Debate - Has Compiere Become Closed? Do We Fork? How?

[scott5375]

Hi Adempiere folks

I am new to Compiere as well. Just finished reading all the posts. In the past I have been rather hesistant to choose Compiere, but now Adempiere resuscitate this open source ERP and give new life to it. Anyway just would like to show my support for Adempiere, and hope that I can also contribute in terms of testing and developement in the future.

As for Jorg, I think we were all impressed by his great work, we do hope that Compiere will move on, make great imporvements, take our suggestions seriously, take the lead to unite back the community strenght and make it truly open source project before it is too late. or Is it correct to still to have hope for Compiere?

Lastly, If a fork like Adempiere is the only way out, I believe it will succeed. Trifon, Victor, Carlos, Marco, Red1, etc....they are great contributors. I salute to you guys.

[afalcone]

Just a comment about Jog's post:

First, I agree with all comments that said Carlos.

I want just remember 2 lessons from "The Cathedral and the Bazaar":

6. Treating your users as co-developers is your least-hassle route to rapid code improvement and effective debugging.
7. Release early. Release often. And listen to your customers.

You can obtain your conclusions......

Adempiere will be a Bazaar.

Regards
Alejandro

When the river sounds is because is running water.

[croo]

wow! I go away for a day and it takes hours of reading to catch up ... things are moving very fast!

red1: My email address is colin.rooney@gmail.com my preferred userid is colin.rooney@adempiere.org

re: Jorgs reply
I'd say some PR types spent a lot of time wording it!
I feel the bottom line has to be: Inv was given plenty of opportunity to provide us with some... any.... information on where they were heading. I'm sure it is no co-incidence they finally provided something only after what has happened here in just a couple of days! Jorg says they had too little resources to integrate “Compiere Freelancers”, well even an email stating that would have been nice ... instead of been completely ignored! And as others pointed out, while he is now saying GPL, he did not address the point of the application being split between a hobbled open app and a commercial app . Given the other “open source” projects the new Inc board members are involved with, I think this rumour of a to split in the application has a lot of potential to be true and should have been addressed by Jorg. The bottom line is the Compiere approach simply isn't working ... the versions released have too many bugs & and too many basic holes in functionality for too a long a time... it's time to try another approach!?

re: wiki
I think StevenK is right that an internal wiki is the place to put the equivalient of user “manuals” [need to replace those we will lose when leaving Compiere] and those technical “know how” manuals compiere never provided in the first place [much of which is in compilo].
But I do think there is still a place for the basic definition of the project, in wikipedia. Reading wikipedia's reasons for rejecting the articles created so, I think perhaps they just want bear facts [which being a “pedia” makes some sense]. I'll have a go at creating a very minimal description to see if I can gets us “in the door” so to speak... then we can extend it slowly. finger crossed!

colin

[mdsahni]

Hi Guys,

Let me introduce myself, I'm Deep and running a small company [Soft Solvers technologies] in Malaysia, providing IT solutions to small and mid size customers. Since last few months we are also offering Compiere as one of our implementation solutions. Initially Compiere looked too good to be true, with great functionality and FREE, but very soon we started seeing the hard realities (migration, pdf, etc) Even after paying $1500, migration is nth next to perfect, you can see my requests pending for weeks.. and on an on!!

Today I wanted to discuss with red about one new compiere project that are hoping to get and saw this discussion and since last three hours reading with huge enthu!! Its really a bold effort and I'm excited to be part of this ... rather proactively!!

During our first [and only] implementation 2.53b, we have fixed many bugs and also have enhanced [or atleast made worked] the Sales Commission modules that we are ready to contribute to Adempiere [I too loved the name, though at first looks bit difficult]. Hopefully can do lot more in future!!

I my early days of struggling with learning Compiere I read lot from Marco, Victor, Trifon, Rob, Peter, and of course Red1, a 180 degree salute to you Gurus!!

Well I've around 10 years of IT experience in designing, developing and implementing business applications and now picking up Compiere [I guess ] should be able to contribute. Also with my business growing, I'm planning to hire 1 or 2 more programmers that also can work dedicated on Compiere and I can pledge 10% of their total work time for this project!!

I sincerely wish all the best to all you guys in this endevour!!

