Something the comunity should be aware of

[Guest]

From Marco Cantu blog and from his comment here https://blog.marcocantu.com/blog/2020-april-embarcadero-licenses-download-portal.html

 

Quote

 Dear "deeply worried",

we are currently still evaluating how to handle downloads and 
other services for customers who haven't bought product or 
updates in a while. In the past the company was extremely open, 
allowing past customers to download their products again and 
renew their licences   without a time limit. So the company is 
spending resources (servers, bandwidth and people's time) to 
serve someone who has, say, an almost 20 years old Delphi 7 
license. The industry practice is that once after a given amount of 
time you stop being a current paying customer, you lose access or 
download options. 

Comment by Marco Cantu [http://www.marcocantu.com] on May 21, 07:29

 

Now, i am not trolling and not asking to be trolled, i want to hear your discusssion, i marked (in bold ) those keywords that the most important in Marco comments

"extremely open" not sure on how to interpret this, (not going there)

"licences without a time limit" they are pulling the plug on old licenses and your ability to compile old code, means with one button they pushing countless of projects and library into legacy uncompilable code, you will lose the ability to download and activiate your older licenses unless you have current valid license.

"servers, bandwidth and people's time" 20 years ago 1TB (traffic or storage) was costing an arm and leg with one kidney, sure . but in 2020 it more or less a $5 on many cloud services as those downloads are cold files, for people time, agaion i have no idea what to say here except reading this https://github.com/jrsoftware/issrc/commit/4f8d9e6c29c07d473c4a8e0ab8dd2304e36499b0 which make me sad, real sad about people time, inno setup is number one Delphi project in the world that has been used on PC, i know you would think Skype is, but when skype was on the top before microsoft i believe ( according to its EXE signature), its installer was in fact inno setup.

"industry practice" What to say here ?!, i would love first to be aware of the competition first, or a list of this industry to be compared to, is Delphi/RAD will become a online services or computer language and technology ?

 

Points in the subject to discuss :

Will such move affect you ?

What do you think ?

Considering i/we not in place to discuss their business model, that is Idera/Embarcadero thing, no one arguing there, but we should arguing the effect on us as our livelihood depends on it, for example this might force one to update subscription, OK... but what about your customer ( the owner of that project you contracted to maintain ) will he update too ? 

 

And all of that boils down to this question : who is Idera/Embarcadero targeting ?

Hobbyist , i don't thing so, such move will be good bye for all of them.

Professional programmer, this will cause all sort of disrupt in their life.

Big companies, this will put them under ultimatum to update with great cost ( there is no real big project depends only on what Delphi/RAD offer and 3rd-party code are not cheap) or just bite the bullet and redo your project with different developers under different platform.

 

( I am not ranting or trolling here, if the administrator think otherwise, and think this subject is out of the discussion or irrelevant , then please delete this )

[FredS 138]

12 minutes ago, Kas Ob. said:

after a given amount of time you stop being a current paying customer, you lose access or download options.

That part sounds fair enough to me..

 

More troubling is that the New Embarcadero Licenses and Download Portal still has no method of handling license bumps as outlined by the post above yours.
As it sits now I can be responsible and burn an ISO or make backups but I can't find a legal way to move my installation..

 

 

[Guest]

15 minutes ago, FredS said:

as outlined by the post above yours.

That wasn't me, i didn't ask/comment on Marco's blog.

 

Edit: the "deeply worried" is another deeply worried person.

 

Edit2 : "That part sounds fair enough to me.." and "I can't find a legal way to move my installation.." are contradiction, you can't see one thing fair in the same time you see it unfair.

 

Edited May 24, 2020 by Guest

[dummzeuch 1505]

18 minutes ago, FredS said:

More troubling is that the New Embarcadero Licenses and Download Portal still has no method of handling license bumps as outlined by the post above yours.

As it sits now I can be responsible and burn an ISO or make backups but I can't find a legal way to move my installation..

While you have a valid subscription, convert your license to a "Network named user license" and install the Embarcadero License Center (server under e.g. Ubuntu on a virtual machine). Then you can have as many installations on your LAN as you want and even use several at the same time (there is a limit, but I haven't hit it yet). And you will never again need a "bump" either.

