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SourceA few critical binary 'black boxes' are at
the J core. In particular, the J Engine (analogous to the Java Virtual
Machine), the Windows GUI support, and the Unix GUI support are
provided by Jsoftware as binaries for specific platforms. Most J users
are happy to depend on Jsoftware for development and maintenance of
these binaries. However, some users require source for some or all of
the binaries.
Our policy on source for our binaries is between the extremes of Microsoft proprietary source and Linux open source. You can have the benefits of open source for J binaries, but under a license and a fee. Here are a few examples where one might want source for J binaries: Scenario 1Your company builds products that depend heavily
on the J Unix GUI support and your priorities may not align completely
with Jsoftware. You could use Jsoftware consulting to develop your
proprietary changes, but a source license gives you complete control to
develop exactly as you require.
Scenario 2Your company builds products that depend on the J
Engine and you want to be able to leverage your applications by
programming both at the J level, and in C at the core engine level.
Examples are language extensions, new primitives, new data
types, and performance improvements that are of significant
benefit to your applications.
Scenario 3You (or more likely your CTO or CFO) find your
company 'betting the farm' on J. By that we mean you are
building products with J on which the future of your company or
division depends. In situations like this business people concerned
with risk start asking questions: "what if Jsoftware all got on a
jet and went for a holiday and didn't come back?"; "what
are our options if something totally unforseen happens?", and so
on. These are serious questions, and too often the answer is "we
can't afford the risk so we'll stick with Microsoft and
IBM".
This is a hard problem for a small company like Jsoftware to address. A big truck could run over our entire company and there you'd be with J applications driving your profits and suddenly no more Jsoftware development and maintenance of the critical binaries. With source, any problem can be managed by you. FeesJsoftware licenses source for all the Jsoftware
binaries. There are several factors in determining the cost of source
licenses. Primary is the source itself: J Engine (portable C); Windows
GUI support (C++); and Unix GUI support (Java). Secondary is the scope
of use: internal; distributed products; and competitive (to
Jsoftware) products. And finally the platforms: Windows; Unix;
PocketPC; etc. The price range is from $10,000 to $400,000. Regular
updates to our current source levels are available for separate update
fees.
Contact us for more information. |