RE: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
-Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Anthony Atkielski Sent: Thursday, February 24, 2005 9:02 AM To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD? Daniel writes: would not these things be worthy of implementing in FreeBSD? this way other big companies would use it, pay you guys for it and FreeBSD will grow stronger... There are other obstacles to deployment of FreeBSD in large organizations. The main one is a lack of formal, guaranteed support. This afflicts Linux, also, to some extent, depending on the distribution. Even for supported Linux distributions, the support is often very limited in comparison to that available for systems such as Solaris, Windows, or even Mac OS X. Not for Red Hat, at least not anymore. The entire reason for making Red Hat commercial was to emulate as closely as possible the same type of $upport $tructure and co$ts that Microsoft provides. The problem is that the largest companies need more than just a technically superior operating system. That's why they are still buying Solaris and Windows. This is a gross simplification of the realities. The reality is they are still buying Solaris because the back end apps they run on it - big company apps that is, like Peoplesoft and SAP - require it. And they are still buying Microsoft Windows because they don't have a choice - because the low-end desktop computers that business purchase all come with Windows preloaded on it. And they are still buying Microsoft Office because their users are demanding it. But if you think that support is the reason for large companies buying Windows, I have a bridge to sell you. Every large company admin I've ever talked to with a Microsoft support contract all say that their paid support sucks. The only good thing I've ever heard about Microsoft support was the per-incident Developer support, which is $250 per incident, and is handled by a completely separate group than the regular paid support. Microsoft understood years ago that if you want to lock in the business market, the key is to lock in the application developers to your platform. Businesses if given a choice would go for Linux - but they aren't given a choice because the applications they want to run don't run on Linux - because Microsoft has in many cases told those application developers that if they offer Linux versions of their products, they won't get the same level of support from Microsoft than if they remain loyal. (this is one of the behaviors that was stopped by the antitrust trial - however, many ISV's still to this day will tell you that they believe they get better support from Microsoft if they don't support Linux) Years ago I worked for Symantec, and it is this very reason why for years no Symantec applications were offered for Linux. At the time the CEO, Gordon Eubanks (who was apparently pushed out of or got tired of Symantec around 2000 or thereabouts) prohibited development along those lines. (Eubanks was asked in 1999 by Bill Gates to testify in support of Microsoft at the antitrust trial) This was done solely to enable the Symantec development team to get inside information about Windows from Microsoft. This also is why Microsoft fought the idea of divestiture of Office applications which was proposed as a remedy for the trial. (indeed, it's the only remedy that made any sense at all) With Office apps supplied by a different company post-trial, it would be illegal for them to give special data to the Office company in exchange for preventing a port of Office to Linux. Since they own Office and have succeeded in killing off all other business office suite vendors, they can prevent new ones from getting a foothold by using their inside information tricks, and they can refuse to port to Linux. None of these dirty tricks are needed by businesses, contrary to your assertions. Ted ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
On Thu, 24 Feb 2005 11:48:05 -0500 (EST), Jerry McAllister wrote: would not these things be worthy of implementing in FreeBSD? this way other big companies would use it, pay you guys for it and FreeBSD will grow stronger... making a good OS that runs on cheap, low-end machines is nice, but the real money come from companies... Maybe. But the initial intent of FreeBSD was not making money. It was having an OS that the people creating it liked so they didn't have to muck around with the rest of the junk out there. by making money i did not meant necessarily big bank acocunts for the its developers but money that would allow developers to allocate more time to FreeBSD, enhancing it so that when someone, sys admin/company/ would want to setup a internet-aware (mail, web, fw, gw) server and at the same time keep the peace of mind, would think Of course!, we'll use FreeBSD, you'll see, it's awesome But, there is no reason that someone could not make such a system out of FreeBSD and charge for it - and probably make some significant money. I don't know if that should be the direction of the FreeBSD project per se though. Maybe, if those people who made the big system contributed their work back to FreeBSD it would be interesting. i hardly think that companies that use and enhance FreeBSD adding features that they (and maybe others) need, would submit back those enhacements - BSD license... Dan ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
RE: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
-Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Daniel Sent: Friday, February 25, 2005 12:04 AM To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD? by making money i did not meant necessarily big bank acocunts for the its developers but money that would allow developers to allocate more time to FreeBSD, enhancing it so that when someone, sys admin/company/ would want to setup a internet-aware (mail, web, fw, gw) server and at the same time keep the peace of mind, would think Of course!, we'll use FreeBSD, you'll see, it's awesome Daniel, if I'm running a big company and I pay a developer a chunk of change for a distributed FreeBSD server manager program, or some such thing like that, I am not going to pay them if they are going to take the money and run out and work on their own projects. i hardly think that companies that use and enhance FreeBSD adding features that they (and maybe others) need, would submit back those enhacements - BSD license... Your wrong. There's lots of code and features that are in FreeBSD right now today that came from companies that used and enhanced FreeBSD. Ted ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
On Friday 25 February 2005 12:04 am, Daniel [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: i hardly think that companies that use and enhance FreeBSD adding features that they (and maybe others) need, would submit back those enhacements - BSD license... Happens all the time - the goodwill is stronger than the license, or maybe it's because submitting improvements helps create a better OS for that company, as well as everyone else. Apple and Yahoo! are two notable examples. - jt ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
