[Info-vax] The VSI Hobbyist program is Live!

[Dave Froble]

On 7/29/2020 7:19 AM, johnwallace4 at yahoo.co.uk wrote:
> On Wednesday, 29 July 2020 02:05:40 UTC+1, David Goodwin  wrote:
>> On Wednesday, July 29, 2020 at 11:35:59 AM UTC+12, Chris wrote:
>>> On 07/28/20 23:23, David Goodwin wrote:
>>>
>>>> Yeah, this is more just reducing friction. Why bother potential users with extra work when its not actually required? Why make users renew their licenses every year? Is there actually a good business reason for doing this or is it simply being done because that's what DEC chose to do 20+ years ago.
>>>>
>>>> Given its being given away for free why not just bake a non-expiring non-commercial license into the ISO and just have a link to download the ISO on the website? Its a better experience for all involved.
>>>
>>> Have no plans to use vms in the near future, but am grateful that VSI
>>> have done this and the registration requirement is not an issue. Had
>>> to do that for years to get copy of Solaris. Let's the vendor keep
>>> track of how many are interested and provides a marketing point for
>>> for possible follow up. It's a business, right ?.
>>>
>>> Still, some always moan because it's not exactly what they wanted,
>>> free or not, but just seems a bit petulant and childish to me...
>>
>> I'm not arguing from a "this isn't exactly what I wanted" perspective. I'm fine with filling out the form and installing PAKs and the current registration process is an improvement over the old one.
>>
>> No, I'm arguing from a "competing with Linux is really really hard so lets make the new user process as painless as possible" perspective. And at least under the OpenVMS releases I've used entering license PAKs on a new install was anything but painless. Once you have the system up and running renewing the licenses wasn't so bad provided you did it before the previous ones expired but its still a chunk of work that I've never seen a good reason for.
>
> Your comparisons seem flawed on various grounds.
>
> VMS isn't competing with Joe Random Linux.
>
> Is it competing with Red Hat? Is actual RHEL downloadable for free? Not
> as such, as far as I know. Rebranded/debranded variants, maybe. That may
> or may not change following RedHat's takeover by IBM.
>
> Is it competing with Suse Linux? Suse Linux Enterprise Server (SLES)
> requires registration and an activation code, even for a "free trial".
> Until recently OpenSuse (freely downloadable, no registration) and SLES
> weren't guaranteed to be derived from a common codebase. Now they are.
>
> Anyone here remember the joys of FlexLM?
>

I think David Goodwin has advanced some good ideas.  Some defend VMS as 
not being as "easy" as Linux.  That is the wrong approach.  Perhaps 
desire VMS to be "better" and "easier" than Linux.

Regardless, I see the lack of tracking of VMS users by DEC as a flaw.  I 
do support VSI gathering information on anyone showing interest in VMS. 
For one thing, they know who, and can easily do so, to contact should 
important patches be required.  It can also be a marketing tool.

VMS itself perhaps should look for, and download patches and 
information.  I won't go so far as to advocate automatically applying 
any such patches.  Maybe optional.

-- 
David Froble                       Tel: 724-529-0450
Dave Froble Enterprises, Inc.      E-Mail: davef at tsoft-inc.com
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