[Asterisk-biz] Re: Asterisk Ffork - OpenPBX.org

[snacktime]

>
>
> >
> > I find myself in the unusual position of agreeing with Jeremy here. :)
> (no
> > offense intended, Jeremy.) I don't want to get into legalities or dive
> into
> > this flame war, but I think that Digium has done the world a great
> service
> > by developing, funding, and releasing Asterisk. I think they deserve to
> > profit from their work, and I will support them. If some on this list
> don't
> > agree with Digium's vision of Asterisk's future, then they should
> > contribute code and publicly debate their positions. Working against
> Digium
> > IMHO is counter productive, and discourages future open source
> development.
>
> In what way is OpenPBX working against Digium? A fair percentage of the
> new
> code in OpenPBX has either previously not been accepted by Digium or has
> not
> been "disclaimed" by the owners of that code for one reason or another.
> Putting these patches together in one place, using a new name (As per
> Mark's
> wishes) and continuing development in a direction that Digium currently
> isn't
> heading all do not harm Digium in any way. What these things DO create
> though
> is an alternative PBX which natively supports Digium hardware as well as
> providing features to end users that Digium is either unwilling or unable
> to
> provide in Asterisk.
>
> Hmmmm... Another piece of software that works with Digium's hardware but
> doesn't require any of Digium's resources to maintain, with the added
> advantage of having more features than the software that Digium already
> gives
> away for free as a loss leader to sell their hardware... Can someone
> please
> explain how this "works against Digium"??
>
>
I think that in order to have a productive discussion on this you have to at
least look at reality. Of course there is a large potential to hurt
asterisk. The question is whether openpbx will add more value then it takes
away. In order to add value it has to offer something that asterisk doesn't
have and attract a user base. If you put a lot of time into openpbx but very
few people use it, then it's still a net loss to asterisk as well as those
who spent time on openpbx.

I think the main thing that hurts openpbx is that they have a problem with
ABE and the contribution policies. Most people just don't see it that way,
and it's not in itself a good reason to fork. I also doubt that the fork
would have happened if that issue was not present.

Overall, I just don't trust the judgement of the people behind openpbx.. I
don't think they forked for the right reasons and I don't think they have a
grasp of what it takes to make a successfull fork. And if it isn't
successfull, then it helps no one at the possible expense of a lot of other
people. One good thing it might do is bring about some good discussion on
what Digium could do better, but so far I haven't see much of the
conversation go in that direction.

Chris
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