[Uwe Raabe 2057]

13 minutes ago, Kas Ob. said:

they are pulling the plug on old licenses and your ability to compile old code

That is not what can be read in that comment. I cannot see anything about licenses being invalidated or not being able to compile old code. Even the question does not imply that. It is only about downloading the setup files, isn't it? If my business were founded on the fact to be able to download old Delphi installation files I would do something wrong in the first place.

 

I suggest to install old Delphi versions inside a VM and have a good backup strategy for those - like many people I know are already doing for years now.

 

In case someone is worried about not being able to register a valid license later, the solution can be to convert the Named User license into a Network Named User license. That requires an ELC server installed somewhere in the local network, but it simplifies registrations a lot. License bumps are no longer necessary with that. Moving a Delphi installation to a new machine boils down to installing it and importing a slip file.

 

My own situation covers quite some of your points. I have old software that has to be maintained (if at all) with old Delphi versions. Some of my customers are stuck with an old Delphi version, so I am regarding their projects. I see no problems in any of those. Even if Embarcadero would be hit by a comet, I would be able to work for plenty of years.

 

35 minutes ago, Kas Ob. said:

Will such move affect you ?

No! If anyone would be affected there are ways to prepare for it and be safe.

35 minutes ago, Kas Ob. said:

What do you think ?

No problem and I think it is fair. There is plenty of other software where it is impossible to get old installation files now. I can still remember times when software was delivered in CD or even Floppy disks. We were used to make backup copies of those in case they will break and the vendor would charge for a replacement CD - if even offering that at all. One can do something similar for ISO images.

 

Having that said, the other points are just meaningless.

 

 

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, Uwe Raabe said:

In case someone is worried about not being able to register a valid license later, the solution can be to convert the Named User license into a Network Named User license. That requires an ELC server installed somewhere in the local network, but it simplifies registrations a lot. License bumps are no longer necessary with that. Moving a Delphi installation to a new machine boils down to installing it and importing a slip file.

What i understand here i am forced to update/renew my subscription to be able to use ELC in order to use Delphi 7 to maintain the project that i don't own, and ask the owner of that project to do the same to order for him to do the branding and final release build, right ?

 

After search and still can't figure this out, how to convert my license to network named without paying money those days ?

 

22 minutes ago, Uwe Raabe said:

That is not what can be read in that comment. I cannot see anything about licenses being invalidated or not being able to compile old code. Even the question does not imply that. It is only about downloading the setup files, isn't it?

Nope , it is about the license itself not just downloading files "allowing past customers to download their products again and renew their licences   without a time limit"

And if i am not aware of such move or i am not prepared th way you suggest, then i simply lose the ability to compile old, that was my point, i am not sure about this Network Named license yet, and if it will be included in their new policy with time limit, right ?

[Clément 148]

1 hour ago, Kas Ob. said:

"extremely open" not sure on how to interpret this, (not going there)

It's a fact that one could always download previous licenses. There was always an upgrade path to a newer version. And occasionally some discounts to force users to get a newer version. Emb is the only who can tell if that worked at all. And of course, you could always request a reload if you made several installations. I would not call that "extremely", thought.

1 hour ago, Kas Ob. said:

"licences without a time limit" they are pulling the plug on old licenses and your ability to compile old code, means with one button they pushing countless of projects and library into legacy uncompilable code, you will lose the ability to download and activiate your older licenses unless you have current valid license.

I understand this statement differently. You can still use your Delphi 7 or Delphi XE version today. (license without time limit), but you still have the bump dependency problem. 

1 hour ago, Kas Ob. said:

"servers, bandwidth and people's time" 20 years ago 1TB (traffic or storage) was costing an arm and leg with one kidney, sure . but in 2020 it more or less a $5 on many cloud services as those downloads are cold files, for people time, agaion i have no idea what to say here except reading this https://github.com/jrsoftware/issrc/commit/4f8d9e6c29c07d473c4a8e0ab8dd2304e36499b0 which make me sad, real sad about people time, inno setup is number one Delphi project in the world that has been used on PC, i know you would think Skype is, but when skype was on the top before microsoft i believe ( according to its EXE signature), its installer was in fact inno setup.

"industry practice" What to say here ?!, i would love first to be aware of the competition first, or a list of this industry to be compared to, is Delphi/RAD will become a online services or computer language and technology ?

