Re: Little activity ?

Matt,

I would be interested in helping financially on this. I can't pay a guy's
whole salary or anything, but can spare some of my home shop profits.
In the past, I had offered stepper motors for Linux CAD/CAM and got no
response (linux wise that is- I got response from a few Windows
programmers).
I also believe in releasing something that is of use to people, rather than
putting up web sites that describe the theory of some lofty, unknown
project, that never gets done- like the guys at fpa. Let's start simple,
with useable routines- that don't make the user jump through hoops to
install and go from there. Porting Jon's routines to Tcl/tk would probably
be a first step- since EMC now has a Tcl/tk GUI version. Ron, what do you
think?
Maybe the guys at the www.fpa.engineers site could be woken up and
redirected too. Or maybe we should talk the GCAD people and get a joint
effort going. I know that there are people out there doing something
similar to what we want, but maybe need some actual customers' prodding to
get the job done.

Thanks,
Dan Falck


At 02:22 AM 10/15/1999 , you wrote:

>From: "Matt Shaver" <mshaver@...>
>

>Over the years I have bought a lot of software and most of it has been a
>disappointment. I don't mind paying for software. It's just that there's
>little to no actual support to be had. If you find a bug, or need another
>feature you are wasting your time if you call the manufacturer.
>I would be really interested in finding a way to pool the financial resources
>of a group of people who all wanted a certain software application written
>(CAM software for example). We could then hammer out a spec and hire some
>programmers to make it a reality. Once its basic functions work (that is, it
>has enough function to be useful and not some alpha stage curiosity) and it's
>RELIABLE we release it, with full source, under a loose license like the GPL.
>You might ask, "Why give away the store?". The answer is that once you get a
>project like this going it tends to become self perpetuating. My hope is that
>other people will use the basic application as a platform to which they add
>new features they need. Under the GPL these improvements get plowed back into
>the publicly available version and the application grows. The trick is to
>gain the necessary momentum and burst onto the scene with something good
>enough to attract attention. I believe that contrary to the "release early,
>release often" philosophy of some open source advocates that you need to
>bring something substantial to the table early on. A good example of what not
>to do is:
>
>http://www.fpa-engineers.com/OD/
>
>I'm sure these guys mean well, but I think they'll have a tough time
>attracting the interest of developers without at least SOMETHING to build
>from.
>
>What we could do is what Microsoft does. They write some of their own stuff,
>but to save time they also buy whole companies to acquire technologies they
>need rather than reinventing the wheel (they also do this to eliminate
>competition, but that is another story).
>
>WARNING - THE FOLLOWING IS ENTIRELY HYPOTHETICAL!!!
>
>Ron Ginger has written a really nice little CNC/CAM program (I mean it really
>is nice, that's not the hypothetical part). It's not completely finished, but
>there's a lot there including some really nice graphical toolpath displays
>and the ability to generate CNC code for a MillPower system and perhaps G
>codes without much more work. He has written a few posts describing his
>efforts and soliciting advice on what direction to take in his development.
>He has indicated that he might turn it into a commercial product when it
>achieves its final form, but the full scope of the program's functionality

>hasn't yet been specified (that's the nature of the advice I believe he was
>seeking).
>Suppose we could come up with enough incentive (probably in the form of
>money) to compensate the author for his work so far, and also to continue the
>development enough to get the program "up on its feet" in a form that's
>useful to those who provide the incentive. From my own standpoint there are a
>few drawbacks to this program, but they are probably not insurmountable.
>First, due to my interest in the EMC software, I'm not really concerned with
>the CNC part of the program except to the extent that algorithms or
>techniques in the code could be folded into the EMC code in order to improve
>it. Second, it needs to be translated to a multiplatform environment,
>probably Tcl/Tk (not Java, been there, done that, too slow). This would allow
>it to be combined with Dave's Tcl/Tk gui for the EMC at:
>
>http://users.nni.com/daveland/metal.htm
>
>and also the Tcl/Tk stuff Fred Proctor's been working on lately. This would
>give the EMC the "conversational programming" feature it needs as well as
>allow folks to program offline on Linux or Windows if they prefer to sit in
>the office. It might also be possible to pull in other resources such as the
>G code generating routines from Jon Elson, and code from the GnuCAD project.
>I don't know enough about software to be able to judge whether merging these
>projects and converting to Tcl/Tk is more or less economical than starting
>from scratch, but I think you can get an idea of what I have in mind. I know
>there are huge holes in what I've proposed, such as how to coordinate the
>efforts of multiple developers whose locations aren't the same, or who gets
>to approve of the spec, etc. I present this as an example of how a worthwhile
>goal might be attained. Well, it's 3:15am and I have veered WAY off the topic
>of "Little Activity" so I'll stop here.
>
>Thanks,
>
>Matt
>
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