[Info-vax] OpenVMS Hobbyist Notification

[Phillip Helbig undress to reply]

In article <r46la6$16rt$1 at gioia.aioe.org>, =?UTF-8?Q?Arne_Vajh=c3=b8j?=
<arne at vajhoej.dk> writes: 

> It sort of makes sense not to launch a VSI hobbyist program while
> the HPE hobbyist program still existed.
> 
> Now that the the HPE hobbyist program has been officially
> EOL'ed then VSI got the ball and we will see how they want
> to play it.
> 
> But I would give them a few months before concluding anything.

OK, good point.

> That said then the business justification for a hobbyist
> program may be a bit tricky.

While there might be tangible benefits (early adopters who can test, 
etc.), the main benefit is an expression of goodwill to the community.

> Most VMS hobbyists are just that true hobbyists aka retired or
> close to retire VMS people that run VMS for fun.

Right.

> If VMS hobbyists were busy porting open source to VMS or
> young IT enthusiasts wanting to learn about a new OS before
> they hit the job market etc. then the benefit would be
> more obvious.

Chicken and egg, but in this case, the egg (the hobbyist programme) has 
to be in place before VSI can have a chicken (open-source porters, 
etc.).

In a few months, I'll have more time than I do now.  I've used LaTeX 
for a long time.  It was written by a DEC employee.  Many later 
developers used VMS.  But a modern distribution won't build out of the 
box on VMS.  I'd certainly be willing to donate a substantial amount of 
time to getting it up and running on VMS on x86 (Alpha probably isn't 
worth the effort; older versions are fine for many things), but that 
would mean that license costs to me would have to be reasonable.