Previous versions of delphi where a lot more popular I guess. It's a fact that some still keep Delphi 7 or Delphi XE because the produced executable is very small compared to newer versions. It wouldn't surprise me that people still need small executable to run in limited devices. Again, only Emb can tell how demanding older IDE version can get. They could event let Delphi 7 download for free... why not? (One can always dream)

1 hour ago, Kas Ob. said:

 

Points in the subject to discuss :

Will such move affect you ?

Not directly. I'm always using the newest version, although it's getting harder and harder to keep it up, Delphi Sydney most probably will be my last subscribed version.

1 hour ago, Kas Ob. said:

What do you think ?

Considering i/we not in place to discuss their business model, that is Idera/Embarcadero thing, no one arguing there, but we should arguing the effect on us as our livelihood depends on it, for example this might force one to update subscription, OK... but what about your customer ( the owner of that project you contracted to maintain ) will he update too ? 

The forcing upgrade is not an issue, but the cost/benefit. I have no way to downgrade my Enterprise subscription and for the price/quality there's a LOT to complain about. I'm not using Datasnap, I'm not using RAD Server, I'm not using WSDL wizard (I wrote my own), there are components that took so long to be available that I was had to buy, or write my own) . If you are using those technologies, it's ok to pay for them, but if you're not?
This is what makes Delphi extremely expensive, and new managers just won't pay for a product they are not 100% sure is able too solve their problem. (Technical, documentation, developer availablilty, SDK integration ( lot's of C#, C++, Java etc, but no Delphi) )

1 hour ago, Kas Ob. said:

And all of that boils down to this question : who is Idera/Embarcadero targeting ?

Hobbyist , i don't thing so, such move will be good bye for all of them.

Professional programmer, this will cause all sort of disrupt in their life.

Big companies, this will put them under ultimatum to update with great cost ( there is no real big project depends only on what Delphi/RAD offer and 3rd-party code are not cheap) or just bite the bullet and redo your project with different developers under different platform.

 

Emb itself is not sure who it's target is, and nothing is done to help find it out.  One solution would be to have several SKUs:
RAD Studio Small Business, RAD Studio Standard Business, RAD Studio Large Business and a combination with Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum Licenses that would allow us to get access to the products we need.

Moving to a different platform is getting real every day.

[Uwe Raabe 2057]

Not sure how you do, but I have always just copy the Delphi 7 license data to another machine without any further registration. Actually I guess that Delphi 7 is not even covered by the ELC server - it is just way too old. At least you should still have the original CD, so no need to download.

 

Also, I am not sure what the term renew their licences actually means in this context. Is this just registering a license or is it bumping the registration count? It is not even clear what Marco is saying to be taken away from former customers. He just says you lose access or 
download options. Well, he will have a hard timer to stop you to access your Delphi installation on your system.

 

And again, move your Delphi installation into a VM and take care of backups. No need to install again, no need to register again and no need to bump your registration count. Perhaps you should tell your customers to do the same.

 

BTW, I wonder how many software companies still provide installation files for like 20+ years old software - at no cost. (most of those companies probably don't even exist any more)

[Anders Melander 1783]

3 hours ago, Kas Ob. said:

I am not ranting or trolling here

I think you are.

You are not presenting the subject in a neutral way and your arguments are all over the place. I'm not biting.

 

 

[Mike Torrettinni 198]

4 hours ago, Kas Ob. said:

Will such move affect you ?

Not me, but it would be nice to hear from anybody who is affected by this change - but you can already see different interpretations of Marco's comment in just a few posts here.

I don't see any big change for v7 licensees, they just might be more frequently targeted by email to upgrade, or even charged for download.

 

Expecting any service to work the same (unchanged) after 20 years is a bit over the top, no?

 

[Lachlan Gemmell 33]

9 hours ago, dummzeuch said:

While you have a valid subscription, convert your license to a "Network named user license" and install the Embarcadero License Center (server under e.g. Ubuntu on a virtual machine). Then you can have as many installations on your LAN as you want and even use several at the same time (there is a limit, but I haven't hit it yet). And you will never again need a "bump" either.

