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Blender Is Free Software

code.blender.org

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Re: Blender Is Free Software

#281

Post by pessimizer »

chrisseaton wrote: post #11
Jonnax wrote: post #4

Can someone provide some context for this post? Are there calls to change Blender's license? Are add-on developers violating GPL? The post mentions that a bridge between open source and proprietary needs to be open source but the add-on itself doesn't? Is it just a "how dare you sell products closed source products on top of blender?" The business model of providing support is all well and good but it's just one. If…

If you post a long statement like this article and the first response from people is "I don't know what they're talking about or referencing" then you know you've written it very badly.

Or for people who are familiar with your product and industry, and not a general audience.

Re: Blender Is Free Software

#282

Post by minieggs »

herbstein wrote: post #54
neilv wrote: post #18

I try to say libre software rather than Free Software , and I wish the FSF would back the libre term fully. When RMS is giving a speech, he has an opportunity to expound on what's now wordplay about "free software", to a captive audience that's perhaps already receptive or prepared to listen. But low-level grassroots advocacy opportunities often happen in contexts in which people are talking for some other purpose, a…

I'm a soon-to-be third year CS student. If I started to use the term "libre software" I'd be ridiculed to hell and back. I think you overestimate the receptiveness of developers.

Same here. I use libre software (perhaps with a tinge of irony). I don’t mind having a laugh about it every now and again. RMS himself is a pretty ridiculous figure.

Re: Blender Is Free Software

#283

Post by BubRoss »

chii wrote: post #219
micmil wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bullshit. This is like saying someone that trained in Java will struggle learning Python, or someone that learned with C will have a hard time picking up Rust. With a few exceptions (Houdini probably being the prime example) all 3d graphics tools work in the same fashion. The concepts and techniques are universal, the only difference is the implementation. If you have even a modicum of experience with one thing, you…

> The concepts and techniques are universal, the only difference is the implementation. only someone who hasn't really used the tool in anger and mastered it would claim this. I can't even switch to eclipse from intellij and not have a huge productivity hit for several months. and that's just typing code! A real 3D modeller would have so much muscle memory for their modelling app of choice it't not funny.

Companies don't really put too much emphasis on tools that someone has used when hiring. It's nice if they have expertise in some areas but mostly people are hired for the quality of their work and they will learn new software depending on what the company uses.

Re: Blender Is Free Software

#284

Post by pbhjpbhj »

pessimizer wrote: post #132
neilv wrote: post #18

I try to say libre software rather than Free Software , and I wish the FSF would back the libre term fully. When RMS is giving a speech, he has an opportunity to expound on what's now wordplay about "free software", to a captive audience that's perhaps already receptive or prepared to listen. But low-level grassroots advocacy opportunities often happen in contexts in which people are talking for some other purpose, a…

"Libre" is not an easy word for Anglophones to say, because the intense ambiguities of English orthography give you a few tentative choices of how it might sound (including having to attempt a French "r") and hints that they may all be wrong. It's easier to pronounce if you're a romance speaker, but still not consistent, again due to the location of that "r." "Free" is pretty easy to say for everyone, and recognizabl…

Does it matter if you pronounce it wrong - half the words I use for internet things I'd never heard anyone say until I'd used them for a long time.

"my SQL" vs "my-sequel" (I use the former), NginX I still pronounce as "en-jinx", similarly GIF.

If people call it "lib-ruh" software it doesn't really matter as long as the meaning is conveyed.

Re: Blender Is Free Software

#285

Post by _mikel_ »

craigsmansion wrote: post #65

It's nice a high profile project such as Blender speaks about freedom to push back against the "source available" movement. I've always wondered why niche specific software such as Blender doesn't have a ton of industry backing. Any medium sized graphics shop could have a full developer on the payroll for a fraction of the repeated licensing costs of proprietary solutions, that is, someone who works full time on Blen…

The big issue with blender compared to some of the other options on the market is the cluttered ui- it doesn't look friendly to artists/tech artists and the controls are very unintuitive for someone who uses other 3d softwares.

I'm curious as to why the community working on it hasn't taken steps to change this- the software is equally if not more functional than alternatives like Maya and making it a bit more familiar to industry professionals could go a long way

Re: Blender Is Free Software

#286

Post by voltagex_ »

swerner wrote: post #264
voltagex_ wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you able to talk about anything you did there? I only get to work on open source in my spare time (and nothing as complex as Blender). What did a normal day look like for you?

