Colleagues,

Here we go again - another round to save InterBase from the fate Dale
Fuller is determined to make for it. This time, though, we have much more
in hand to work with. We don't even have to BUY a database now. In
January, we had enough investor interest to start up. Needless to say,
those investors went away when Dale Fuller made his mid-February promises
and began the charade that convinced us that his intentions were good.

We now recognise that Fuller's PR over the past six months disguised his
determination to vindicate his November decision to choke IB 6 development
and put InterBase on the cold slab. We hurt his ego in January. His
elaborate campaign for personal retribution was implemented as a PR effort
that sucked volunteers (that's us!) into working around the clock to create
a viable support environment. It sucked customers into believing that what
*should* happen for InterBase was indeed *going* to happen with the
cooperation of Inprise.

Now we know that his strategy was, Dale Fuller is attempting to put
Inprise on a war footing with the community surrounding InterBase (that's
us). Already it appears he is setting up our technical colleagues inside
the Inprise walls (who have our highest respect and are personal friends to
many of us) as soldiers in this war. That is sad and destructive and,
rather than engage in it, we must sympathise with these folk and the
position they are force to take through their conditions of employment.

We are only too well aware of Inprise's record wrt InterBase. The latest
move - of putting Inprise's PR chief in charge of their token support
framework - doesn't show a glimmer of hope that Inprise is going to be
sympathetic to or supportive of a committed, technically proficient
user-developer base in the Open Source environment. Ted Shelton even seems
confused about the difference between "open sourcing" and "outsourcing".

OK, Dale Fuller hasn't released enough for anyone to do a 6.1 build this
week or even this month. He won't release the user documentation. He
won't release the technical documentation or the build framework. Most
vitally, he won't release the Test Suites. He will sell them to somebody
willing to pay $10 million for them. They are not worth $10 million to us
because we have the talent to reconstruct them ourselves.

Fuller's latest moves have made an immediate fork inevitable. A name
change looks inevitable, too. This is not a huge problem - Inprise has
helped greatly by ensuring that this 15-year-old product has practically no
brand recognition.

Work is needed. Your work. Your willingness. We have a clear view of
what needs to be done to hit the ground "in motion", if not running. We
have the strength of numbers and of skill and the "many eyes of the
bazaar". In January, we saved InterBase. Now, we must save and protect
its future.

Please start by responding to this thread - reply to this message, keeping
the subject intact and deleting the contents. Make a statement of your
position with regard to the NewCo that will stake IB henceforth.

Helen









http://www.interbase2000.org
___________________________________________________
"Ask not what your free, open-source database can do for you,
but what you can do for your free, open-source database."
(J.F.K.)