Back in January I spoke to EMBT about switching to a Network Named License. I backed out when they told me that the license agreement restricts you to just 3 installations. I knew from your blog posts that back in 2018 they weren't enforcing this restriction, but I was worried that had changed. Sounds like that's not the case?

[dummzeuch 1505]

13 hours ago, Uwe Raabe said:

Not sure how you do, but I have always just copy the Delphi 7 license data to another machine without any further registration. Actually I guess that Delphi 7 is not even covered by the ELC server - it is just way too old. At least you should still have the original CD, so no need to download.

You are right: ELC only covers Delphi 2007 and later. Delphi 6 and 7 did not need activation, that was optional. I'm not sure about Delphi 2005 and 2006 though.

[dummzeuch 1505]

13 hours ago, Uwe Raabe said:

I wonder how many software companies still provide installation files for like 20+ years old software - at no cost. (most of those companies probably don't even exist any more)

Neither does Borland or Codegear.

[dummzeuch 1505]

6 hours ago, Lachlan Gemmell said:

Back in January I spoke to EMBT about switching to a Network Named License. I backed out when they told me that the license agreement restricts you to just 3 installations. I knew from your blog posts that back in 2018 they weren't enforcing this restriction, but I was worried that had changed. Sounds like that's not the case?

Depends who you ask. I have the impression that the terms of these licenses and what kind of restrictions they impose is not that widely known in the company. But I might be wrong.

 

I don't remember reading about a restriction of 3 installations (but I may have overlooked it) and since there is no way to see the number of (passive) installations in ELC and also no way to unregister an installation I don't see how they could enforce it. Of course they could update the ELC software to enforce it and have new Delphi versions require the update. Maybe that's not 3 installations in total but 3 active installations, that is "the IDE is running" at the same time?

 

For me even only 3 installations would have been better than being stuck with a debugging problem on a Friday with no way to install Delphi on the computer in question, because a "bump" was not possible until Monday (or at all).

 

I think we currently have about 20 Delphi 2007 installations, most of them are only used once or twice a year, some not even once a year. But when I need them, it's usually in a hurry. But not all these installations are Network Named User licenses, we had quite a few ordinary licenses before, that were either from an upgrade or came for free with later Delphi versions. These were never converted.

Edited May 25, 2020 by dummzeuch

[Fr0sT.Brutal 900]

If the subject is just about setup ISOs then they are likely remain in torrents. Emba could setup its own initial seeder if they're worrying about bandwidth but still care of old customers. If not, old ISOs will still live in torrents but without Emba.

Edited May 25, 2020 by Fr0sT.Brutal

[Uwe Raabe 2057]

6 hours ago, Lachlan Gemmell said:

that the license agreement restricts you to just 3 installations.

That is not true! Installations are not limited.

 

The restriction is that you can run multiple instances of the same IDE version (10.2 and 10.3 are different versions) on up to three different machines at the same time. That is you can run Delphi 10.3 on the same machine (as many as it can cope with) and still start Delphi 10..3 on two more VMs or physical machines, where each can run multiple instances. Together with that you can run Delphi 10.2 instances on up to three different machines, be it the a same as above or others.

 

You just have to make sure that all these machines can connect to the ELC Server and you are logged in at these machines with the same user name the license is bound to (you can change that yourself in the ELC Server).

 

My installations are spread over dozens of VMs and I never reached that 3-instance-limit.

[Guest]

32 minutes ago, Uwe Raabe said:

You just have to make sure that all these machines can connect to the ELC Server and you are logged in at these machines with the same user name the license is bound to (you can change that yourself in the ELC Server).

I might be wrong about this ELC, from documentation and support request page, i understand this ELC is fully offline , right ? 

 

 

But it does need an activation email from Embarcadero with ELC with specified server IP address, so even if ELC doesn't require online connection/checking with Embarcadero servers, you will need an email in case that ELC server the host failed  or in need to reinstall or move, means your last activation email is invalid and useless, hence the question will be still valid for renew license of older versions,

Will embarcadero will supply you with such email wasting their people time ? (without current active subscription) 

 

[Uwe Raabe 2057]

11 minutes ago, Kas Ob. said:

i understand this ELC is fully offline , right ? 

Right. You only need to contact the Embarcadero Server when you register your Network License with your ELC instance and when this license get updated while your are on Update Subscription.