Our repository is public. You can look at every single commit we did: https://github.com/tangent-animation/blender278/commits/mast... "Normal days" changed during the course of the project. In the beginning, it was work on new features for months if necessary, towards the end it were overnight patches for "frame x in shot y looks wrong/crashes/takes forever".

Thank you!

Re: Blender Is Free Software

#287

Post by voltagex_ »

diggan wrote: post #186
voltagex_ wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you able to talk about anything you did there? I only get to work on open source in my spare time (and nothing as complex as Blender). What did a normal day look like for you?

BlenderConf 2018 had a talk from the co-founder of Tangent (Jeff Bell) about how Blender was used for Next Gen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZn3kCsw5D8

Thank you, too.

Re: Blender Is Free Software

#288

Post by pbhjpbhj »

Animats wrote: post #198
Causality1 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Back when I was trying to learn Blender as a hobby I had no issue finding tutorials, but they were for a variety of Blender versions. For most programs that would be a non-issue but Blender seemed to radically alter its UI with every update. Buttons were moved to different submenus, entire menu categories were added or dissolved, and keyboard shortcuts would either not work or do something different than descri…

Yes. The big question in Blender is usually "where did (function) go?" In 2.8, the mouse buttons have different meaning. Still, the UI has gone from appallingly bad a decade ago to sort of OK in 2.79. Haven't tried 2.8 yet; it's still in beta.

This is a general issue for software I find - where is function X [now] (when I know function X exists).

For settings, eg on phones, MS Windows, Linux, this used to be a big problem to and it has been solved by simply including a settings search.

Is it time apps had a "search" on the application menu that would then open the relevant dialog, or perhaps optionally allow the finding of the menu item (eg open the menu, open the sub-menu, highlight the menu item that opens the dialog, pause, open the dialog)?

I had the same issue earlier, where is the Voice settings in Steam -- it strikes me if I can type "voice" in a function-search on the main menu that would be better than trawling for help info online.

Re: Blender Is Free Software

#289

Post by AnthonyMouse »

phkahler wrote: post #279
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However, most medium sized graphics shops are probably concerned that they'd effectively be subsidising their competitors' production costs, since the 'exclusive' returns to the shop employing the developer are likely minimal compared to any other user of the feature they develop. What causes most usage of big proprietary software is that the software has 10,000 features and every customer only needs five of them,…

Nobody wants to wait for a developer to implement the things they want. If they have work to do, they need a solution NOW. Pick what's available and pay what it costs. For commercial software that's some $$$ and for Free software that's $0.00. Then once the purchase has been made, the question of paying someone to work on it is a separate issue. Most rational people would say "why would I do that?" Comparing paying a…

> Nobody wants to wait for a developer to implement the things they want.

And yet they still want them, and things take non-zero time to implement regardless of who is doing it. It's not as if proprietary software appears from whole cloth in zero time containing every feature requested by every customer.

> If they have work to do, they need a solution NOW.

If they have work to do they can do it the same way they did it last week. But when the question comes whether to upgrade to the new version of the proprietary software, you should ask whether it makes more sense to pay the money to do that this year, or stay on the existing version for a year while you use the money that you would have spent and instead get the free software equivalent into a state that it satisfies your needs, then never have to pay for the proprietary software again.

> Then once the purchase has been made, the question of paying someone to work on it is a separate issue. Most rational people would say "why would I do that?"

Because you have twenty or more full-time people using it and if you can make them each even a single digit percentage more efficient on a permanent basis, it becomes highly profitable to hire the software developer that allows that to happen.

> Comparing paying a FLOSS developer to paying for commercial software doesn't make sense. Companies don't see themselves as funding development either way.

What did they think the proprietary software license money was funding?

Re: Blender Is Free Software

#290

Post by weberc2 »

phkahler wrote: post #103
weberc2 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would think the obvious way a corporation could contribute would be financially.

But it's voluntary. When a company (or most individuals) get the product for free, there is little incentive to pay anything. I think the notion that people (and companies) pay for proprietary software because there is support or some other reasons are complete BS. They pay for software because they have to in order to use it. It's just a cost of doing business. As free software has become viable (high quality) in so…

We were discussing “hire a developer to contribute” vs “financial contribution”. Of course it’s voluntary and the incentive is low, but that’s off topic.
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