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Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

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Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#431

Post by Jach »

jkaunisv1 wrote: post #412
HerraBRE wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something you didn't mention, which I suspect is a major factor in why promoting FOSS alternatives proves surprisingly difficult in education. I remember when I was in university students were acutely aware that tools like PhotoShop, Microsoft* and MATLAB were used in businesses. I doubt this has changed. Even if superior Free options had been available, many of them would still have opted for the "safe" proprietary…

I can't speak to Matlab/Octave but as for Photoshop, FOSS folks always say use GIMP. But the interface is just so terrible compared to PS and I think they underestimate how important that is. Maybe it's configurable but for example, simple things like alt-tabbing between GIMP and other programs was painful because it opened parts of its interface as separate windows, so you'd alt-tab to your browser, then back to GIM…

What's funny is Gimp used to be single-window, then for some reason they redesigned to multi-window crap, and now they're back to single window (at the cost of ctrl+s -- fine, whatever). Still many UI quirks for sure. I don't know how much it matters for non-trained users though, Photoshop confuses me too on the rare occasion I get to try using it. For professional artists, they're likely using more tools than just "Photoshop for everything", so it's not like they're incapable of learning new UIs even if they suck. (Edit: And generally these days I'd rather advocate for more diversity in tooling, regardless of closed/openness, just to avoid monoliths and monoculture.)

The GIMP-over-Photoshop argument should be because it does something Photoshop doesn't (very possible with its ecosystem of plugins/filters -- for example a "smart remove" plugin was around for quite some time before Adobe made their own and spent who knows how much in marketing/demos for it) or because the artist wants to save money.

Agree that people are goal oriented. OSS that's free-as-in-beer can help drive adoption on account of being free, but ultimately the best OSS succeeds because it's better than its competition in important ways. Pure clones are risky, I'm glad Gimp doesn't try too much to be a clone.

Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#432

Post by jrumbut »

igk wrote: post #346
Tepix wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure he's correct. Donations to charitable non-profits are tax deductible both in Germany and the US IIRC.

I thought so as well, but we were asked for sponsorship instead of donations again and again, not because they wanted more of a service but "because I need an invoice" It might be that the legal framework is there, but the process within companies is not. I'd be interested in someone correcting me if I misunderstood things

You know it's never something I've thought about before but if a group of students came to me looking to go to a trade show I would expect them to use the word sponsorship, whereas if a homeless shelter came looking to support their daily operations, I would expect that to be a donation.

I think the critical different is that the sponsorship is for a specific activity, but I'm not sure.

There's certainly tax structure in place for donations in the US, but perhaps there is also a custom regarding sponsorship.

Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#433

Post by cableshaft »

st3v3r wrote: post #384
edblarney wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There should be funding bodies for projects like this who can fund projects and also provide a semblance of orchestration. " A much better way than 'government funding' would be for users to just pay for it . It's called 'capitalism' it works very well. Oftentimes, it's difficult for the government and centralized bodies to know 'what to fund' and what not to - it's a hard thing, it can get political. Money goes ent…

Have you been on the internet for a while? You know that anything someone can get without paying for it, most people will go for it. Pirating video games, torrenting movies, music, ad blockers, etc. And honestly, this idea of perfect meritocracy, the idea that if you don't get funded, then your project was crap, has been disproven a long time ago. There was a kickstarter that raised insane amounts of money for someon…

I think Netflix and Steam have proven that convenience can be better than free for a lot of people (not everyone, some don't have the disposable income, and some would rather deal with inconveniences in order to get it free).

I pay Netflix a nominal fee each month and whenever I feel like it I can choose to watch between hundreds of shows (currently working through Penny Dreadful), without having to hunt down a torrent for it. Especially a torrent of good enough quality.

Same with Steam. Sure, I could try to find a game to download via torrent, but I know I can find it on Steam, often at a steep discount (or put it on my wishlist and wait until the inevitable one arrives and they notify me of it).

Additionally, I know it won't have any malware or viruses hidden in it, and will be the most up to date version (seriously, try finding torrents that are up to date for most things, it's almost impossible).

Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#434

Post by crestedtazo »

fsloth wrote: post #258
fnord123 wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strong disagree. There should be funding bodies for projects like this who can fund projects and also provide a semblance of orchestration. The Linux Foundation (with the Core Infrastructure Initiative) and the Cloud Native Compute Foundation are already working in the right direction, imo. There are other organizations that work through contracting work to develop free and open source software. Red Hat and Canonical…

>> Blockchains? >I'm scared to ask what you mean by this. To copy from another reply: "I meant it would be convenient if there was some platform to maintain the licence contract chain so that a dual licenced project could use a third party dual licensed library, and the license fees would be forwarded to all license owning parties in a transparent manner." I'm not claiming it would be a good idea. Just a thought.