 

14 minutes ago, Kas Ob. said:

But it does need an activation email from Embarcadero with ELC with specified server IP address, so even if ELC doesn't require online connection/checking with Embarcadero servers, you will need an email in case that ELC server the host failed  or in need to reinstall or move, means your last activation email is invalid and useless, hence the question will be still valid for renew license of older versions,

I am not sure if I understand you here. As I said above: you need to register your Network License once when you enter it into your ELC Server instance. You also need to update this License whenever a new Delphi version is released and your license is still under Update Subscription. Without any Update Subscription the Network License stays valid inside your ELC Server. What do you mean with renew license of older versions? I still don't get the meaning of this term. AFAIK, any valid Delphi license up to a recent version also covers all previous versions down to Delphi 2007. At least my own licenses do.
 

I also don't get the IP address issue. The ELC server is not bound to any IP address. Only the server name must rename the same. That is similar to the normal Named Workstation license, which is also bound to the computer name. I haven't been in the need to try, but it should be possible to re-install the ELC Server with the given login credentials and certificate number (optional) as long as the server name matches the previous one.

 

I can't help and I don't mean to insult, but your arguments feel like just trying to forcibly construct a broken system where nothing is broken in the first place.

[Guest]

Chieftain @Uwe Raabe , There is no insult, and i am really sorry if i am sound stupid here.

 

I am using simple logic in all of this, in the screenshot i attached above, there is list of reasons to request new ELC email activation, of them there is changing hard drive and network card, both has nothing to do with computer name (hostname), so the logic here dictate that Embarcadero has a mechanism to establish and lock your network license to to your server hardware, right ? i mean you can use the same email for ever, may be that is the case, i don't know.

 

That was first, second the email will contain of list of avaiable license per IDE to use, right ? i mean it not simple you can use up to version X, but a list.

 

Marco words was the following :

"allowing past customers to download their products again and renew their licences   without a time limit" what i am missing here !

 

so if they are limiting ability to renew older versions based on time and your active subscription because you are pas customer, they can even do that with Network Named Licenses based onthe logic above, and this will make the method you suggested (again thank you ) with VM to be once and for all (forever), somehow not so assuring, right ?

 

Don't feel obligate to answer and wate your time, if you see this as wasting time, may be i am wrong here and ELC will solve this, but also may be not (there is no smoke without fire), i am hoping it is not, the whole thread i started is about what the community think and feel, if this will affect you and your business then sound your voice to Embarcadero itself, or discuss it here, just your opinion.

[dummzeuch 1505]

The easiest way to protect against ELC server failures, is running it in a VM and keeping a working backup of that machine. We use a XenServer VM and run ELC under a minimal Ubuntu server, so the backups aren't that large.

[Guest]

@dummzeuch Thank you, that is great to know, The question is now very simple now : does your VM with ELC need access to internet (Embarcadero servers) to be able to serve your local network IDE's ?

[dummzeuch 1505]

54 minutes ago, Kas Ob. said:

@dummzeuch Thank you, that is great to know, The question is now very simple now : does your VM with ELC need access to internet (Embarcadero servers) to be able to serve your local network IDE's ?

The answer is equally simple: Once it has been activated, No.

[Bill Meyer 337]

On 5/24/2020 at 11:59 AM, Uwe Raabe said:

Not sure how you do, but I have always just copy the Delphi 7 license data to another machine without any further registration. Actually I guess that Delphi 7 is not even covered by the ELC server - it is just way too old. At least you should still have the original CD, so no need to download.

I have no issue with a limit on the time in which versions could be downloaded, but prior to the recent bump to installation counts, I learned the hard way that my venerable copy of D7 could not be installed as licensed, despite my having the installables and the license code. And I am sorry, but that's a bad policy.

Back in the day, I used to license new releases whether I needed them or not, just to support a company I valued. Now we are asked to pay impressive license fees, and if we do not stay current, we lose the ability to reinstall old versions, which may occasionally be needed for one reason or another. And curiously, the mantra has been that developers don't understand marketing. Sorry, but that dog won't hunt. Any of us who have made our living through contract work or custom development certainly have hard earned knowledge of marketing. And as to marketing, any recent promotion of Delphi apart from embarcadero.com?