On Thu, 24 Feb 2005 18:02:20 +0100, Anthony Atkielski wrote: would not these things be worthy of implementing in FreeBSD? this way other big companies would use it, pay you guys for it and FreeBSD will grow stronger... There are other obstacles to deployment of FreeBSD in large organizations. The main one is a lack of formal, guaranteed support. This afflicts Linux, also, to some extent, depending on the distribution. Even for supported Linux distributions, the support is often very limited in comparison to that available for systems such as Solaris, Windows, or even Mac OS X. making a good OS that runs on cheap, low-end machines is nice, but the real money come from companies... The problem is that the largest companies need more than just a technically superior operating system. That's why they are still buying Solaris and Windows. well, if a big company pays for support, those money would allow FreeBSD to have some more people (developers or not) focus on giving the support (fixing/answering) while the developers do their job...i believe this is quite natural course of action the reason for the above comments is that i think FreeBSD should come out in light and become more popular, not only in sys admin world, maybe just like Linux; yes, we know that it is used in many critical systems, that it is there, serving, provinding certainty; true, FreeBSD is like real things just happen, the press doesn't have to talk about it. Dan ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
Ted Mittelstaedt writes: Daniel, if I'm running a big company and I pay a developer a chunk of change for a distributed FreeBSD server manager program, or some such thing like that, I am not going to pay them if they are going to take the money and run out and work on their own projects. Nor will most companies pay them to write anything that they are going to release as free software. -- Anthony ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
Daniel writes: well, if a big company pays for support, those money would allow FreeBSD to have some more people (developers or not) focus on giving the support (fixing/answering) while the developers do their job...i believe this is quite natural course of action Paying for support would rapidly generate a conflict of interest, in that it would encourage the production of buggy software in order to increase support revenues (the only revenues the software generates). -- Anthony ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
On Fri, 25 Feb 2005 13:10:57 +0100, Anthony Atkielski wrote: well, if a big company pays for support, those money would allow FreeBSD to have some more people (developers or not) focus on giving the support (fixing/answering) while the developers do their job...i believe this is quite natural course of action Paying for support would rapidly generate a conflict of interest, in that it would encourage the production of buggy software in order to increase support revenues (the only revenues the software generates). my scenario was this: i'm a big company and i use FreeBSD coz it suites best for my needs; let's say among others that my/a programming team built something on top of it ; because i want the system to work as flawless as possible i pay a monthly fee for support - say some 4 to 6 figures of dollars; would i care what you do with the money? i think not; i'm only interested that you'll be there (in place) whenever i need, whenever i get some freaky error the more companies will pay, FreeBSD will have some more guys for support and some more guys for developing... this may be a rather crude view but it could serve as a starting point... Dan ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
Daniel writes: my scenario was this: i'm a big company and i use FreeBSD coz it suites best for my needs; let's say among others that my/a programming team built something on top of it ; because i want the system to work as flawless as possible i pay a monthly fee for support - say some 4 to 6 figures of dollars; would i care what you do with the money? i think not; i'm only interested that you'll be there (in place) whenever i need, whenever i get some freaky error Maybe, but for the company providing the support, it has an interest in creating as many bugs as possible, in order to generate more support revenue. Some companies have actually fallen into this trap. They try to convert support functions into profit centers instead of cost centers, and in so doing they create serious conflicts of interest. The same problem exists for companies that provide both free/low-cost support and highly-paid consulting services. There's a tendency to push support issues off to the consultants and try to bill the customer for consulting fees in order to fix what is actually a bug. It's not very ethical but I've seen it happen often enough. -- Anthony ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
RE: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Ted Mittelstaedt writes: Daniel, if I'm running a big company and I pay a developer a chunk of change for a distributed FreeBSD server manager program, or some such thing like that, I am not going to pay them if they are going to take the money and run out and work on their own projects. Nor will most companies pay them to write anything that they are going to release as free software. No, not true at all! The vast majority of businesses that employ contractors to customize software for them are actually paying companies for the labor, and the developer is an employee of that contracting company. In those cases the code ownership is that of the contracting company, and you as a business owner won't see a line of code written for you until you sign a contract that formalizes this. What the contracting company then does with the code is their own business. Ted ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
Ted Mittelstaedt writes: What the contracting company then does with the code is their own business. It's not giving it away for free. Contractors are even worse than their clients. -- Anthony ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
sorry, i should have sent this to entire list... On Thu, 24 Feb 2005 01:43:32 -0800, Ted Mittelstaedt wrote among others... FreeBSD does not have some of the things - such as distributed management of hundreds to thousands of FreeBSD servers over a large enterprise - that are a requirement for big companies. would not these things be worthy of implementing in FreeBSD? this way other big companies would use it, pay you guys for it and FreeBSD will grow stronger... making a good OS that runs on cheap, low-end machines is nice, but the real money come from companies... Maybe. But the initial intent of FreeBSD was not making money. It was having an OS that the people creating it liked so they didn't have to muck around with the rest of the junk out there. But, there is no reason that someone could not make such a system out of FreeBSD and charge for it - and probably make some significant money. I don't know if that should be the direction of the FreeBSD project per se though. Maybe, if those people who made the big system contributed their work back to FreeBSD it would be interesting. jerry another idea, a study of what features big companies want from an OS should be conducted...by you, maybe or some other people interested and these features be prioritized for FreeBSD... have a good day.. Dan ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Fwd: Is Yahoo! moving from FreeBSD?
Daniel writes: would not these things be worthy of implementing in FreeBSD? this way other big companies would use it, pay you guys for it and FreeBSD will grow stronger... There are other obstacles to deployment of FreeBSD in large organizations. The main one is a lack of formal, guaranteed support. This afflicts Linux, also, to some extent, depending on the distribution. Even for supported Linux distributions, the support is often very limited in comparison to that available for systems such as Solaris, Windows, or even Mac OS X. making a good OS that runs on cheap, low-end machines is nice, but the real money come from companies... The problem is that the largest companies need more than just a technically superior operating system. That's why they are still buying Solaris and Windows. -- Anthony ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
