5 ms·
Do you have an example of a commercially successful GPL desktop app?
by lemming 9y ago
Do you have an example of a commercially successful GPL desktop app?
- ungamed 9y agoVLC , but it has LGPL and GPL components iirc.
- SXX 9y agoSynergy [1] https://symless.com/synergy https://symless.com/synergy [2] https://github.com/symless/synergy-core https://github.com/symless/synergy-core
- coldtea 9y agoThat's only some "core" for the software, not the full software, which is kept proprietary. And even that could hurt their business if somebody used the core to build their own app for the same target market on top of it.
- SXX 9y agoI wouldn't say about what available on GitHub today, but up until year ago all source code was included and they only sold precompiled binaries and support. Also I doubt they can really change anything about that because Synergy never required CLA and it's under GPLv2. I pretty sure their "core" naming is just another way to promote usage of paid version, but you can still compile it yourself and easily remove all license checks.
- coldtea 9y agoIsn't that more proof that it doesn't work well though? Why would they do all these changes if the previous model worked well for making them money?
- SXX 9y agoPrevious model was usual open source community-driven project with donations and it's obviously didn't worked, but Synergy was developed by different team at different times and looks like they find what works for them. It's tarted 3 years ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/2fydpm/synergy_gpl_input_sharing_software_gone_paid/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/2fydpm/synergy_gpl_i... Of course it's not shiny VC funded company with 10000% growth, but I guess it's profitable business. Though it's not that much different from what Red Hat doing by selling support even if it's on small scale.
- tea_lover 9y agohttps://www.knime.com/ https://www.knime.com/