General Pluto Direction

[archived]

Hi all,

Just some general questions which are primarily directed at Pluto staff themselves but are worthy of the public forum I think.

1. Is the Pluto release schedule available with a rough idea of features aimed for? I imagine that internally you guys are working to project plans etc., is it possible for the community to know any details of this? Not so that we would hold you to dates and features, just to get an idea.

2. I have heard some mention of a March release. Is this when you are aiming for the first stable (non-development) release?

3. Is there a way for us to manually confirm upgrade activities? At the moment when a new version is released a reboot will automatically upgrade all the machines. Sometimes this might not be desirable.

4. Is the software likely to remain with the current open source model for the forseeable future or will released versions implement a different licensing model?

5. Once there is a released version, will it be possible to actually license the software so that compatible hardware sales can be made with it bundled or at least tailored for Pluto. The current free usage license prevents this. I understand that this may be in competition to Pluto themselves but still is an effective way to get better market penetration. It seems this is what Monster are doing, but I could be wrong.

6. What is the releationship with Monster? Are they just a licensed software user with their own hardware or do they maintain some sort of stake in Pluto? Is there a likelihood that they might buy Pluto and change the licensing models?

7. Even though I recognise that you have an open source software model, you obviously employ a staff that are the primary designers/developers of the software. Have you, or would you, consider outsourced work or fixed payment to 3rd parties for development of software modules. I see this may be a way to speed up your rollout plan and enable hardware sales to happen earlier, therefore starting to generate income sooner.

I understand if some of these questions can't be answered at this time, however all answers are appreciated. My interest currently only stems from pure curiosity, rather than any real commerical interest. But I do find the current home automation area interesting and I thing the Pluto design is quite solid and may be tempted to extend it beyond a hobby.

Thanks
Darren

[archived]

1. all our features list or support devices are in our mantis. it might be possible that it's a clear overall picture but mantis is our tool when it comes to this.
we work with timeline and schedule the work load but that's our internal plans.
2. we're planning to implement all that we can until the end of this year, test few months and have a stable (non-development) release next March
3. when a new upgrade is available your system will update packages list and will ask you what to do. upgrade or not. you can choose not to upgrade.
4. & 5. the non-development version will be available with hw for sale. the development version will remain free like it is now.
6. Monster or anyone else doesn't have any stakes in Pluto, the company is privately held. As far as i know, there's no arrangement between pluto and monster.
7. we have our own staff, but we accept any kind of help related to development new features, adding support for devices, etc.
we don't have at this this any financial arrangement with pluto users that might helps us. i don't think we ever will.

[archived]

Thanks Dan,

Just on Number 3, how do we make this interactive? For each upgrade we have had so far it just automatically installs when the machines are rebooted.

[archived]

the upgrade it's working like this.
there's a cron for /usr/pluto/bin/DownloadUpdates.sh
this will update the packages list. as soon as it finishes a popup message will be displayed on orbiter, asking if you want to upgrade or not.