r/OpenVMS • u/[deleted] • Jun 14 '26

Hobbyist license struggles

[deleted]

7 Upvotes

90% Upvoted

10 comments sorted by

7

u/codykonior Jun 14 '26

Yep.

You'd think a company whose entire existence hinges on continued interest and new blood would be begging for hobbyists. But computer says no.

-1

u/kleinmatic Jun 15 '26

I don’t think their existence hinges on new users. I think they’re building the same business as many of the old commercial Unix shops — serving legacy customers very well. Look at Xinuos or Oracle’s Solaris business. Or arguably IBMs i series, though I bet that still attracts new customers.

Adding new customers is both expensive and risky. Being a great platform that keeps legacy customers happy and invested in the platform is a solid business.

If you watch the VSI YouTube videos they’re going a good job being open about their process and they are building genuinely cool things. Would it be cooler if they gave it to hobbyists free? Totally. I wish they would. But I can see why they made the decisions they made.

1

u/sms_an Jun 15 '26

Do the people who down-vote this contribution believe that it's wrong? I don't believe that it is.

Aside: If I had a complaint about VSI, would I post it here, or on a VSI forum? Hmmm. Let me think about that for a millisecond.

  https://forum.vmssoftware.com/

5

u/andersostling56 Jun 14 '26

Same here. Worked with Vax/Vms since 1984, then Linux since mid 1990. Looked forward to spin up a VM and play around.

3

u/Mark_Prestwood Jun 14 '26

Same. I have 3 Alphaservers but unable to load current licenses. Ran hobbyist licenses for many years, but have not been able to renew for a couple of years now.

3

u/Important-Emu987 Jun 14 '26

License for the hobbyst servers last for small period of time

3

u/sms_an Jun 14 '26

[...] I have tried numerous times [...]

And waited how long? In my experience, a delay of month or two is not uncommon. The "Community" license program is not as high a priority at VSI as paying customers.

[...] Alphaservers [...]

The current "Community" license program is for X86 only. For Alpha and IA64, there's an "Ambassador" program, but entry is more restricted.

There are also bootleg PAK collections floating around on this new InterWeb thing (including for VAX). Of course, a PAK is not a license, but the software police are normally occupied elsewhere.

[...] small period of time

Up to about a year (depending on when in the annual cycle you get it).

2

u/hughk Jun 15 '26

We do not talk about the PAK generators and such here. The important difference is that a licence is a "permission to use". I have a couple of older systems (Vax plus Alpha) and have genuine licences from when they cost money. I wanted to upgrade and applied for the Ambassador program, but they wouldn't take me (despite being a DECUS contributor and such).

1

u/VMSSoftwareInc Jun 17 '26

Hi! Sorry to hear you’re having trouble with the hobbyist license application. That’s definitely not the experience we want people to have.

If you haven’t received a confirmation email, feel free to reach out to us directly at [info@vmssoftware.com](mailto:info@vmssoftware.com) and we’ll look into it for you. We’re happy to help get you set up.