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#25

Post by williamstein »

the_common_man wrote: post #19

Open Source is really just a check mark in a list of things required for developer tools these days. It doesn't sell a product by itself. What people pay for these days in primarily service and not the software. If you want to sell software, the only place left is the enterprise. Enterprise sales is really about networking and connecting and not whether a product is technically good. This is also why I am worried abo…

I also very much wonder what CoreOS's business model is.

Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#26

Post by api »

alexbanks wrote: post #24
thesmallestcat wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For those not "in the know," what capability is that? Everything I hear implies a focus on ease of use: Easy replication/distribution, JS API, single number type (float64), usefulness when teaching novices, etc.

RethinkDB's niche is allowing a service to listen for changes to a dataset. As in, your Node application could listen for published events by Rethink, rather than your Node application long-polling the dataset for changes. "Real Time" data analytics can then be performed.

Its other niche is easy to deploy replication and sharding that actually works, actually scales, and does not lose data.

Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#27

Post by the_common_man »

williamstein wrote: post #25
the_common_man wrote: post #19

Open Source is really just a check mark in a list of things required for developer tools these days. It doesn't sell a product by itself. What people pay for these days in primarily service and not the software. If you want to sell software, the only place left is the enterprise. Enterprise sales is really about networking and connecting and not whether a product is technically good. This is also why I am worried abo…

I also very much wonder what CoreOS's business model is.

Same goes for docker. Many monetization options for docker (like the registry) have been duplicated by Google and AWS in their cloud centers. The good news is docker is in bed with Microsoft now which has very deep pockets.

Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#28

Post by williamstein »

nchelluri wrote: post #18

I wonder what will happen to products like SageMathCloud using RethinkDB now that the company is gone away. Will support contracts end? Will people run into new problems and be stuck without help when this happens? Just curious to see what happens.

The answer to "Will support contracts end?" is "Yes". The email they sent me says "Unfortunately the shutdown of the company is abrupt. We won't be able to service your contract but we'll try to provide a list of contractors who might be able to help support you. We're also working hard to find a continuity plan, and to rally the community around the open-source project. We don't know for sure how active RethinkDB development will be going forward, so you should make appropriate preparations."

> I wonder what will happen to products like SageMathCloud using RethinkDB now that the company is gone away.

Unlike my first year of using RethinkDB, during the last six months, my RethinkDB cluster has been rock solid stable and I have NOT hit a single noticeable issue. It seems like the last "the devil is in the details" bugs got ironed out a few months ago. So fortunately there is no pressing need to make a decision. My plan is to do what I can to support the open source project, and if it takes up, stick with RethinkDB longterm. If the open source project does not take off within a year, I will probably spend about 2-3 months fulltime (my estimate) to rewrite SMC to use Postgresql and RabbitMQ. Anyway, that's my plan. After this experience, I personally can't imagine rebuilding everything on top of a database that is substantially less proven than Postgresql.

Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#29

Post by thesmallestcat »

api wrote: post #26
alexbanks wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

RethinkDB's niche is allowing a service to listen for changes to a dataset. As in, your Node application could listen for published events by Rethink, rather than your Node application long-polling the dataset for changes. "Real Time" data analytics can then be performed.

Its other niche is easy to deploy replication and sharding that actually works , actually scales , and does not lose data.

Pretty much anybody can appreciate that, right? Not just the "deep thinking people"?

Re: RethinkDB, SageMath, Andreessen-Horowitz, Basecamp and Open Source Software

#30

Post by rdtsc »

halestock wrote: post #21
rdtsc wrote: post #16

It seems new users and people who saw the ease of querying, distribution, good docs, solid architecture jumped on board. Lots of HN articles were written. The technology is really solid. Come to think of it, don't recall seeing a single negative RocksDB article on HN, ever. However databases are hard and they are a bit like operating systems. They are so important that people expect them to have a long track record o…

Interesting that you make the comparison to operating systems, since Linux is open and completely free and doesn't have a big company behind it. (Granted, I think the big difference is that Linux doesn't have as many competitors as exist for DBs today.)

It is an "or" thing. It can be completely free and open like PostgreSQL or it should have Oracle behind it.

OSes are a bit like that. Either a multi-billion dollar company like Apple or Microsoft behind it or it is completely open.

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