License for PLEG and PLTS Plugins (Starting April 1, 2014)

Plugins & Plugin Development Program Logic (PLEG)
#41

I agree in that I don’t mind paying for the plugin. Its like paying for an app in the App store.

I think its a little strange to be limited to 4 pleg devices when before it was unlimited and I wasn’t paying anything. I’m not sure how limiting it to 4 plegs affects the developer except to make money if you have more than 4 Plegs you have created when it was free.

Its kind of like me writing an iPhone app and offering it for free for the vera . Then one day I start charging 5.99 for it and I limit it to 10 vera z-wave or misc devices you can use. Then if you want the rest of the devices you would pay another 5.99. That to me seems shady…

#42

To whom it may concern-

If you’ve read any of my posts, you hopefully realize my style is not to scold people, but to try to help. I believe we are all put on this Earth to help each other, not compete with each to gather the most $$$ and die with it.

Anyone who complains about spending ~$6 to make a >$170 device and investment work properly should have their head examined. I guarantee most of you have bought $199 phones and have spent a few dollars in the App stores buying programs to make them more fun or useful in your life. That’s what Richard’s programs do for Vera.

Anyone who complains about not getting more than 4 PLEG devices for the extremely small license fee doesn’t understand technically why you wouldn’t want more than 4 PLEGs in most instances. A VeraLite simply wouldn’t be able to handle it due to the limited memory in these units and the minimum memory footprint of each PLEG device. In theory, one could do everything they want in one PLEG device. Multiple PLEGs are more for organizational and isolation purposes. Many of us use the best practice of dividing our HA functions by a PLEG, ie, all lighting control in one PLEG, HVAC/environmental control in another, Security control in another. That leaves you one more PLEG for “miscellaneous”. I’m sure Richard didn’t simply pick the number 4 out of thin air. If you have a full Vera3 unit, then yes, you could get away with having more than 4 PLEG devices without possibly consuming all your memory. If that’s you, then go for it and buy the extra license.

If you’re not a programmer, then you have no idea how much effort and hours, days, weeks and months go into developing a program that will be used by the public. You have to spend hours investigating every possible use case and bug that is reported. It’s obvious Richard constantly updates and maintains this program, even when it was free. The man deserves to be compensated, he’s worked hard for that right. It makes absolutely zero difference whether the program was free before or not, many open source or fee-free projects eventually go to a paid support or commercial version model.

And finally, as Richard previously alluded to, it’s a free market. Just as one doesn’t have to buy a car, they can simply take free or public transportation. Both will get you from point A to point B. But you will more than likely enjoy the ride better in the car. Try doing anything useful with your Vera without PLEG. If you’re a programmer you can do it, but if you’re not, have fun while you write and debug LUA code. The fact a plugin like PLEG even has to exist is because MCV put out a half-baked product.

I for one think he’s charging too little given the fact a Vera can’t even do conditional statements right out of the box, which to me is a joke given the sophistication one needs to competently do home automation. Again, blame MCV for putting out a half-baked product.

-TC

#43

Thanks - just bought two.

My PayPal email address is not my Google account address so interested to see which email account gets registered!

#44

I think it’s safe to say that no one can disagree with someone’s desire to recover some money for the time and effort they’ve put in to develop something that’s felt to be of considerable use/value to others .

However while I’m not a programmer, I do still like to learn little bits here and there about Luup, but I’ve also lost count of the number of times people have responded to a Luup question I’ve raised, with “you should use PLEG”

PLEG is a great example of what Vera’s own in-house programmers did not or could not do.

But please do continue to support those of us still interested in learning about Luup on the side (if thats we want to do). :slight_smile:

#45

Hi Richard,

I’m running PLEG ver 5.8. I do not see a registration place anywhere.

I want to stay on 5.8 until 6 has all the kinks worked out.

I also want to register my vera 3 ID 30101824.

Please let me know what I can do at this point. I also do not want to lose all my configs. I’ve backed up so I assume I am safe.