Regards,
Deep

[mdsahni]

Well I too have few ideas on functional, architectural and technical enhancements but would like Guru's to take lead and I'll do "After You", maybe once we have wiki's or contributing platforms in place.

Regards,

[globalqss]

Can I suggest PHPWiki? http://phpwiki.sourceforge.net/

I only have experience with TWiki (perl), but this excellent program needs access to some operating system resources (as fgrep, rcs) so is difficult to find a cheap ISP for that.

I've read excellent info about PHPWiki, and this site is constructed around PHP.

[globalqss]

Hello, I just want to say that looking the Bazaar in action, and all this movement, and all of these new people joining this project, I feel a strong commitment with Adempiere.

I just only hope to be at the height of your expectations (and sure I'll do) and not to defraud the community.

Regards,

Carlos Ruiz
carlos.ruiz@adempiere.org

[afalcone]

Yes Carlos, I believe that the fast movement that is having the project is surpassing extensively own expectations. I think that the disagreement with the Compiere's way is more extensive that we have thunk. We just give the initial kick.
We are making a hard commitment with this project !!

Regards

Alejandro

[goanookie]

Hi All,

another commitment from a small startup company (Kinamo Solutions), we were about to start our business as service supplier/integrator centered around compiere.

But seen the current developments of Inc. and whatever they have in mind for their roadmap, I was having second thoughts about compiere being the perfect opensource product.

Untill I started reading this already very long thread, I was really delighted to see the power of a community working. And decided that Adempiere was and will be more an open source project then compiere ever will be. Why? I have been using opensource software as user and programmer since '99

After a quick discussion with my partner, who spend the last 6 month building knowledge of compiere's code base, we agreed that we also are commiting ourselfs to this project. What are we commiting, my programmer found it a good idea to work on the technical documentation of Adempiere like an ER diagram and such.

Regards
Peter De Zutter
CTO Kinamo Solutions

[red1]

Welcome Peter,
Its gud if u can start a new thread on say, "Technical Specs Effort" to get the ball(s) rolling, to gather tots and more volunteers. Later when things formalize, then we know who to refer to.

red1

[mhafod]

Hello all,

Please add me to the technical specs team, the one proposed by Red1 and PeterDeZutter.

Thanks for all

[rvergara]

I guess many of us had a first reaction to respond JJ entry in the SF forum.

When I am not sure if I should response something I normally take some time to thinking it over so Idid this week end.

My conclusion is that, reading among lines, JJ was not talking to the community, he was talking to their fleeing partners.

JJ says "What funding allows us now, is to better integrate community activities. Our 100+ Partners are our main backbone for contributions – and partners will continue to determine the direction of the product. In our Partner Conference in Santa Clara on 20/21 October, we will discuss directions and best practices."

Partners have never determine the direction of the product. Even if this ever happens it will be very far from being the bazaar we foresaw in this project when we originally joined.

Some postings suggest that a resolved decision "a single word" from JJ is what it would take to evolve the project into what the community had long asked. This is unfortunately unfeasible now.

JJ led the project away from a bazaar gradually and intentionally for years. Even if in a split second he sees the light again, it is now practically impossible to repair the damage. It is not only how demoralized and dissapointed the community got along the time (we have seen many of those testimonials in this forum); but also all the corporate structure (business plans, Board of Directors, funding, financial commitments, etc, etc) that are fueling the current direction set for Inc.

I said it before and I will repeat it here. The Open Source Compiere Project is dead and the sooner we accept it the faster we will move on and make Adempiere the solution we all dream of.

I really appreciate the work JJ has done with Compiere, we would not all be here having this discussion without JJ developing Compiere during all these years. So I would like to offer JJ the opportunity to prove me wrong.

JJ can come to us here, in this forum and prove us wrong

1. Tell us that is untrue the rumors that the upcoming GPL new version is an artificially trimmed Compiere with no Multis.
2. Explain that the cvs has not been updated in more than 5 months because unintentionally because of all the corporate workload Inc has had lately.
3. Explain how Inc has designed the leverage of the community echosystem into Inc business plan.
4. Explain that the neglection of the community in all aspects was not especifically intended and let us now how he plans to change that.

