I must state for the record that I too have contributed to the word of mouth advertising for this company. How valuable is that to a company and can it be quantified?
When I first ventured into the Open Source world several years ago, I soon abandoned corporate style marketed products for a residential gateway simply because I had limited control over what went out to the net and no efficient logging mechanism as many of you have noted don't work that well. I turned to Linux. As most of us... we searched for solutions like snort to add to our box and learned how to create effective chains for iptables and somehow STUMBLED across a good review of SNF (then MNF and then MNF2 beta) and discovered someone had put it all together for simplicity while still giving you complete control. When friends and small business owners questioned me for a good firewall/router when they too became perturbed with the crap that was marketed to them, I quickly advertised what I had discovered to make things easy yet effective too. Guess what... at least 3 copies of MNF was purchased due to my word of mouth and I'm aware of those 3 entities who purchased MNF always talking proudly of you're product. How many more have purchased it due to their word of mouth? The point being this: You probably pursued making such a product when you too realized potential for out-doing the corporate products and thus created SNF and MNF. How long will it take for guys like me to discover a new product that was created to outdo mnf2? MNF has been a great product and I hope with all sincerity I can continue to use it freely. However, guys like me can't ignore the fact that there are a number of free solutions out there to use. Hold up the spirit of Open Source, and Open Source will hold you up. -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Phil Groschwitz Sent: Saturday, July 02, 2005 9:10 AM To: security-firewall@mandrivalinux.org Subject: Re: [Security Firewall] firewall Bye and thanks! I started my linux journey with SNF then MNF, and joined the mandrakeclub to support it (and mandrake in general since they were bankrupt at the time.) I moved my w2k pc's to mdk shortly thereafter. I've been looking for a replacement for mnf for a long time because of the uncertainity. My needs are for my home network - this is for me a hobby. I decided on ipcop. (Before taking down MNF to install ipcop, it had an uptime of 173 days. Would have been longer if not for power outages.) Thanks everyone for the support over the years and for the great work with SNF and MNF (including the Amaury how-to's!) Phil
____________________________________________________ Want to buy your Pack or Services from Mandriva? Go to http://store.mandriva.com Join the Club : http://www.mandrivaclub.com ____________________________________________________
