Is Cincom slowly killing Visual Smalltalk Enterprice

Dear All

If you have forgotten about Visual Smalltalk (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_Smalltalk_Enterprise), it is this really cool Smalltalk dialect that enables users to build native Windows applications. Visual Smalltalk is one of the original Smalltalk dialects, and was made by Digitalk. In 1995 active development stopped when the merger between ParcPlace and Digitalk happened. VSE has since been in the hands of ParcPlace-Digitalk, then ObjectShare, and  since 1999 Cincom.

The state of affair of Visual Smalltalk Enterprise (VSE) is not optimal. The VSE community has make several attempts in the past to clear this up. These attempts has all been made quietly and discrete. When I left ESUG last year I was confident that there was a future for open-sourcing VSE. Unfortunately I have since learned that Cincom are not willing to change anything, and are regarding VSE as a cash cow.

The current status is:

Cincom stopped all work on the VSE platform more than a decade ago

Cincom continues to collect support fees for VSE

Cincom has raised the price for VSE licenses

Cincom only fixes bug on a case-by-case matter. Bugs fixed for one customer is not made available to other customers.

Cincom charges huge money for fixing bugs. They charge by the hour, and since they don't have the knowledge one can expect 50-100 hours for trivial fixes

Cincom does not hold the IP for VSE - Seagull Software does

Cincom has exclusive rights for selling and supporting VSE

Seagull Software has no problem selling/donating the IP

Cincom has refused to sell/donate their rights

Due to the above, VSE users are jumping through hoops to actually use the product on newer operating systems. To make the matters worse, every time anyone makes a bug fix, we all fear that Cincom will drop its lawyer muscle on us.

I believe that the time has come to stop being discrete and speak up in public. For VSE to have a future we need to act now.

I would love for Cincom to comment on these issues. Does Cincom really see the  free support and maintenance made by the community as a threat to their business? Are Cincom interested in actually supporting VSE, and not just collecting money from their trapped customers? Does Cincom really believe that VSE customers will migrate to other products supplied by them, taking only their word for not abandoning them again in the future?

Unfortunately I am not able to attend ESUG this year, but I hope that others will raise these questions.

I am pretty sure nobody in the Smalltalk community will benefit from the death of VSE.

The layers of Cincom believe that Cincom is the *only one* who has the rights to support the product.

Hi James. Did you not read the whole posting, specifically:

Cincom does not hold the IP for VSE - Seagull Software does

Cincom has exclusive rights for selling and supporting VSE

Seagull Software has no problem selling/donating the IP

Cincom has refused to sell/donate their rights

It is not Seagull blocking anything, it is Cincom.

	Henrik Høyer
	Chief Software Architect
	[hidden email] • (+45) 4029 2092
	Rued Langgaards Vej 7 • 2300 Kbh. S
	www.sPeople.dk • (+45) 7023 7775

From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of James Robertson
Sent: 3. september 2010 03:29
To: The general-purpose Squeak developers list
Subject: Re: [squeak-dev] Is Cincom slowly killing Visual Smalltalk Enterprice

Cincom does not actually own the IP for VSE - when Cincom acquired VisualWorks from ObjectShare (back in 1999), the limited rights to VSE we do have were inherited from ObjectShare. ObjectShare had sold the IP for VSE to Seagull, which later was acquired by Rocket Software.  I have no idea whether that company does anything with that IP, or what level of concern they have with it.

Cincom has no ability to open source VSE; we cannot open source IP which we don't own.  You would have to pursue that with the people who own it.

As to stopping work, recall that VSE was EOL'd by ParcPlace-Digitalk in 1997.  It's been in that state ever since.  If you look at the Smalltalk products Cincom owns - ObjectShare and VisualWorks - I think you would have to say that we've aggressively supported them and moved them both forward.  We are committed to Smalltalk, but there is very little we can do about IP we don't own.

Hi John

The VSE Community has actually trying to do make this happen. Seagull has been approached and they are willing to sell/donate their IP. It is Cincom who is blocking this!

	Henrik Høyer
	Chief Software Architect
	[hidden email] • (+45) 4029 2092
	Rued Langgaards Vej 7 • 2300 Kbh. S
	www.sPeople.dk • (+45) 7023 7775

From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of John M McIntosh
Sent: 3. september 2010 04:27
To: The general-purpose Squeak developers list
Subject: Re: [squeak-dev] Is Cincom slowly killing Visual Smalltalk Enterprice

Well I'll maybe someone oh say the Squeak Foundation needs to write a nice letter to "Rocket Software"  which seems to still exist

Dear all

From the reactions to my post, I fear that people might have misunderstood me. Bear in mind, that I am not a native English speaker – though my language might sound harsh and offensive, I do have the best intensions.

The subject of the original post should perhaps have been: “Is Cincom slowly killing Visual Smalltalk Enterprise *customers*”. Who shot VSE a long time ago is another discussion. As are the discussion of how/whether one could/should port the applications to other Smalltalk dialects.

My focus is entirely on how the current VSE users can extend the life of their applications on the VSE platform. Even though development on VSE stopped more than 10 years ago, the applications are still running today on current operating system versions and with on-par performance.

Part of VSE is closed source; The VM, the compiler and several other stuff. Though clever hacking/patching bugs in these closed parts of VSE have been fixes by the community since the official development stopped. But Cincom (who has the exclusive rights to make money from supporting the product) has now unleashed its lawyers, and are threatening some of the most active people in the community. The amount of “lawyer muscle” behind the threats are actually keeping people from even replying to this post.

I did have a deep respect for Cincom; they have done a great job for the Smalltalk community. I don’t know where in their organization the “money matters more than ethics” policy is in action. It is not among the Smalltalk people we all know, but the ones who are pulling the strings are in fact doing a lot of damage to their corporate image.

I know that some Cincom employees have commented on my post, but I still have had no answers to the main question:

Are Cincom willing to donate/sell their “exclusive exploratory rights to the VSE product”?

Please note: The question is not about the IP. It is only about the rights that Cincom holds, oh and by the way; are Cincom willing to disclose the contact they have with Seagull regarding these rights?

With all the best intensions