If JJ wants to talk to the community let's listen to him. If he wants to talk just to Inc's partners I respect his decision. It is his business plan and that is all right. We will wish him best of luck and we will move on.

Unfortunately this "Single word" is not going to happen. I am afraid all what I have heard coming from Inc is true.

The Compiere Open Source project is dead. Long live to Adempiere

Regards

Ramiro

[red1]

Hopefully ppl see that this fork is not a hijack, when it is always revealing. As we all have the chance now to make sure. To be more open than open. All ERP-value knowledge right from its accounting to business process to pre-sales will even be put open by the best minds this industry can offer. No more mystcism, no more priests. Open means allowing the most harshest criticism put forward against us. Open means allowing even our codes to go the other way. Thats the risk of been Open, but it has its merit as Eric said in CatB, that someone gave to him to take over a project that isnt active anymore. Thats accepting that what u did receive in the first place, cannot revert, but kept on.

We will encourage and reward that behaviour by blessing them with branding - i.e.
a)the email@adempiere.org shall be awarded and regulated only among meritous and truly contributive developers and coders, the email@adempiere.com to the business people.
a.2) Award will be by peer voting too.
b) And a list of the names by merit rank published in our sites, open to srutiny and challenge.
c) All business projects be logged for reference like the law journals
d) Those who withhold information will be shun.

The goal is to enrich the many rather than the few. Those who have still dreams of making a market scoop or killing better think hard that there isnt any chance of doing that here. The playing field is going to be leveled and only favours those who absorbed knowledge and shows it.

When one is branded by merit, they gain market recognition of their skills and assets - which is their expensive time.

Perhaps a radical licensing that lock the time factor of ppl into it. i.e. That this time "This codes has warranty, provided that a ranked practitioner is allowed to set it up for you". and "if it fails to warrant against our SLA stds, u can refer to the Adempiere forum for replacement support, and fees accorded to the consultant be channeled where due".

Compiere can then reap back such an aware market, that the pre-sales pitch will be redundant. With more market participation, which isnt forthcoming as can be seen from many who said that this Adempiere project is rekindling their hopes and dreams, Compiere couldnt be happy with the whole pie, as its stagnating when good ppl shuns away.

Bottom most, all admits that Compiere only become a household name among ERP circles because of been Open. And this forum is plainly but harshly that. No friend can tell u harsh stuff. Even if he wants to, u will shut him up.

Like Bill Gates (excuse me but its not who said it, but what is said) once said, words to this effect, "Why sue me?, We didnt stop anyone... any kid... can just with a single idea, make a difference, and we couldnt stop that idea.. Our free IE couldnt stop that" I always suspect that he is correct and that Netscape just missed the boat when Marc didnt want to be open until it was too late.

Open ideas have to be expressed and be expressed and be damn, and are needed as someone must have said that u grasp the future when u get the idea.

This is a friendly fork, so we stand to be corrected.

[mdsahni]

Hey Guys,

I too have MHO.

Based upon these four things said before:

We'll be a friendly fork
We are ready to offer our work to JJ, if he take some good steps
He's inviting all of us in December for discussion
Power is in Community [otherwise JJ never would have posted anythng]

1. WE target November end for coming out first version of Admpiere [maybe 0.9] that will not have any new feature but only the integration of the work currently done [ComXE, Kompiere, FA, 2Packs, etc] and fixing of most of the bugs reported in SF since last one year [we need to consider and test atleast that many]. This is important to show our strength.

2. Send one ADempiere [lil off track, how bout stressing AD with making A & D Capital in logo] representative to Contributors conference for discussion with JJ and offer two things:

ADempiere 0.9, to be included in Compiere
Dissolving ADempiere initiative and return back and support original Compiere

If he agrees to following demands:

You all know the long list of our demands!!

It might be possible that he won't agrees to us, but since we started with the Friendly Fork concept, we should give him one sincere chance, otherwise, I don't have any doubt on success of ADempiere on it own.

Need your views guys!!

Regards,
Deep

[moyses]

I have been reading the comments about JJ Message. In my opinion most of the people want to trust JJ, but at the same time they are somewhat skeptical.

I don't have doubts. I don't think anything is going to change, maybe I am too pessimist. The relation between Compiere Inc and the community have deteriorated over the time.

