In my previous thread, I took a bold move in suggesting that MikroTik was no longer committed to The Dude and had effectively silently abandoned it.

With a few days past and a stern silence from MikroTik, I'd like to suggest to MikroTik that they consider Open Sourcing The Dude. Here are three simple reasons why MikroTik should do this:

1. Allow the community to take over further development of a non-core asset from MikroTik, that you are no longer committing any resources to.

2. Provide a ready-made code base to the community that opens your SDK up for others to create NPK files to extend your excellent (and core) base platform. Imagine that - a RouterOS App store!

3. Let us fix the things that you haven't been able to fix to date - Real Linux support, web interface on RouterOS, and the numerous other reported outstanding bugs.

Of course there are many more valid reasons, and there are many precedents where this has worked for other vendors. Prince of Persia was the most recent example, wasn't it?

Let's face it, you've got nothing to lose, since you already give it away for free, and everything to gain - since it's already an extension on your existing platform. If The Dude was made better by the community at no cost to you, doesn't that just make your core RouterOS platform that much more attractive?

So, MikroTik, how about it?

I have posted the same argument in a plea over a year ago. Many issues are just never resolved. The dude is exactly what any good developer would imagine when dreaming up how to write the perfect network monitor. That is why so many people come find how awesome it is but then they can't get it to work exactly how they would like. Then they get no answers, no progress and they leave wishing they got it working the way they imagine it could.

The real issue is how much bigger MikroTik would be if every user that ever used The Dude stuck with it? I am trying to get my employer to purchase MikroTik stuff and we are a Cisco shop. We would have never even considered them if it were not for the dude. I guarantee they would grow their user base much quicker if The Dude was treated as important.

I have given up waiting for things to get fixed and I just use it the way it sits. There are many issues and quite a few show stoppers for some people but since I am using w2k3 and have it working as good as it will I try not to think about anything ever getting fixed (and post known issues when the right opportunity comes up, note the beta4 thread). I do wish they would do something but I am considering other products. Many times I have mentioned we would pay for support or pay for the product but never a response.

I would even just become an intern and work for free for MikroTik just so I could fix bugs and add features, that way they would not have to open source it and things would be getting done. If they do not want to open source it... I think I should formally approach them with this idea!!

I suspect that there maybe some underlying licensing issue that they have never communicated, maybe they used a purchased a library to do some functions inside the dude and therefore can not charge for it or they used libraries that are free to use and distribute but can't give the source out. In any case they should open source the parts that don't violate any agreements and let the community deal with it.

As a user of the free product I feel a little obligated to do something in return so I come here and field technical questions and learn as I go. It is amazing how much there is to network monitoring and there is always something to learn or something you can teach. The Dude is still ahead of the curve but there are other products that get a lot of attention and they are getting better. With that in mind thanks for the great product and don't lose sight of the original vision! Just let the community carry it forward!

Lebowski

Holy words!

**** it dude, let's go bowling!

It will be awesome.

I suspect that there maybe some underlying licensing issue that they have never communicated, maybe they used a purchased a library to do some functions inside the dude and therefore can not charge for it or they used libraries that are free to use and distribute but can't give the source out. In any case they should open source the parts that don't violate any agreements and let the community deal with it.

you can already read the Dude license and you will see all the libraries used.

normis
Then why ?

The Dude development is more dead than alive.

i have the same question with you slech.

Dear Mikrotik,

Please could you provide some formal communication regarding this?

Is it still partially under development?

Is it not worth your time.

Is there a reason you have not made it open source, for example, some other firm pays you a fee not to develop it further, in exchange for support in their product?

All these reasons are fine, they are your choice, we do not make Mikrotiks choices, we only buy good vs bad products.

I implore ( To beg for urgently) you to at least communicate something to your users?

Its very confusing to see a reply from mikrotik, but not any definitive answer regarding it.

There must be 1'000s if not 10s of thousands of the dude running monitoring things that could become so much more effective if the product was either developed further or made open source, and then contributions factored back into the "Mikrotik compiled" product if one of your staff saw fit? If that wasn't viable, then surely an API would only take a few weeks to develop and allow everyone to be satisfied.

Dear Mikrotik,

Please could you provide some formal communication regarding this?

Is it still partially under development?

Is it not worth your time.

Is there a reason you have not made it open source, for example, some other firm pays you a fee not to develop it further, in exchange for support in their product?

All these reasons are fine, they are your choice, we do not make Mikrotiks choices, we only buy good vs bad products.

I implore ( To beg for urgently) you to at least communicate something to your users?

Its very confusing to see a reply from mikrotik, but not any definitive answer regarding it.

