Aurora Freeware Edition

You may have noticed that Aurora development and support has been struggling since we missed our deadline at the end of last year.  This is to let you all know what is happening.

Last year was a very bad year sales wise.  By the end of the year, we took a serious loss.  We've done several cost cutting measures with the hope of recovering from last year's slump, but even with the savings we can't pay the bills at our current level of sales (Year-to-date we've only sold three copies of Aurora).  A business that does not make money is really a hobby, not a business.  As a result, I have needed to timeshare the unprofitable  Aurora development time with other projects.  Combined with a couple development plan detours (like the installer), we've been unable to provide the level of product updates and support that we were once known for.

As a result, I am making the 1.x version of Aurora a freeware product.  Updates will continue to be done, but on a hobby basis instead of a commercial product basis.

DMX:
The ultimate goal is to make Aurora DMX compatible in as short of time as possible under the circumstances.  Hardware vendors (D-Light and LOR) are taking steps to make their products DMX compatible instead of using just their own proprietary protocols.  As a result, the obstacle that once existed regarging multiprotocol support in Aurora is largely diminishing on its own.  Version 1.1 of Aurora will fix copy/paste and a handful of other issues.  Version 1.1 will be the last version of Aurora 1.x to support the D-Light and LOR protocols.  Starting with version 1.2, Aurora will become a DMX only product.  This greatly simplifies the continued development and support of Aurora into the DMX era.  Support for the proprietary protocols will not return until version 2.

Version 2:
The future of version 2 remains uncertain.  If the high end Christmas display market turns around, then development on 2.x may resume.  If so, version 2.0 will be a commercial product just as 1.0 was.

The key to unlock Aurora 1.x as freeware is:
[Key Removed - Aurora is no longer freeware]








Edited by LightsOnLogan - 30 Nov 2011 at 9:09am

Completely understandable, but still...WOW.  

As someone who doesn't see himself buying any DMX fixtures... wow.  As far as giving away the same product that I paid for, well, that's irritating to me but then I'm sometimes known as a grumpy old fart.

That is good news for people just starting out... But not so good news for the people who have already paid for the product and have been waiting for updates to fix their $99 program that is now being given away for free.

Queb,

You will not need DMX fixtures to take advantage of DMX... the hardware vendors have been gradually opening up their hardware to DMX firmware.  The DIY crowd has done a great deal to push things in this direction.  All this means is that you will use your same hardware (an ACx16 for instance), but drive it with the DMX protocol instead of the D-Light protocol. 

baelinc,
As a paid customer, you will obviously receive priority over the freeware customers when it comes to software support.  We're still actively updating the program (that hasn't changed); we're simply being honest regarding future timelines and the level of support attention that we are able to give to new customers (and pricing the product accordingly). 

We could have chosen from two other paths:
1 - Just close up shop and go away (leaving everyone hanging)
2 - Keep stalling and providing less than the best service

Aurora has had a few years as a version 1 product.  As with every version 1 product out there, we learned a lot along the way and wish we had done some things differently.  The optimist in me believes that the market will turn around.  When it does, we'll be able to make a comeback having learned our lessons for version 2. 

Slinkard,
If the market can't support version 2, then I may consider drafting the official architecture and making letting it be developed as an open source community project.  Actually, I'd love to port Aurora over to Linux but haven't had the time to put into learning a new development environment.

As for version 1, some contractual obligations prevent release of the source at this time (I looked into it), but if development really stalls beyond maintainability then I might be able to abstract those out into supporting DLLs making the remaining source available for community use.  In any case, I can guarantee this will not happen prior to September.

I'm not opposed to the idea... if you wish to continue to discuss it, let's move the discussion into a new thread.