Thanks for the great work.

#46

Hi Richard

As I didn’t want to be ‘PLEG less’ I’ve just bought a licence for $5.95, enjoy that beer on me :slight_smile:

I’m also going to be upgrading to a Vera 3 fairly soon, due to my lite’s memory issues, so by all accounts I will have to buy another license then too. :frowning:

Please can you confirm that Micasaverde / Vera have given you permission to sell your app directly to us via the app itself and that they will support you 100% with all future changes so that there is little to no interruption to its use

#47

Well simple fact is if Richard is out of pocket from alerts etc… money needs to be generated. Pleg is also so good im happy to pay for his time to keep it updated. I ended up buying more than I need or use of both just to help keep it alive and to show my appreciation.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk

#48

Hi,

I would add to this discussion just a word, “confussion”. I would (likely will) buy a licence, as the plugin is really good, but I do not like how this new feature has been managed.

I?ve been usig the PLEG app from few weeks ago, and I do not remember anything about licensing, limits in the PLEG instances you can use by free, disable autoupdate, etc.

I have, like many other users, auto update enable, I have no time to read you post every day to know if the licence is free or not, etc. Also, if I’m not wrong, I read an advice in the forum to use several PLEG instances instead only one with many conditions to save memory.

Now, my plugin is updated, and I do not know if I can restore a backup.

So, my modest advise, for future developments, please:

1.- Inform that your app will not be free forever.
2.- In case you change the licensing, diable auto update unless the customer purchase the licence. It is not fair to allow autoupdate, and once done you have to pay. Probably not legal, no idea.
3.- Implement something to inform the client in Vera, email notification, or something similar. No surprises.

And for the particular conditions:

1.- Why only 4 instances? I have to merge what a I have just because I read an advise stating it :frowning:
2.- Why linked to my vera3? recently I “lost” my vera lite and I moved to Vera3. In a similar case, have I to purchase another licence, or I just reuse the current one (If bought)?
3.- What happens if the plugin is not connected to internet all the time?

Please, understand my comments to improve this process and the info we have, especially in how it is managed.

The plugin is excellent, no doubt.

Thanks

#49

I’m also all for contributing to the developer. But maybe it would have been best to release a complete new version of PLEG/PLTS, i.e. PLEG NG, to not upset current users. Though, I guess you would have the hazzle to export/import all your logic in some way.

#50

Do you need to use your vera email?

#51

Many of us using the Vera product and its various plug ins don’t even login to our device but every couple months or so if something needs to be changed / updated. I do not have a problem paying for a plugin. But it should be a complete new version that has to be re-installed and registered/payed for. The existing product should just not have updates created for it and then all of us that just “sit” on our product can know it will be working in its existing outdated form. We can then make the choice to pay for the new improved product and support. Many of us cannot go backward to a earlier version which makes this seem a bit unfair.

#52

If it just updated … you can use restore from a backup and then turn off the auto update.

I offered to provide FREE licenses for current user that do not want to move up.
I will document how to install them later this month.

#53

This is excellent! Just bought two.

Thanks for allowing me to donate to your time.

#54

When register says registration failed with code you sent me in e-mail

Registration: Failed

Demo evaluation period is: 82 days and 8 hours.Your are allowed a total of 3 PLEG and/or PLTS plugins.

#55

Richard is it possible to make more than one condition bypassed instead of bypassing an entire PLEG.

By separating my PLEG in Different Sections I can bypass those if needed. If put several conditions all under one PLEG then I would be bypassing all the conditions in that PLEG when I don’t want them all bypassed…

#56

@TC1

Hmmm My Vera Lite worked fine with 6 PLEG devices. I’d be willing to bet that if it didn’t work with more than 4 Richard wouldn’t be offering to sell us more. I do understand that there is a Vera with more memory and maybe thats why he offers it, but It doesn’t look like he is limiting the purchase of 4 devices to a Vera Lite.

quote author=TC1 link=topic=23564.msg161189#msg161189 date=1393640575]
To whom it may concern-

If you’ve read any of my posts, you hopefully realize my style is not to scold people, but to try to help. I believe we are all put on this Earth to help each other, not compete with each to gather the most $$$ and die with it.