In JJ words:
"To be very clear – there were quite a few changes, but what did NOT change is our commitment to Open Source".

I am affraid that's what put me in a pessimist mood. There won't be many changes as I consider that we need a lot of them.

Personally it feels great to be part of a real community around something, in this case Adempiere. There is a lot of work ahead, but we have just started.

Just like everybody in this forum I recognize JJ work on Compiere, but we have to be honest, we have been ignored most of the time.

Hopefully my message won't be agressive, we have the commitment to be a friendly fork. I am just trying to be sincere and this is just my personal perception.

Long live to Adempiere.

Best Regards

[globalqss]

Hi, I like the ADempiere proposal, I was thinking on that, strength on the AD could be what we're going to make with XML2AD and AD2XML.

A marketing thing:

I believe we must start with ADempiere 2.5.3b (if we're not changing anything at first)
- then 2.6 if we integrate the AD tools
- and then ADempiere 3.0, 3.1, 3.2 ... and so on when we integrate another modules (Human Resources, Payroll, Fixed Assets, etc...)

Regards,

Carlos Ruiz

[anticareer]

The discussion so far has been around forking with 253b. The latest version released under CPL is 253c/d.
This is not widely known becauase it was only released to Partners. 253d was an emergency fix to 253c, which had a database connection problem that caused all available db connections to be consumed and not released.
This is a source of confusion because most people with visibiity (ie., paying partners) were under the impression that HEAD is considered 253d.
Nevertheless, that is the recent history on versions. Here is the licensing consequence so far as I can tell.
253d (not HEAD) is still under CPL 1.1, I have the code and have searched it for any reference to the GPL. There is none.

So should a fork begin with 253b or 253d? There is obviously much collateral based on 253b so maybe it makes the most sense to start there. On the other hand if there is anything redeeming in 253d it should be considered as a starting point. It does have the additional Collaboration Management module but I haven't dug into it and cannot speak to its usefullness.

[alainpod]

Hello Community,

As a Compiere Partner, I have been reluctant to participate to "dissident" endavours", however, I feel that the current situation is very serious and requires as much open and frank discussion as possible.

Let me first tell you how relieved I am to see how qualified and commited the "Community" is. This is a great asset to all of us who have invested into Compiere.

Although I do understand what brings you to forking, I am not sure yet that I am convinced that this is the best direction : all of you who are out there on the market working hard to "SELL" Compiere to end-users should agree that forking will make our job even harder... we should not forget that our beloved ERP has serious competitors.
I already have a hard time explaning to prospects what "open source" is - I'm not impatient to start explaning them what a "fork" is !

Also, I am relieved to read that you all recognize Jorg's work and that the forking is "friendly". However, I'm sure that you are not naive enough to really believe in this concept of FF "Friendly Forking" : Adempiere can be friend with Compiere only if Compiere wants to be friend with Adempiere... I would not bet my trousers on this one ....

It is extremely frustrating to see how much effort and energy is wasted because of lack of cooperation between official and unofficial contributors, between Compiere and partners, between partners themselves...

A basic start-point to stop this waste is the Compiere Wiki (which should not be hosted on wikipedia indeed, but on a private server - let me know if I can assist on this).

This being said, I will attend the Partner's conference in October and I (with many other partners) will advocate that Compiere does remain a real open-source project.

I will be glad to relay your concerns / requests so that we are sure that the "voice of the community" is heard.

What will come out of this; I don't know. But I would suggest to avoid any official announcement before this event...

I believe that Jorg is fully aware of the importance of the community and if Compiere wants to stand a chance in front of SAP, Oracle, etc. and above all Microsoft, I think that its best option is to fully and really embrace the opensource credo...

I will not be naively optimistic in promoting the "happy ending" where everyone loves everyone, but, for the sake of discussion, what steps, if any, could Compiere Inc. take that would convince you to reconsider forking and come back to the "official" way ? (btw, we all know what Compiere Inc. did not do right until now, so the challenge is to be constructive and forward-looking...)

Cheers,

Al

[gba]

Hi,

Let me first say that you made it to Germany's biggest IT news portal.
Here you can read the message about your fork:
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/77954
Maybe you just use something like Google's translator for it.

