Opinions from IMSL users requested

[Steven_L_Intel1]

If you are an IMSL user, please take a moment to reply to this thread with your feelings about the change in IMSL licensing. Will this affect your use of IMSL going forward? Feel free to mark your reply Private if you wish.

[onkelhotte]

I dont use the IMSL library, but a colleague does.

His program is being used by other employees of our company and by some costumers - over all 30 copies.

He doesnt accept the new licensing policy, so he stays with his 11.x version of IVF with IMSL. If this policy wont change, he will port his code to MKL so he can use newer versions of IVF.

Markus

[Andrew_Smith]

The cost of the runtimes has caused us to pause with IMSL and we have not updated to the new version with IVF 12. However we are able to continue use of old IMSL under IVF 12.x despite Intel advice to the contary.

The precompiled mod files may no longer work with future IVF updates and performance will lag due to non-optimum code for new processors. Therefore we are evaluating other commercial libraries before we decide if we should be spending more money on IMSL or changing to another package.

We mainly use spline fitting and the general sparse linear solver. I believe MKL may come to the rescue with curve fitting in a future release.

The MKL sparse solver is is not an intirely good replacement as we need a solver that produces repeatable results in parallel execution. I believe the MKL PARDISO solver is branched off V3 code. Will Intel be implementing Pardiso V4?

[ZlamalJakub]

I abandoned IMSL due to licensing policy and also due to almost one year of Intel FORTRAN subscription without update of compiler.

Now I am using IVF without IMSL. I changed routines from IMSL to MKL routines or routines from NETLIB.

[netphilou31]

I am not sure to understand correctly all the new licensing policy (these type of agreement is for me always difficult to read and to understand properly andmuch more dedicated to lawyers).

Anyway if this means that we cannot embedanymore IMSL routines in our software products (dlls) that we deliver to our customers without paying additional fees, we will probably have to switch to another numerical library (MKL or another one). We are using IMSL library mainly for spline functions and solving sparse systems.

[sknobat]

Hi

After several meetings with my managers, here is the outcome: I will develop two versions of my software:

• one with IMSL routines (only for developer/me),
• and one with replacement routines (will be distributed to the end-users).

I will use IMSL version as a reference for validation/verification of users version.

SK

[Andrew_Smith]

I just found out about the GNU maths library called GSL. It looks well worth a look. For me I think it could entirely replace IMSL

[dannycat]

I only use a couple of IMSL routines and if I can find a suitable replacement I would drop it immediately, until then my end users won't get the Composer XE compiled program they will continue with previous version which is covered by a moresensible licensing approach.

The routines I use are eigenvalue extraction (which can easily be replaced) and 3D Surface Fitting which is more difficult to find a replacement.

Intel clearly want to drop this "hot potato" and who can blame them but doing socould leave many customers in the lurch. Their intentions are obvious because IMSL is not supported in any of the suite options so if you require the capability of the suite and IMSL you would have to get both.

[Steven_L_Intel1]

Please do not read anything into the lack of IMSL in the suites. If we continue to offer IMSL, we plan to allow it to be added to the suites.

What we are specifically interested in is how customers are reacting to the licensing change.

[mm_p]

I have used for many years the IMSL library. Changing the rules of licensing is for me unacceptable. I was going to buy a new version of IVF+IMSL (currently I'm using IVF10+IMSL6) but now I will not do. Urgently looking for alternatives to the procedures of IMSL. Soon I'll buy a new version of IVF.