> * How is popularity relevant to choice of an Open Source-software? More important is how good the software works for you. In OSS you have the choice between many alternatives or to customize one solution for you problem. So normally you choose, what fits best, not what is most popular. On the other hand, choosing a popular package over a not so popular raises the chance, that the problems you will encounter are already solved by someone. So it is a balance between popularity and good support (by the author or a community around the package).
> * How is documentation relevant to choice of an Open Source-software? Depends on the software. A simple program may be self-explanatory enough to figure all out on your own. But sometimes missing, wrong or half written docs make more complex software simply unusable. But since this is often a problem with closed-source too, this is not a show-stopper (and you have the advantage to look into the code, so you can at least try to understand, what happens). Localized docs are not so important for me, as long the docs available in englisch (I'm german). But I agree, that it may be a problem for many users. > * What 10-top factors do you think is of most importance when chosing OSS, > and why? For who? - I think, there are most times less than 10 factors... Most times, I think it is a combination of: Fits my problem, it doesn't cost anything, the Admin or whoever likes OSS or recoomends it, personal sympathy for the OSS-idea and you can modify or improve it. This is the least important thing for most users, I think, because they just want to use it, not hack it. I personally like to learn how it works, but this is not and should not be a motivation for a normal user. Regards Stephan _______________________________________________ gnu-misc-discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/gnu-misc-discuss
