[Passed] ALix & RAW.coinerella - Six Month Contract (Proposed 11/2015)

[Nagalim]

I guess my concerns would be satiated by a statement about the event that a grant doesn’t pass in 6 months. Who will keep copies of the software if it is not open source?

[willy]

No documentation

Please have a look at https://coinerella.com/index.php/ALix.

pair
https://alix.coinerella.com/volume/?pair=x&frame=y

Returns the ALix data for the requested pair X in time frame Y. 

Note: The "columns" value shows the number of stored data arrays for the pair in said time frame and is currently used for debugging purposes only. 
 We check whether our gathered data doesn't contain more than one data array per day. 
 In this example the total volume for 7 days was 74084.68313822. This value is divided by the number in the "columns" value, which should be identical with the "frame" value, to get the "alix" result. 

There is always room for improvement, in this case describing that the GUI shows those exact time frames, which I falsely assumed to be obvious, but you can not claim there is no (essential) documentation at all.

simple timeline graphics

I did my research here. The PHP libraries I found suitable cost around 100-300 dollars for commercial use. I’m not willing to pay that kind of money out of my own pocket, but I can surely imagine to include that feature.

Do we pay another 3 grand for another 6 months?

No. Here is what I answered @desrever to nearly the exact same question:

I’ve divided the cost report in to running and software costs. Running costs are 1090 for 6 months or 181.67 NBT per month. That could be lower in the second contract term, because I might have a better feeling what “maintenance package” is really required

There is room left to reduce server and CloudFlare costs. I’ll have to think about it. Not sure what extend of reduction I would be comfortable with yet. The absolute minimum of server costs would be 20 NBT / month without CF plus maintenance hours á 30 NBT.

Did we pay for daology? I don’t remember that grant.

I was talking about the future. Daology is a company, no non profit. I assume they will have to generate revenue at some point. I see no advertisement on the site, so I assume that the communities had to pay for it.

I guess my concerns would be satiated by a statement about the event that a grant doesn’t pass in 6 months.

You mean a follow up grant wouldn’t pass?

[Nagalim]

Asking for contingencies in case it doesn’t is not predicting its failure. I’m just saying that this would not be an issue if open sourced, but as you don’t want to open source we have to think about possible contingencies, such as if we are not able to reach consensus on the affordable continuation of this project in the future.

When daology starts asking for custodial grants to cover their programming costs I’ll start asking similar questions.

[masterOfDisaster]

if I look at the revenue Nu made in the last weeks, the financial situation is better than in the recent months and I dare say it should be possible for Nu to afford this.

And what if you looked at previous 12 months?

I’m not trying to imply that Nu shouldn’t care about money, because there’s (temporarily?) a lot of BTC on T4 buy side.
Nu needs to be prepared for the next steps, of which FLOT and decentralized higher tier management is an important part.

What I was trying to say is:
Nu is both in need for such a service and can afford it. That would have been different to some degree 12 months ago.

[mhps]

you can not claim there is no (essential) documentation at all.

You are right. Sorry I forgot that page.

The PHP libraries I found suitable cost around 100-300 dollars for commercial use.

I thought there are several adquate free ones, such as http://dygraphs.com/

I’m not trying to imply that Nu shouldn’t care about money, because there’s (temporarily?) a lot of BTC on T4 buy side.

The BTC in T4 is temporary. A lot of buyback BTCs have gone into the hands of non-shareholders and will leave Nu. If tier 4 and the buy back value are not preserved well when the BTC price tide changes Nu will have an unprecedentedly hard time to maintain the buy side. Development is importand but we should spend it carefully.

[masterOfDisaster]

If tier 4 and the buy back value are not preserved well when the BTC price tide changes Nu will have an unprecedentedly hard time to maintain the buy side.

I fully agree!

And that’s why I’d rather see a part of the funds spent on this kind of development than on so much more and (at least partly) predictable buybacks that make people rich who buy today and sell in one of the buy walls in the coming weeks.

A motion to preserve the T4 buy back value is something I have on my agenda once the T4 Circulating NBT threshold motion did pass.

[cryptog]

I am fine with the amount request.

The only thing I need to discuss is the license.

So right now Nu would have to pay whenever the software is upgraded? (Nu could use the version it paid for for ever) or is it a license that lets Nu use the software for a certain amount of time?

Also, I am wondering why the software code is closed.
In case it is open sourced, obviously @willy would need to find another business model but it could make it more transparent.
What about maintenance fees?

[willy]

So right now Nu would have to pay whenever the software is upgraded? (Nu could use the version it paid for for ever)

Yes.

I’ve added the following paragraph to https://daology.org/proposals/f1321650972f798a608a40a82bf07854e36b0e69

Terms:
…
-The software’s code will by audited by trusted community member wolly_sammoth with every update.

This grant already received 10% of votes. Thanks for that, but that was a little early. Anyhow, it is now open for voting.

[Mark]

@willy we are OK to pay for your valuable work, but why do you not want to make it open source? Please, arguments.

[willy]

I want to build a long term revenue source for Coinerella with this service.
Open sourcing might threaten this goal because I could easily be replaced with someone else doing it for less money.

Give me some time, maybe one or two paid upgrades and I’ll get confident that I’ll be hired again regardless if it’s open source or not.

Needless to say, I think the audit solution I proposed is a good middle ground for the mean time.

[Cybnate]

Is it an idea to have the source code encrypted in escrow? As we are talking a future trusted service I would strongly recommend to have at least that in place to ensure continuation.

[willy]

@mhps I had a little time to play with dygraphs today. I’m currently exploring the possibilities… good catch.

Above: This is how our last 4 hours would look like in a chart.
What else would be useful?

[Nagalim]

I really want to vote for this but I need a response to @Cybnate’s question.

[willy]

Sorry, but I can’t imagine how that would work.

[Nagalim]

you encrypt the source code, give it to someone for escrow (multisig?). Then, give the private key to specific trusted members of the community that will collude with you and not the escrow. The idea being that if you disappear and you don’t take a whole section of the community with you we will possibly be able to continue the project.
[best not-an-expert face I can muster]

[mhps]

I am glad that you find it useful. Maybe leaving the raw data as scattered dots and only plot 15min and 4 hr moving average as connected curves will make the graph easier to read.

[cryptog]

In case Nu can use for ever the version it paid for, how is that possible in practice? Are you going to maintain for free a server running that particular version for ever?

[willy]

Sorry. I think I misunderstood the first time.
I would like to present you with a more sophisticated answer but I am currently on a mobile device.

Think about ALix as it would be world of warcraft.

You buy the base game. (this licence proposal)
You buy expansion packs. (future updates)
You pay a monthly fee to continue playing. (maintenance costs)

If you don’t pay the monthly fee, you have your wow licence, but you can’t use it. That would be the case here as well for ALix and raw.coinerella.

[Cybnate]

Thanks for your response @willy But comparing this with a game is a bit unfortunate in my view. This is a piece of software I believe NU will need to rely on, that is not the case with a game. Therefore providing the Shareholders with the ability to continue the service in some way or the other when you are not available during an agreed timeframe and potential some other conditions is a requirement in my view. This assumes correct payments have occurred.

[cryptog]

The piece of software is very useful but the license is a bit problematic since Nu wants to have control over the code.
I would vote immediately for that grant if @willy is willing to give away the basic code at the end of the term so that Nu is left with something in case Nu cannot pay any more for coinerella or @willy is unable to continue the service for whatever reason.