There must be 1'000s if not 10s of thousands of the dude running monitoring things that could become so much more effective if the product was either developed further or made open source, and then contributions factored back into the "Mikrotik compiled" product if one of your staff saw fit? If that wasn't viable, then surely an API would only take a few weeks to develop and allow everyone to be satisfied.

seems to be much more interaction here:
http://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=63338

I have already tried to explain it elsewhere, but here it is again. As you can see in our MUM presentations, we only have 90 people working at MikroTik total (this includes any type of staff. this is not developers only). Currently all developers are very actively working on RouterOS and new RouterBOARD products. The Dude is our hobby project, we don't ask any payment for it. When we will have some free resources to fix up the long list of bugs in the Dude, we will do it. At the moment, everybody is super busy, sorry about that. Currently I have 14 major bugs in our todo list, which we will hopefully look at during this year.

Normis, if you are tired of answering these threads make an official sticky thread and include what you just said.

I am trying to get my employer to purchase MikroTik stuff and we are a Cisco shop. We would have never even considered them if it were not for the dude. I guarantee they would grow their user base much quicker if The Dude was treated as important.

Like Lebowski, the Dude is also the only reason I even know about Mikrotik and use their products. When I started my WISP I began using non-Mikrotik radios and routers. After I had my initial network built out I Googled "free wireless network monitor software" and the Dude came up in the first few results. I used the Dude for quite awhile before I even realized Mikrotik made hardware and ROS. Then one day I clicked the little banner ad at the top of the Dude and was blown away by what products I saw they had to offer. I've been using Mikrotik in my WISP ever since.

I used to use a lot more Mikrotik products, but these days I'm only using Mikrotik as core routers and am using Ubiquiti for my APs and CPEs and am eagerly awaiting AirControl to replace the Dude because I know it will integrate better with the network map of my Ubiquiti CPEs and APs (I like that it offers bulk updates and changes to configs and better display of information and statistics than the Dude). Ubiquiti has the right idea of integrating everything together and making themselves a "one stop shop" for monitoring, CPEs, APs, antennas, and routers. However, I DO NOT like Ubiquiti routers and their clumsy web interface style management of devices. Mikrotik is much better in every way with their router GUI (WinBox) and OS capabilities (RouterOS). I still see myself using Mikrotik as my core routers for a very long time because they are much more powerful than anything else and there's no way Ubiquiti could ever catch up with the amount of features and years of development put into ROS.

However, if Mikrotik were the "one stop shop" for CPEs, APs, antennas, monitoring, and routers then I would see myself being 100% Mikrotik instead of only 5%. It's too late for me to turn back and start using Mikrotik APs and CPEs because I have recently invested over $100,000 to change my network over to Ubiquiti CPEs and APs because I feel more confident investing my money with them. They seem like a more WISP-oriented company that has a fast product development lifecycle for hardware and software. They also simply offer more products (many different CPE models on several frequencies, modular AP and antenna combos, and a bunch of other junk that I'm not really interested in, but still seems interesting). Mikrotik seems like they are mainly only interested in core routers and SOHO routers.

I think Mikrotik underestimates the desire their customers have to do business with one manufacturer. It simplifies things very greatly at my company when 95% of the products I have deployed are from a single manufacturer. Ordering products is easier, RMAing products is easier, updating products is easier, compatibility is easier, and integration is absolutely fantastic. If Mikrotik had a strong selection of APs, antennas, a variety of CPEs, routers, and a great network monitor then I would be 100% Mikrotik and order 20 times more products from them. As it is they really only make great routers and I'm left looking for the remaining products elsewhere.

Well, actually I could see my company building APs again with Routerboards and trying out their SXT CPEs and then possibly looking for a good dual polarity antenna manufacturer, but that still leaves me wanting a good network monitor. The lack of a good network monitor is really the main problem here. A couple of years ago I was in the process of changing over all my towers and CPEs to Mikrotik gear. I had built several APs at a few of my different towers and was in the process of making a list of parts to order for building Mikrotik CPEs. At the time Mikrotik didn't offer prebuilt CPEs and the task of building CPEs ourselves seemed rather unattractive. That combined with the fact that the Dude v4 never got out of beta and was not updated in several months made me rather frustrated with Mikrotik and is why I started looking elsewhere. My dissatisfaction with the Dude is really what drove me away form Mikrotik. The bugs and lack of care for and attention to one of their IMHO greatest products (second to ROS) made me lose confidence in Mikrotik. One major example of frustration that jumps out at me is the ACK bug that has been in the Dude since sometime in v3 (device goes down and shows red > you ACK it and it shows blue > device comes back up and shows green > device goes back down and immediately auto ACKs? and shows blue and doesn't give you any notification it ever went down). We had very big problems with not knowing when some of our devices were down. This makes customers very mad. Mikrotik just seemed like they didn't care about this bug and any further development of the Dude. It made me uncomfortable to invest money with a company that would just decide to abandon one of their products. So, I asked myself, "Do I really want to convert my network to 100% Mikrotik and risk them abandoning one of their products or leaving a bug in their software that might make my customers mad? Since Mikrotik abandoned the Dude does that mean that they are having internal problems and are maybe going out of business?". I didn't know for sure, so of course I decided against Mikrotik and invested my money with a company like Ubiquiti that seemed more active in developing products. It's very ironic that Mikrotik is reluctant to further develop the Dude because it would cost them money or resources for programmers. I think Mikrotik is actually losing more money by not developing the Dude. Truthfully, I would have a 100% Mikrotik network today if the abandonment of the Dude had never happened.