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Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#435

Post by squar1sm »

mperham wrote: post #417
jordigh wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These two points are very important. I've wanted to make Octave a business, but I just never knew how to start. I tried to find people who would help us get started, but the only ones I could find wanted to either compromise Octave's freedom (e.g. sell non-free extensions) or wanted some kind of way of turning Octave into a giant billion-dollar business very quickly. I couldn't find anyone who could help us do someth…

(sidekiq dude here) I had no idea what I was doing. I found a local lawyer who incorporated me for $1000. He wrote the commercial license for my software for another $750. I had a friend who was a CPA and taught me how to keep books. I was terrified but literally every business is started this way. Need help? Walk outside your house and ask the five nearest businesses who they use for legal and accounting. Talk to a…

I'd also just like to call positive attention to the bravery and openness Mike has shown by publishing his revenue/business numbers (which maybe some would hold as precious private information). He's been very open in hopes of inspiring and giving back. It's not just the code that he's open sourced but a path and pattern. This is pretty special in the best use of the word.

Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#436

Post by GFK_of_xmaspast »

jhbadger wrote: post #61
sotojuan wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You said it yourself—Octave isn't trendy or cool.

The problem is I think Octave missed its window. 20 years ago when I was in grad school, everybody was using Matlab and a competitive open source version would have been a killer app. I looked into Octave at the time, but it was basically a toy at that point. I looked into it recently, and it really has come a long way, and even has an official GUI similar to Matlab's, but these days Matlab is kind of fading out and…

20 years ago when I was in grad school I did use octave to do my research, and it was 'mostly fine'. (Also I discovered that a couple of the matlab toolboxes I needed were just .m files and there was no technical reason that I couldn't just copy them into a local directory for octave to find; I consider this no worse than 'morally iffy' considering that we had a matlab site license)

Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#437

Post by mperham »

squar1sm wrote: post #435
mperham wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(sidekiq dude here) I had no idea what I was doing. I found a local lawyer who incorporated me for $1000. He wrote the commercial license for my software for another $750. I had a friend who was a CPA and taught me how to keep books. I was terrified but literally every business is started this way. Need help? Walk outside your house and ask the five nearest businesses who they use for legal and accounting. Talk to a…

I'd also just like to call positive attention to the bravery and openness Mike has shown by publishing his revenue/business numbers (which maybe some would hold as precious private information). He's been very open in hopes of inspiring and giving back. It's not just the code that he's open sourced but a path and pattern. This is pretty special in the best use of the word.

This is exactly why I disclosed my revenue: people won't know there's a successful path forward unless it's disclosed. I want more OSS developers to follow my lead and build a bright future for themselves based on their awesome software.

Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#438

Post by st3v3r »

edblarney wrote: post #399
st3v3r wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There's no need for a sales and marketing team for a very well established and entrenched product." So should I go tell Pepsi and Coke that they're wasting their money? Plus, while Octave is an established project, there are many projects being started each day. No project comes into being fully established. "He could make something very easily himself, 1-click to $X a month for some bit of software or service." Do…

"Pepsi and Coke" are multibillion dollar commodity consumer brands - and have absolutely nothing to do with this. "No project comes into being fully established" Octave is well established, so he doesn't have that problem. For those that are 'new' - it's extremely difficult for governments to decide how to allocate funding. There are 1000's of 'open source' ideas. It's very hard to tell which one's would work, and ha…

""Pepsi and Coke" are multibillion dollar commodity consumer brands - and have absolutely nothing to do with this."

Really? They're "established and entrenched products." I think they're a pretty good analogy here. Even if you are established and entrenched, you still have to advertise.

"Paying money to each other as a fair exchange of value is how most of the world works, and it works well."

Billions of people in poverty, and rising income inequality would say otherwise.

Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#439

Post by sctb »

crestedtazo wrote: post #434
fsloth wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Blockchains? >I'm scared to ask what you mean by this. To copy from another reply: "I meant it would be convenient if there was some platform to maintain the licence contract chain so that a dual licenced project could use a third party dual licensed library, and the license fees would be forwarded to all license owning parties in a transparent manner." I'm not claiming it would be a good idea. Just a thought.

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I apologize if I'm missing something here, but I don't see how this comment relates to the discussion. This account has also posted other unsubstantive comments, which is against the guidelines. We ban accounts that continue like this, so please comment civilly and substantively or not at all.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html

Re: Looking for Work After 25 Years of Octave

#440

Post by st3v3r »

edblarney wrote: post #401
st3v3r wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you been on the internet for a while? You know that anything someone can get without paying for it, most people will go for it. Pirating video games, torrenting movies, music, ad blockers, etc. And honestly, this idea of perfect meritocracy, the idea that if you don't get funded, then your project was crap, has been disproven a long time ago. There was a kickstarter that raised insane amounts of money for someon…

He has a valuable, entrenched product that is apparently used by a lot of people and provides value for them. If those people won't pay a small sum to use this - or can find some easy substitute, then that could be an indication that this open-source project simply isn't that valuable. If there is no easy substitute, and he is creating consistent value, he should be able to get some kind of revenue for something, pos…

Your post once again goes to the extremely flawed and inaccurate "If people aren't going to pay, then your thing is not good" thought, which has been proven false time and time again.
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