How Open Source will Benefit You
Our CEO explains why we are going open source and what's in it for you

By Kevin Miller

Its been a busy week since we launched our Kickstarter campaign to take the platform open source. The response has been overwhelmingly positive so far. We've had lots of questions about exactly what going open means from many of you using LiveCode for different things. In this article I wanted to share the main benefits for you, no matter what you use LiveCode for.

I'm Building Software to Use in My Company
We know many of you use LiveCode as an information aggregator, a swiss army knife to create a quick utility to format some data or automate production. Going open source has numerous benefits if you're using LiveCode to build software for your own use:

• LiveCode will become free. If you're not redistributing the software outside employees of your company, you won't need a commercial license to continue to use LiveCode. Think about all the license fees you'll save.
  
• More people working on the platform means it will move faster. That means more support for a broad range of features covering the latest technologies and operating systems.
  
• If you need to get in there and scratch an itch or fix a bug in the platform you can. If you're not a C++ developer, you can work with someone who is if you need a quick change.
  
• The new reworked architecture and open language extensibility framework means more off the shelf components, objects and libraries that will make working with the platform even more efficient.

Consider how much value LiveCode brings to your organization today. Now imagine a next generation version of that same platform, free and with a wealth of consultants available to work on it. Surely that's worth making a $1K pledge to our Kickstarter campaign?

I'm a Consultant
If you create software for others, you know that LiveCode's productivity advantage gives you an edge. Consider:

• How much of your company's or client's revenue is derived from LiveCode.
  
• How much would it mean to you as a consultant if LiveCode has an audience ten times (or more!) larger than it is today?

That's a much larger community who will need your experience and services.

Then there is the possibility of creating extensions using open language - written in either LiveCode or a lower level language. And if you or your client needs a tweak to the source, you'll have access or be able to find someone else who has access to it.

The possibilities that are opened up are endless.

You'll still need a commercial license if you want to create commercial software for a client and they don't want to redistribute their source code as open source. However the annual license price will fall once we go open source. We've included a year long license extension with the $1K pledge level.

I'm Creating Software to Sell
If you're an ISV and software is your business, you probably rely on LiveCode because of its live, iterative workflow that allows you to create and test apps on real users in a fluid process and its rapid, English-like language. Going open source means that you'll be able to benefit from faster development, the ability to access the code base or pay others to do so, faster and broader support for the latest technologies. You'll still need a commercial license to sell closed source software and we've included a year long license extension at the $1K pledge level.

I'm an Educator
Educators choose LiveCode because it engages students quickly, doubling the uptake for advanced computer science courses in high school classrooms. You'll benefit from LiveCode going open source because:

• It will be free. LiveCode currently costs money per seat and schools have tight budget constraints.
  
• It won't ever go away. The GPL license we've chosen for LiveCode cannot be withdrawn. Once the software is out there under that license, it cannot legally be recalled.
  
• It will be easy for the community to create cut down versions of the product for teaching, such as a tablet based visual editor for those schools that don't have desktops any more, or a cut down version of the desktop visual editor for younger children.
  
• It will be easy to port the platform to other low cost platforms which are in increasing use in education, such as Raspberry Pi or ARM Linux.
  
• The open language capability will allow creating domain specific languages for use in specific verticals such as research.

We've included some teacher training workshops at the £55 pledge level in the campaign. They are perfect for teachers looking for continuous professional development (CPD) that gets them up to speed teaching programming fast.

I'm Creating Open Source Software
Again, LiveCode will become free. All the other benefits above apply. If you just like tinkering with code, making your computer do fun things, creating little apps to share with friends, this means you can do so whenever and wherever you like, without paying us a penny.

I'm Creating Mission Critical Software or Enterprise Applications
Larger organizations choose LiveCode because of its proven track record and high level of productivity. With open source, we'll be introducing a high end license package that includes service-level-agreement technical support and critical bug fixes. That means that you can count on us to be there when you need help and to respond to issues quickly when you're on a tight deadline. This new license type will also include commercial access to the source code, so you won't need to go through the GPL version to apply patches but can alter it for your own use. You'll have access to a far larger army of consultants who can help work on your project or on the underlying source. And we'll even be introducing a commercial source escrow option for those larger companies that need that extra peace of mind.

What's in it for Us?
We're so excited to be making this change. We can't wait to see a new generation of young people get inspired and get into coding the right way. Our business is going to change a lot. We've spent a lot of time planning these changes and we're ready. The vast majority of our customers (90%+) will now get the platform free and will no longer pay ongoing fees to us. However the community will expand so much that we'll still have a healthy business from the smaller percentage that do pay license fees or the even smaller proportion that go on to purchase our higher end support options.

The platform will benefit from the massive engineering changes that this Kickstarter project is funding. That means our engineering team can focus on and execute those big projects that have been years in the planning. When we're done, we'll create a platform ready for the next 10 years. By separating out the internals into neat modules with a small kernel and virtual machine structure, we'll be able to make fast progress. And we'll be able to work with the community in partnership on new features and fixes.

Going open source makes sense for everyone. Let's make it happen. If you have made a pledge already, thanks so much for your support. If not, you guessed it... here is the link!