Now for my question to you:
I am not experienced in ERP/CRM things, so I am not sure,
BUT is it not better to just take the code (as it is Open Source you will have no legal problem with it) and implement the functionality from the beginning anew ?

I watched the Compiere project now a long time as I am a Java dev and so very interested in Compiere as one of the biggest Java projects in the FOSS world. And what I saw and still see is not a good picture:
*) Many questions about problems not answered in the forums on SF.
*) Many many bugs not even assigned to a dev.
*) As I can also can read here many components/functions/modules are not implemented or implemented not fully.
*) And last but not least the project made many people think that it is not "real" FOSS.

So, all this together for me is the sign that it should be implemented anew.

Ohh, I know, Compiere is a very big "beast".
But come and think about it: You have here people who know its functions as most people here are working with it even earning their daily bread with it. Its specifications are known(at least everyone has the code).
AND as Compiere is OpenSource there is NULL problem to look at the code and make a very fresh implementation.

Then: You all have in your head the imagination that Adempiere ultimately should not only work on many platforms but also should work on various DBMS, various App-Servers and also should have bindings for many (actual) programming languages.
If I had learned something about ERP than that it is "real" platform independent because you can never know which devs and admins and techs and users you get in the next company where you will install and deploy the ERP(and if the stuff there not "help" you then it will not be a successful project).
Heck, at least for DBMS independence you will in any case implement many SQL code lines in Compiere anew.

You already made the first (and biggest step) in loosing your "lock in" in Compiere with this fork. Now you can make the next step and develop the next and in many ways better FOSS ERP.

Okay, waiting for your answers.

yours,
gba

EDIT: Ohh, just forgot: All "real" FOSS programs have some tight binding (or better: some integration) in the FOSS GUIs. AND Compiere as it is today is not architected in the way Unix programs are (the paradigms of Unix programs you can read in Raymond's TAOUP). Two more points for a new development of this "binary blob".

[scott5375]

this forum is moving fast and time is running short. One of the reasons we all choose open source is to avoid Lock-in. Now it seems that the future should be determined and appears we are "LOCK-IN" by a coming Compiere Partner Conference. Is it reasonable to say that we will then need to be worried about every future Compiere conference that which versions will be released, trimmed, to say Open or close, etc...

Isn't that the true objective of Compiere being open source should have been already embedded in the very begining. And the current situtation is not satisfactory and that Compiere Inc is not doing enough to achive it.

As for Adempiere, from the user point of view, to quickly make it to the scene, everybody needs a stable product. Victor's 253b version with manufacturing and bug fixes is a good starting point I suppose. As for the web UI, can we make use of the Open Bravo source? Open Bravo is Open Source as well right? I agree with Red1 that Open Bravo didnt give propostionate tribute to Compiere and the look and feel of the ERP Subject Matter is suspicously entirely Compiere's. but their web UI are better and looks just fine. Can we at least make use of their web UI code in Logistics module. I suppose a lot of users would want the web UI functinality, be able to raise a sales order via internet browsers.

With the Stable 253b with bug fixes, Basic Manufacturing functionalies and Logistics Web UI, I expect there will be a lot of switches from Compiere to Adempiere in a very short time.



-scott

[red1]

Mdsahni hinted on it and Alainpod really gave a dose of it. I personally feel that such 'middle ground' views be strongly encouraged so that we are pretty sure all truths are uncovered and this debate exhaustive.

Yes, i admit that politically there may not be such a thing as 'friendly', when u shake a white house occupant to wake up from his slumber to issue a statement, he could be heading next to his missile launch room asking for the launch codes.

Alainpod touches on a reality that forms the business of ERP apps in the first place - the unknowing but paying customers. Its true that its a bane to educate them on the term "Open Source", and what now the "Fork". But i would say, there is no need to even explain Open when it is not so that in the first place and be innocent from a sales pitch.

Compiere shall continue and so shall others. Compiere's partners have been selling Compiere few years ago with the same success and now with more choice and a matured sponsored private Compiere, i dont really see the problem.

The issue here is not a hijack nor a stop work order to anyone.

But again, followers of this debate should take heed of AlainPod's comments and advice as i often heard such sobering views before that often give us a reality check and avoid misjudgements that some may regret in the end.

