I love B4X. Is it lasting forever?

Sandman said:

That's a strong statement. Do you have some facts to back it up, such as a detailed, public, written plan published by Anywhere Software? If so, I'd very much like to read it.

All I've seen is something to the effect of "I have a plan, don't worry about it", which isn't enough to make me stop worrying, I'm sorry to say.

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I just speak based on my experience. If it doesn't enough to convince you, I am sorry.
No one should trust or believe me. Even MS said Windows 10 was the last version, I did believe it.

Guys... I like keeping the "good things"...

One good thing... is the answer - at the question... is this tool doing my job ? Yes it is doing...

Is anyone knows what will happen at the future... No !

Is there a way to keep all the things as are they working now ? I think No... and this is because ... "as History teach us"...

have a look at the OSes.... was CPM... DOS... Windows... (do you think that this way is the normal?)
have a look at basic.... was BASIC, QuickBasic-Qbasic, VisualBasic, .net (do you think that this way is the normal?)

.net ...has nothing to do with BASIC... ... also Windows is a different approach of Operating system... (and don;t forget windows had never lost the terminal-shell... actually dos)

I think Sandman... this is a Fact... don't you think ?

ps: @Sandman I appreciate your opinions... and ofcourse you are talking from the side of logic... but this world never "worked" with logic... and if we target the word-world...and specific this world at Informatics... will see that we are just "crazy"

I hope and plan to continue with the development of B4X for many years. I'm doing it for 12 years (actually 17 years if you count Basic4ppc) and hopefully it will continue to thrive in the future.

As much as I believe that cooperation is the best way for a company to move forward, even more so I believe that the best way is to have the right King. Because in the end the King-Director shapes the final product.

Ofcourse the "environment" will always be the place of battle... and for B4X a part of envivronment is the OS... Android, Windows, Ubuntu, MacOS...
other part is the way of "thinking" the people use it... so there are many parts...

If for example.. B4X sold at Google... ..now will have in this thread a BOT... or better a guy (that reading by the book the answers) and not Erel... or even... that project RIP
If was Microsoft ... we had an MS before B4X... and all products cost some thousand $$$ by the year... and having free only the B4J-Turtle...
What will be the best of it ? - do you think that Erel selling this product to a big company will make this tool better or it will maximize EOL ?

Erel said:

I hope and plan to continue with the development of B4X for many years. I'm doing it for 12 years (actually 17 years if you count Basic4ppc) and hopefully it will continue to thrive in the future.

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Since, for example, B4A requires constant updates to keep up with SDK and toolchain changes, is that kind of maintenance possible by someone else in your company?
The answer may well be "not until this company will generate enough income to have a full-time developer beside me"

I'm the main developer behind B4X since the beginning. From time to time and for specific tasks I'm being helped by others.
Some SDK changes are simple and some are quite complicated. There are no strict rules.

Just the simple fact that there is someone else who can work on the B4X codebase, is reassuring

Erel said:

From time to time and for specific tasks I'm being helped by others.

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I help Erel.

What you do not believe me ??
But you believe members claiming here "They will live longer than Erel" !!

Guys... If I was Erel: from a point on I wouldn't answer in his position... may be locking the thread too.... I feel he gave us - too much freedom here...

You make him... feel ill... i know the feeling... if someone says to you... "hey tomorrow may be you are not going to live..."

How you will have the "power" continue your day...? You know something... "developers" have feelings too... These days is for giving love and hugs (yes i know i am at the XMAS mode)... not for talking things like this... may be a more delicate talk would be better..

For Example... a Wish -purpose- to Share the code... or better to share the "work" to have to do Erel for B4X... to help him..
or a wish if someone want to buy the B4X or sell to Google... (hope not)....

but hey this is life... please not mention death... (this year I ve lost loved people)

...And something last to add... Erel decided to create this language, prefer to say this "idea"... We are here and we can talk to him !! ... He could just changing his "nickname" answering with many nicknames at this forum... and when sometimes not having the answer.. could say... "I will report it at the company... and we will answer to you at the future"... but he didn't... we all know that he is Erel and can support this tool... What, if you didn't know that is Erel... and think that is a company with thousand employees ?

