The "Death" of Motherboard Monitor

Post by **Rusty075** » Tue Jul 06, 2004 3:51 pm

After 7 years:

Alex Van Kaam has stopped further development of Motherboard Monitor

Perhaps a moment of silence for the passing of one of the great shareware apps of all time.

ChucuSCAD · Post by **ChucuSCAD** » Tue Jul 06, 2004 3:55 pm

I will fly my flag at half staff for a month.

chucuSCAD

Edward Ng · Post by **Edward Ng** » Tue Jul 06, 2004 7:58 pm

NOOOOOOOOOOO!@#@#$!@#@!#$!#@$

HammerSandwich · Post by **HammerSandwich** » Tue Jul 06, 2004 8:55 pm

Didn't he make a similar announcement about 3-4 years ago?

peerke · Post by **peerke** » Tue Jul 06, 2004 9:54 pm

HammerSandwich wrote:Didn't he make a similar announcement about 3-4 years ago?

Yep, and he was bombarded with e-mails trying to make him continue. It worked!
So start the second bombardment.. maybe including a small donation.

DanceMan · Post by **DanceMan** » Tue Jul 06, 2004 9:59 pm

Sad news, if he doesn't change his mind.

Inexplicable · Post by **Inexplicable** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 12:54 am

Ask him to GPL the code, so the project won't die away and be lost.

Pjotor · Post by **Pjotor** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 2:09 am

Inexplicable wrote:Ask him to GPL the code, so the project won't die away and be lost.

Quote from the MBM page:

no you can not get the source code, there is to much in there I got via NDA and I will not violate that

Too bad.

Post by **Rusty075** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 5:14 am

I completely understand his logic. 7 1/2 years is a long, long time to spend on a project for which you are not being paid. That's 7 1/2 years of begging manu's for info. And 7 1/2 years of answering the same user questions over and over. I'd be tired of it too.

But it's not all lost: MBM will still be the monitor of choice for any current chipset, and it would be a simple thing to add support for new chipsets through its plugin system...all it takes is someone to beg/borrow the required configuration datafrom the motherboard manufacturers. Someone will pick up the project.

Inexplicable · Post by **Inexplicable** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 6:01 am

Pjotor wrote:Quote from the MBM page:

no you can not get the source code, there is to much in there I got via NDA and I will not violate that
Too bad.

Seems the height of stupidity, though, if all that work goes to waste. The lm-sensors guys have begged the same datasheets and reverse engineered what they couldn't get and they are able to put out the source. I've never understood what the chip makers think they gain by not telling people how to use their products. As if their puny programming interfaces had any IPR worth speaking of. Morons!

wsc · Post by **wsc** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 6:18 am

if I was in his schoes, I would probably release the source. Who cares about the NDAs now that you're not going to be supporting the software anymore?

Post by **Rusty075** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 6:41 am

wsc wrote:if I was in his schoes, I would probably release the source. Who cares about the NDAs now that you're not going to be supporting the software anymore?

Probably because he enjoys owning things like a house, and a car, and the clothes on his back. Breaking an NDA could result in serious civil liability.

There's also the potential of future professional impact from breaking an NDA; he's a programmer by trade. (I think) Programmers who get a reputation for publishing confidential data tend to have short careers.

greeef · Post by **greeef** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 8:03 am

I'd have thought the name alone was worth a million dollars, no matter what software came attached with it. Glad to see he's just stepping down, not selling the name or handing it on to a retard or anything.

griff

Inexplicable · Post by **Inexplicable** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 8:04 am

Surely his NDAs are strictly time limited? A couple of years should be enough to protect the chip maker's interests.

Edward Ng · Post by **Edward Ng** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 8:11 am

Unfortunately, I would think even the terms of the NDA are protected under itself, and an NDA doesn't have to have a time restriction; if they write up the NDA to last forever, and he agrees to it, that's it. At least that's how I believe it works...

Inexplicable · Post by **Inexplicable** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 8:40 am

Edward Ng wrote:if they write up the NDA to last forever, and he agrees to it, that's it. At least that's how I believe it works...

All I know is I'd never sign an NDA like that. I hope he hasn't either.

Post by **Rusty075** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 9:39 am

Inexplicable wrote:All I know is I'd never sign an NDA like that. I hope he hasn't either.

Sure you would. His goal in getting the information is to encode it so that the sensors read correctly, after that it has no value to the programmer. (what real value it has to the manu is beyond me) It's quite different from the NDA's that places like SPCR sign, where the information itself is what has the value. Alex has no foreseeable need to share the NDA'd data, so there's no reason not to agree to keep it secret forever. If he had planned on selling MBM, then that would be quite different. (if MBM was a for-profit entity, I'd bet the manu's would be even less willing to share their data)

Inexplicable · Post by **Inexplicable** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 10:41 am

Rusty075 wrote:Sure you would.

No, I wouldn't. Definitely not for a hobby project.

Two reasons. One, I do not want to litter my future path with unnecessary legal obstructions to excercising my free will and therefore I do not sign contracts that place such restrictions on me for an unspecified period of time. Even top secret government documents get made public eventually. Why should I be required to hold a secret indefinitely? Especially, since I can't see the "secret information" before signing the NDA. Two, I want to retain the option of distributing my code in open source format. In fact, I would specifically ask it to be made clear whether the NDA concerns the confidential information only, or whether it also includes source code produced on the basis of that information. Sometimes it's possible to specifically exclude the derived (possibly uncommented) source code from the NDA.

As for work, I would view a personal NDA very critically even for a work related project. I have a time limited NDA with my employer that will be voided a certain period after leaving the job. That generally covers any confidential information I may come across at work.

nutball · Post by **nutball** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 3:30 pm

This is something that the for-free software community is going to have to work out how to deal with (along with other glaring issues unrealted to IP).

The RMS approach is all fine and that, he is in a situation where he can take the moral high-gorund. Others don't find themselves in his fortunate situation.

DanceMan · Post by **DanceMan** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 4:28 pm

The best way for us to have helped, now that it's too late, would have been to have e-mailed the motherboard and chipset manufacturers and said that we would be or had bought brand x instead of theirs because brand x had made the code available to Alex. That frustration was first on his list of reasons for quitting.

Nowhere_man · Post by **Nowhere_man** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 6:27 am

Bummer.

wheredoibegin · Post by **wheredoibegin** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 7:24 pm

Damn. That was one of those things you just expected to be around for ever.
What is there out there as an alternative if my next computer might not be supported by MBM?

shathal · Post by **shathal** » Sat Jul 10, 2004 2:39 am

Well, technically it's not really the mobo makes.

It's all in the hardware ASIC's, by and large... most of it at any rate.

luminous · Post by **luminous** » Wed Jul 14, 2004 2:01 pm

Rusty075 wrote:After 7 years:

Alex Van Kaam has stopped further development of Motherboard Monitor

Perhaps a moment of silence for the passing of one of the great shareware apps of all time.

I've been away from this site for a little while. Just read this post, and I'm certainly having a few moments of silence. Maybe if I had donated something to this chap he would still be continuing this project

The "Death" of Motherboard Monitor

The "Death" of Motherboard Monitor

Re: The "Death" of Motherboard Monitor