My comment to that, as i said before, ppl here shouldnt expect to make a market killing. If they do wish, i think they stand a better chance with Compiere which is branded, and we are not. At least not yet, and i dont think that is the priority.

The priority is quality coding, collaboration of the best the world over, and self consultancy. Any worldwide recognition or commercial spark offs by its members are only bonuses and not the main deal, or passion.

Its just a community thing, nothing personal as we say it.

[jsSolutions]

Greeting Adempieres,

We applaud your boldness, and especially the rate at which you organized and moved on your plan. What a testimony to cooperation and community spirit. We also appreciate the magnanimous statements directed toward Jorg for his outstanding work. Although we have been largely quiet in the forums, believe us when we say that we have learned at the knees of those that have been chosen for the counsel of the Adempiere project. Our thanks.

We are an American partner, but have shared the sentiments in this thread. We have suffered from the same lack of support and responsiveness. We have become very worried at the change in licensing direction. In fact we have been putting in place a Plan B for ourselves. We are glad to see the community move forward and are happy to join in. We are happy also to see the continued willingness to work with Compiere

Once the project is established we hope to contribute the work that we have and also add the expertise we have gained alone over the past couple of years.

One piece of info we can share is that there is 2.5.3d code available with the old licensing, although the latest downloadable for the partners has been updated and is much more restrictive, even to the point of saying that if you discontinue paying support you must discontinue use of the product. Our clients come to us for Vendor independence, and we hope that we can continue to support a dynamically growing application for them. Whether with Compiere or not, you have revived this hope in us.

We look forward to participating with you for years to come.

[wellx]

hi All!

And once & once about roadmap.

After adding bugfixes The community must refactoring each others for their common part of code with similar functionality. Many of us wrote tone of code with similar functions but with different code and codenaming. I think it need to see functionality of each modules more precisly and deleopers must generate unified code for similar modules (and based on on compiere vers.).

And once again - take off propreitary part and takein free modules (jasper freePDF or another....).

[steunenberg]

Hi Alain,

don't be worried about explaining the fork to your prospects. Make it offensive: the 'second source' is rather important for people that really care about implementing OS Software. And here you have your second source.

One thing:

This being said, I will attend the Partner's conference in October and I (with many other partners) will advocate that Compiere does remain a real open-source project.

At the partner conference you can advocate. Here is a 'real open-source project'. I think you can advocate with stronger arguments if this adempiere train keeps rolling.

The problem I see though is that the technical structure of compiere has some parallels with the organizational structure, more cathedral-like. I think that is the reason that eg. a good automated testing framework is missing.

We don't hesitate to work with both adempiere and compiere, but we have limited resources. In fact we would be glad to contribute our HBCI interface to a GPLed adempiere - we can not contribute it somewhere else because it is gased on the GPL http://hbci4java.kapott.org/ HBCI library.

Cheers,
Johan Steunenberg

[trifon]

Grreting dear partners,

>I don't know a lot about the details of the AD Customizer Keeper, but would it not be easier to integrate it with with cmpcs rather than all the additional integrated functionality of cmpcs into ComXE?

Yes. It can be used in any project which is based on Compiere(It uses M... classes and X_... classes). It can be used even for OpenBravo


>Would like to transfer .com to Carlos (as the name suggester) and Trifon for .net (as the most serving SFtizen and his ComXE effort. What u think?

It is OK for me.


>I think that we can work together I can integrate ComXE into cmpcs and take this as the starting base of Adempiere Smile, if Trifon is agree?
Yes i agree.
ComXe has really small change in Compiere. I can describe it as Compiere, but usung PL/SQL instead sqlj.
My main goal in comXe was to develop AD Customization Keeper and AD 2 XML project.
I agree to move them to project where i have rights to commit and project which has email list notifying developers when commit is performed.
Also as Carlos is activly working on AD Customization Keeper i would like to have Corlos with the same rights.


>On the licencing, the next Compiere GPL version is supposed to have a drammatically reduced functionality, ie:
>1 language
>1 client
>1 warehouse
>and restrictions on the max users, products and invoice lines (not that much significant)

WOW, i'm shocked... how this is possible!!!


>btw where is Trifon?

Sorry i was 3 days to my hometown.

Kind Regards,
Trifon