LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: Alan Kennington <akenning@dog.topology.org>
  To  : newton@atdot.dotat.org
  Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 13:31:29 +0930

Re: Software rights

Mark,

...and that leaves open the question still of how to make money.

Some people on the linuxsa list know that I publish some of
my entrepreneurial ideas (the less controversial ones) 
on my web site. Apart from the alarm network ideas which have
_some_ linux involvement, I also have a very linux-oriented one
at

http://www.topology.org/ideas/simsoft.html

I wanted to do an open source project (and did in fact do it, but
could not get a living out of it) 10 years ago, when linux did
not exist and GNU was still new.
And I simply had no way of getting the project off the ground.
Now many similar systems have arisen in the meantime.
E.g. opnet (astronomically priced) and various
student-written projects.

I'd like to assert that the relation of linux to linux applications
is the same as the relation of a simulation environment to
simulation packages.

linux	-->	linux applications
sim env -->	simulation packages

So if the linux model can be made to work,
why is there no big open source or free software project to
do a simulation environemnt for linux?

This would be an interesting test case --
see if a money-making model can be dreamed up for
developing a free linux-oriented simulation environment,
in time for the next linuxSA meeting!

If anyone can do that, I will believe that open and/or free software
development is viable. Otherwise I will have to believe
that free/open software will eternally be the product of
students and hobbyists.

Cheers,
Alan Kennington.

PS. Several attempts at this project are listed in
http://www.topology.org/sim.html
but none of them is well-enough funded to get serious
attention from the big-money users.

-- 
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