[Bill Meyer 337]

And to be very clear... anyone who thinks that letting me install my old D7 will have ANY impact on sales of more recent licenses is clearly ignorant of the product, as well as the market.

[David Schwartz 426]

I have mixed feelings about this stuff. One big one is that Borland / Inprise really dropped the ball back in the D6/D7 years when they thought it was a Good Idea to hitch their wagon to .NET and everything Microsoft. They made some improvements in the language that left a lot of customers in the dust holding a bag of rocks. Here we are today and they're complaining that these same users STILL don't think it's worthwhile to invest in moving past D6/D7. Sheesh. Developers cost 2x-3x more today than they did back then, and if it didn't make financial sense to upgrade back then, then surely it makes worse sense today. Embt is not making any more friends complaining about the resources these legacy clients are costing them. The problem isn't the compiler -- it's the 3rd-party components like Dream Components that died on the vine and couldn't easily move forward.

 

If they want to fix the problem, Embt should consider buying the rights to these old component libs and investing their own resources in making them work on the latest versions of Delphi. Add them to GetIt and give people a legitimate upgrade path. Whoa! What a novel idea! Still, a lot of folks still won't consider upgrading because it's harder than ever to find developers with solid Delphi skills today. (I think it's easier to find COBOL programmers today than Delphi folks!)

 

Another option is to have a separate maintenance program for legacy products. I have not found a single job in the past decade doing NEW Delphi work -- it's all supporting LEGACY apps that were written in the D4-D7 years. Maybe they're using newer versions of the compiler, but it seems silly to me that the company is COMPLAINING about the fact that all of these old legacy clients are refusing to pay their ridiculous maintenance fees to stay exactly where they are. It's nice that Embt wants people to move forward, but until more jobs start showing up for NEW DELPHI PROJECTS, they're doing little more than Sisyphus pushing a rock up a hill while complaining about the effort involved.

 

They (previous Mgt) created this problem but they don't seem to want to fix it.

 

The world is moving to Open Source Software. Delphi is one if the few remaining products that's not just NOT OSS, but VERY EXPENSIVE for commercial use.  Microsoft subsidizes the crap out of their dev tools, as do others like IBM and Oracle. I think the best thing for Delphi would be for Embt to push to get Delphi acquired by a company that can afford to move it in the direction of OSS by subsidizing it from other product revenues. Instead, they keep raising the costs to customers who are mostly using it to MAINTAIN OLD CODE.

 

I'm working on my 4th or 5th gig since 2009 that's maintaining code written prior to D2007 and it hasn't changed at all. The company has NO PLANS FOR FURTHER DELPHI DEVELOPMENT beyond maintaining their legacy code. They pay for maintenance updates, but so what? A couple of places I worked are extremely hesitant to allow any sort of large-scale refactoring -- they say if they wanted to invest in that amount of work, they'd just assume switch to rebuilding the thing from scratch in C#/.NET or something else -- not Delphi.

 

WHERE ARE THE NEW PROJECTS THAT ARE CREATING MORE DELPHI JOBS? 

 

This is a MARKETING PROBLEM for Embt. I don't think they have any right to complain when they have steadfastly maintained a posture that has gotten them exactly nowhere in the market. There's no evidence that their products are being used for more NEW product development than to support LEGACY projects. Where's the beef? Or rather, Where's the NEW work?

 

(And don't respond with, "well, we're doing new stuff!" If you are, say how many devs you've hired to help with the NEW stuff vs. to maintain the OLD code. Rather, show me, say, 10 job postings made to any of the popular job boards that are legit posts to hire people for NEW DELPHI-based projects. Nobody hires new devs for new Delphi work -- it's a reward given to long-time employees. The new-hires are almost always for back-filling open spots maintaining the old code. We've lost 3 people in the past 6 months who worked with Delphi, and I'm the only new-hire to replace one. Now Mgt is running around like chickens with their heads cut off because they failed to plan for this. Two of these guys left to work on stuff that's "more fun"; one non-Delphi and one is another legacy project but with some slow growth of new features. EVERYTHING I've seen in the past decade, or been contacted by recruiters about, has been MAINTAINING LEGACY CODE. I've found NO NEW WORK on Delphi, especially within 500 miles of where I live.)