On Wed, May 11, 2005 at 08:45:57AM -0700, Stewart Stremler wrote: > begin quoting Lan Barnes as of Wed, May 11, 2005 at 07:47:03AM -0700: > [snip] > > At the risk of jumping into something that I've been ignoring (in the > > interests of time), both yours and Stewart's statements above strike me > > as silly. Support is expensive. If a company doesn't organize to do it, > > it has to be done by disorganized volunteers (like us), with attendant > > risks that most IT managers find unacceptable. > > This is why you pay money for software. > > > Even companies that sell licenses see support as a profit center. > > Yes. But is that good for the user? I don't think so. > > The problem with charging for support -- seeing support as a profit > center -- is that the forces on the software push it towards NEEDING > support. Making the software more stable, more reliable, more > consistent ... runs counter to the bottom line. >
Hmm ... I once supported a largish C program where the previous support programmer had comments indicating that he's purposely hidden/introduced bugs for him to find and fix later. Have you ever seen me get _really_ angry? I'm told it's a little scary (more out of concern for _my_ health than anything else). Anyway, really good SW needs support, too. In fact, the best SW is nuanced, complex, deep. Having a knowledgeable guide is a wonderful thing. > For _good_ software, you need to roll your support costs into the > initial price. That way, you are *motivated* to make your software > into something that doesn't need a support contract. > That's more likely to lead to bad practices than the other. The minute the sale is over, every call cuts your profit margin. So your support goal becomes no calls. Every call becomes insulting and unsatisfying -- kinda like M$ support (first level). Oh, wait, that is free! > > But maybe I'm missing irony again. > > Anemic, are ya? :) > > -Stewart "Why not ship UNIX w/o the manpages? Oh, wait, that's info." Stremler I'm going on Geritol. -- Lan Barnes [EMAIL PROTECTED] Linux Guy, SCM Specialist 858-354-0616 -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