But he decide to fight, support his own company, and answer every question he can as Erel at the front-line... may be seems one man-show... but hey his passion - giving power to all of us continue... and why not taking his example... to support our small companies... but also "enables" us sharing through this forum our ideas and also helping other members...

Erel said:

...and hopefully...

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This is where the (reasonable) concern is for those who are anxious about it. There needs to be more than hope: a succession plan; e.g., Will B4X be released to open source once Erel is no longer willing or able to work on it?

I know there are plans to clone Erel, but that's still probably a few years off.

This is a rather difficult issue. But I trust in Erel that he has also taken far-sighted precautions so that B4X will not die out. He has simply invested too much work for that and surprises us again and again with new solutions or approaches. What do I mean?

Years ago there was an operating system for mobile phones that was supposed to be free and in no way proprietary and compete with Apple. It was called Android. What has become of Android in the meantime? It hasn't got any better, on the contrary, with each new version Android develops into a monster, a nightmare for programmers. Not that Android is bad. But more and more restrictions (for security reasons, of course, what else) make it more and more difficult for developers to create good applications for Android. Be it the generally denied access to necessary resources in the mobile devices themselves (download folder, IMEI, etc.) or the developer policies that change almost daily and have only one purpose: to generate money for Google. If you don't play along as a developer, you're out of the game.

From this point of view, it is not always an advantage if a company is large and has a dominant market position, but is ultimately only interested in its own profit. Google will also realise this at some point, but then it will be too late. From that point of view, I am quite happy with the current state of affairs.

Erel is very close to the community, tries to help where he can and is always pushing B4X forward. Does he ever sleep? He puts a lot of energy into the whole thing and we should all honour that. That is exactly the right way. A good product with a fantastic developer community. That's how a good development environment prevails in the long run. Something like this can't really fail. I only hope that Erel can also generate enough profit. We all know how hard that is, it's not a no-brainer.
From that point of view, it's not a bad idea to have a team of developers develop B4X, there are enough capable and trusty people for that here in the community.

Everyone should relax. I've been here for many of those years too and I think the point that was made earlier that the whole B4J and B4A is open source answers your concerns.

Erel said:

I'm the main developer behind B4X since the beginning. From time to time and for specific tasks I'm being helped by others.
Some SDK changes are simple and some are quite complicated. There are no strict rules

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CyberDroidWare said:

the whole B4J and B4A is open source

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I don't think that is correct. If I'm wrong, I'd love to hear about it and also see somebody compile B4J and B4A from scratch.

<Erel in March>
Mar 14, 2022

This valid question was asked many times in the last 17 years, since I first released basic4ppc.
During these 17 years, Microsoft, as an example, has killed so many tools that I can no longer count them.
Even Xamarin that was a huge purchase for Microsoft is being faded out.

The company size doesn't always matter. In many cases the opposite is actually true.
I hope to continue to develop B4X tools for many years to come.

Two more things:
1. B4A and B4J frameworks are open source which means that anyone can download the source code and modify it.

I'm well aware of that post. It is my understanding that "B4A and B4J frameworks" does neither equal "B4J" nor "B4A". So, as far as I can tell, it's a part of B4A and B4J that is open source. But not the whole thing; not enough to compile it into your own version of the products. Which obviously means nobody would be able to continue to develop and support B4X if Anywhere Software ceased to exist.

I guess at the lowest level you would, but if you are talking about the IDE, maybe that's a question for Erel.

I want to build mobile App, learning and trying some development tools before with no luck and has no chemistries with them, then I found B4X.

I start to learn until now and successfully create some apps. Furthermore, I was to make money with B4A app for client. (exclude app I made in my signature)

I'm not worried about how B4X in the future, since I saw Erel continuously replying many posts created by community here, so there is absolutely no doubt to hesitate his consistency of maintaining the ecosystem.

B4X is not the only tools I used for development, I just equip my self with B4X for any change in the future for opportunity come to create app for other client request.

B4A and B4J libraries / frameworks are open source: https://github.com/AnywhereSoftware
The IDE itself currently isn't open source. It is built using several commercial SDKs so it is not simple to make it open source.

Erel said:

B4A and B4J libraries / frameworks are open source: https://github.com/AnywhereSoftware
The IDE itself currently isn't open source.

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And I think you consider the compiler (transpiler really) to be part of the IDE, is that correct? Or is it part of the repository on GitHub and I just didn't understand it?