Anyone who complains about spending ~$6 to make a >$170 device and investment work properly should have their head examined. I guarantee most of you have bought $199 phones and have spent a few dollars in the App stores buying programs to make them more fun or useful in your life. That’s what Richard’s programs do for Vera.

Anyone who complains about not getting more than 4 PLEG devices for the extremely small license fee doesn’t understand technically why you wouldn’t want more than 4 PLEGs in most instances. A VeraLite simply wouldn’t be able to handle it due to the limited memory in these units and the minimum memory footprint of each PLEG device. In theory, one could do everything they want in one PLEG device. Multiple PLEGs are more for organizational and isolation purposes. Many of us use the best practice of dividing our HA functions by a PLEG, ie, all lighting control in one PLEG, HVAC/environmental control in another, Security control in another. That leaves you one more PLEG for “miscellaneous”. I’m sure Richard didn’t simply pick the number 4 out of thin air. If you have a full Vera3 unit, then yes, you could get away with having more than 4 PLEG devices without possibly consuming all your memory. If that’s you, then go for it and buy the extra license.

If you’re not a programmer, then you have no idea how much effort and hours, days, weeks and months go into developing a program that will be used by the public. You have to spend hours investigating every possible use case and bug that is reported. It’s obvious Richard constantly updates and maintains this program, even when it was free. The man deserves to be compensated, he’s worked hard for that right. It makes absolutely zero difference whether the program was free before or not, many open source or fee-free projects eventually go to a paid support or commercial version model.

And finally, as Richard previously alluded to, it’s a free market. Just as one doesn’t have to buy a car, they can simply take free or public transportation. Both will get you from point A to point B. But you will more than likely enjoy the ride better in the car. Try doing anything useful with your Vera without PLEG. If you’re a programmer you can do it, but if you’re not, have fun while you write and debug LUA code. The fact a plugin like PLEG even has to exist is because MCV put out a half-baked product.

I for one think he’s charging too little given the fact a Vera can’t even do conditional statements right out of the box, which to me is a joke given the sophistication one needs to competently do home automation. Again, blame MCV for putting out a half-baked product.

-TC
[/quote]

#57

Great, I just paid to contribute your great effort. Keep going like this!!!

#58

Hi Richard. I just bought 1 PLEG license and 2 VeraAlerts licenses. I need to buy 6 more PLEG and 12 more VeraAlerts licenses. I can’t see a way to do this without verifying my email for every transaction and then retyping my credit card and personal details 18 times. Any way I can give you a credit card number and the Vera serial numbers and you run one credit card charge for the full amount and send back the license codes? I’m not looking to shift my work to you so if that means you have to type everything in a dozen times than don’t worry, I’ll go through one at a time.

#59

@dbmet - YMMV (your mileage may vary). Many folks have several other plugins besides PLEG, and quickly run out of memory space. The solution is to consolidate your PLEGs since each PLEG (or other) device you add has a minimum footprint before you even add any conditions or other elements.

In terms of bypassing individual conditions, the solution is to use virtual switches and use them in your conditional logic. The most obvious use case is a “Vacation” virtual switch. You can use the status/state of this switch in any of your conditions, when it is true, have the condition not run. That’s just one of many examples of the granular control one can achieve by utilizing virtual switches.

Hope this helps and sparks some ideas.

-TC

#60

Hi,

Firstly I’d like to add my appreciation for such a great plugin.

I have purchased two licenses for two vera 3’s that are bridged in both directions.

When I registered the first, the license applied to both sets of PLEGs (four on each) and verified correctly on the first vera.
But if I hit verify button on the second without changing the code it says Registration failed and blanks the code field. It does this also when I put the second code in (the one purchased for this Vera).

Could you please look into this and let me know what I am doing wrong.

Thanks,
John