So, basically if the Dude would have been properly developed and maintained I would have never had any reason to look elsewhere for other products. In my searching for a Dude replacement I discovered Ubiquiti was developing AirControl and saw how well it integrated with their APs and CPEs. After looking at the rest of their product selection I got the impression that Ubiquiti was a company I wanted to do business with and this is where I am today. Sometimes it's the smallest thing a company does (or doesn't do in Mikrotik's case) that causes them to gain or lose customers. In a perfect world I would love it if Mikrotik made modular APs, antennas, a variety of CPEs and modular APs on different bands (900MHz/2GHz/3GHz/5GHz etc.), the awesome routers they make today, and an updated version of the Dude. I would do all of my business with Mikrotik if they were a company like that.

I do still use the Dude (and reluctantly work around it's bugs), but I don't really trust it or use it for any serious monitoring. I am still awaiting the new AirControl and will continue to use the Dude until then. If AirControl doesn't meet my expectations then I guess I will continue looking for a better network monitor. I have tried several different network monitors over the last couple of years, and I haven't liked ANY as well as I like the Dude. If it weren't for a few bugs and the lack of a few features it really would be the PERFECT network monitor for a WISP. I am very sad to leave the Dude. I really don't want to, but I have no choice.

In closing, please dedicate resources to the Dude. It would make the prospect of using other Mikrotik products much more attractive! I would even pay for it!!!!!

I love the Dude!

PS Please make a router like the RB/750UP with more PoE out ports. An RB/1200 or RB/1100AH with PoE out on it's ports would be amazing.

We've also started to test out Ubiquiti and I must say we are very impressed. We still have several links using mikrotik and I haven't abandoned them for the simple fact that I work for a cheap company and mikrotiks fit their budget, but ubiquiti is really on top of their game. We use a large combination of manufacturers for tower to tower backhauls, but are exclusive to Canopy for AP's and SM's. It's about time for us to start looking at making a higher bandwidth choice for our customers and its really down to MT and UBNT at this point. Canopy is just too expensive. Due to the fact that training day would be much longer with MT and half of my boards are failing, I think that choice is getting easier.

One thing that would keep me loyal is a cell phone version of Dude. I need this ability in this modern age and if UBNT comes out with it first, Dude will be dead, man!

Something to ponder I guess.

PS If you don't know already AIRFIBER ROCKS!

We've also started to test out Ubiquiti and I must say we are very impressed. We still have several links using mikrotik and I haven't abandoned them for the simple fact that I work for a cheap company and mikrotiks fit their budget, but ubiquiti is really on top of their game. We use a large combination of manufacturers for tower to tower backhauls, but are exclusive to Canopy for AP's and SM's. It's about time for us to start looking at making a higher bandwidth choice for our customers and its really down to MT and UBNT at this point. Canopy is just too expensive. Due to the fact that training day would be much longer with MT and half of my boards are failing, I think that choice is getting easier.

One thing that would keep me loyal is a cell phone version of Dude. I need this ability in this modern age and if UBNT comes out with it first, Dude will be dead, man!

Something to ponder I guess.

PS If you don't know already AIRFIBER ROCKS!

As a WISP I find Mikrotik very reliable but it is a big advantage to have some technical experience with RF for wireless, have a test section on your network before going live with new updates, have a plan-B while issues are being addressed,

I don’t think Ubiquity is top of their game, if YES they would have the configurability options of RouterOS and have a working Dude alternative, Or have they?

PS I don’t think 13Kms for AirFibre under ideal conditions and much less in working conditions is great better results can be achieved using 17GHZ

Please Mikrotik ! Open source the dude ! It can be also our hobby project, we can help mikrotik make it better for everyone.

We have been using the Dude for quite a few years. It is a good product, and we would pay for it, if there were updates and improvements.

If Mikrotik does not have the resources to devote to the Dude, then Open Source it. Share it with the Community and build an excellent product.

Mikrotik like all of us has competition. The Dude was one reason that we started to work with Mikrotik products. We use them almost exclusively now.

We like the fact they are interchangeable, cabinets can be reused. Repairs are much quicker for us by standardizing on 411AH and 433AH. We have less items to stock.

RouterOS Rocks -- nobody beats it. Winbox, WebFig, and CLI Scripting. Just makes it all simple.

The Dude needs help to keep up with the standards of the other MT products.

Dear Network Engineers and The Dude users,

In my last effort to see The dude alive i´m creating a online petition in Change.org asking Mikrotik to release The Dude Source Code. I would like to ask everyone that still come to this forum and also like this awesome application to sign the petition and let´s hope that someone in mikrotik will see it..


https://www.change.org/p/mikrotik-relea ... m=copylink