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We do offer an Apache 2 only binary of TimescaleDB which includes our open source core (and excludes the Timescale Licensed features). In fact, many companies (

We do offer an Apache 2 only binary of TimescaleDB which includes our open source core (and excludes the Timescale Licensed features). In fact, many companies (Azure, Digital Ocean, Ali Baba, etc) offer this Apache 2 version to their customers.

rattray 5y ago
Oh cool! I see this is addressed in your FAQ: > TimescaleDB is a relational database for time-series, with some features licensed under the Apache 2.0 License but many of the features you know and love are licensed via the Timescale License (including continuous aggregates, compression, data retention policies, actions, multi-node, and more). The "Apache 2.0" version of TimescaleDB offered by Microsoft, Digital Ocean, and others includes only the features in the Apache license. The Timescale License prohibits cloud providers from offering the "community version" of TimescaleDB-as-a-service. But I don't find any links to download the Apache 2.0 version, there or elsewhere… By the way, I really hope you guys are able to strike a deal with the cloud providers for them to re-sell Timescale Licenses, so people can get all the great features and pay you without having to add a new vendor relationship!
- akulkarni 5y ago
  Thank you :-) Re: Apache 2.0 only version, it is on our Github readme (but yes, probably could be made more prominent): Apache-2 licensed binaries can be built by passing -DAPACHE_ONLY=1 to bootstrap. https://github.com/timescale/timescaledb https://github.com/timescale/timescaledb
gibba999 5y ago
I'll mention I hate this style of conversation. You call up a vendor, and ask about X. They switch to talking point Y, without ever addressing the point. It's ubiquitous ("it's me, not you"), but I hate it. I'd much rather get a straight "no." To answer the non-answer: I don't want a crippled version of the product with features held back for paying customers. I don't know which other features will be held back in the future, or what the evolution of the system will be. My expectation is that at some point, I'll need e.g. features to comply with a law like GDPR, and some critical feature may be withheld in an attempt to monetize me. When that happens, I end up in limbo. With a half-open-source project, what do you do? Do you fork the system and build the feature yourself? It will never move into mainstream since it undermines your revenue source. Do you maintain a fork? No one will use your fork over mainstream and you have competing communities. Etc. Having built systems which have been used and maintained for decades, those sorts of considerations matter much more for picking a long-term viable solution than which technology happens to be ahead this year. I'm not saying you're going to burn me (and usually by the time this happens, you've been acquired by Oracle like Java, went bankrupt and got picked up by vultures, like SCO, hired a massive number of mediocre people, like Google), but if you make a dozen decisions like this, someone WILL burn you, and that WILL cost you more than the other 11 decisions combined. Make it easy on customers like me.

rattray 5y ago

Oh cool! I see this is addressed in your FAQ: > TimescaleDB is a relational database for time-series, with some features licensed under the Apache 2.0 License but many of the features you know and love are licensed via the Timescale License (including continuous aggregates, compression, data retention policies, actions, multi-node, and more). The "Apache 2.0" version of TimescaleDB offered by Microsoft, Digital Ocean, and others includes only the features in the Apache license. The Timescale License prohibits cloud providers from offering the "community version" of TimescaleDB-as-a-service. But I don't find any links to download the Apache 2.0 version, there or elsewhere… By the way, I really hope you guys are able to strike a deal with the cloud providers for them to re-sell Timescale Licenses, so people can get all the great features and pay you without having to add a new vendor relationship!

akulkarni 5y ago
Thank you :-) Re: Apache 2.0 only version, it is on our Github readme (but yes, probably could be made more prominent): Apache-2 licensed binaries can be built by passing -DAPACHE_ONLY=1 to bootstrap. https://github.com/timescale/timescaledb https://github.com/timescale/timescaledb

gibba999 5y ago

I'll mention I hate this style of conversation. You call up a vendor, and ask about X. They switch to talking point Y, without ever addressing the point. It's ubiquitous ("it's me, not you"), but I hate it. I'd much rather get a straight "no." To answer the non-answer: I don't want a crippled version of the product with features held back for paying customers. I don't know which other features will be held back in the future, or what the evolution of the system will be. My expectation is that at some point, I'll need e.g. features to comply with a law like GDPR, and some critical feature may be withheld in an attempt to monetize me. When that happens, I end up in limbo. With a half-open-source project, what do you do? Do you fork the system and build the feature yourself? It will never move into mainstream since it undermines your revenue source. Do you maintain a fork? No one will use your fork over mainstream and you have competing communities. Etc. Having built systems which have been used and maintained for decades, those sorts of considerations matter much more for picking a long-term viable solution than which technology happens to be ahead this year. I'm not saying you're going to burn me (and usually by the time this happens, you've been acquired by Oracle like Java, went bankrupt and got picked up by vultures, like SCO, hired a massive number of mediocre people, like Google), but if you make a dozen decisions like this, someone WILL burn you, and that WILL cost you more than the other 11 decisions combined. Make it easy on customers like me.