Herbert, This is a great honor, congratulations!
Ultimately the decision is up to you, however as someone who has found your presence in the vserver project to be incredibly valuable, I fear that we will loose such an important piece of this project if you were to take this position. Many free software developers are hired by corporations because the corporations have found that their software is valuable to them, their paying someone enables them to contribute to the community, as well as ensure that the development of the software is able to be sustained in such a way that does not leave them in a bind. It also gives them the ability to say that they contribute to the Free Software movement, if they find it advantageous to make such a claim. If this company is wanting to hire you so that you can continue to work on the vserver project (and get paid), then this is a great opportunity for you and weighing the pros and cons of taking this position are very easy. If the company is wanting to hire a good kernel developer to work on their product, then I would be suspicious. Why? Well, they obviously have identified you as a good kernel developer and would find you a valuable addition to their team. However, they would be asking you to focus your work, time and energy on their product, rather than the vserver product. This may be fine, because you could still work on vserver in your spare time, but working for a demanding company takes its toll and your spare time is often spent recovering from work, rather than doing more coding. You have done incredible work in the vserver project, this work has been done with care and passion, time and energy. If this company wants to take you away from the project that you have devoted so much of yourself to, then there must be a very good reason for you to do that, otherwise they are tearing you away from something you enjoy to work on their commercial product. This would show to me that they do not care about the vserver project, but only their product, and this is not a very nice way to treat someone. It is my opinion that if they want to take you away from the project that you have devoted yourself to in a very passionate way, then they either should be supporting the vserver project in doing so, or it does not matter because you need the money. I suppose some of this suspicion comes from the fact that this company develops a product that is very similar to vservers, but it is commercial and proprietary. I question their motivation behind wanting to hire you, the driving force behind the free software "competitor" to their product. It would be a shrewd business move for them to hire you away from the vserver project because they think that it would languish and fall apart without you behind it. However, I do not know the details of what your arrangement with them would be, or what they have said to you about the vserver project, or their plans for their own product. Perhaps they want to pay you to work on vservers and they will move their product to use vservers as a base, I do not know. These are important questions I think to ask. I do not say all of this to dissuade you from taking this job, if you need to take it, you should, the decision is up to you. I for one would miss greatly Bertl if he was not around because he got vacuumed up by a company. micah Herbert Poetzl schrieb am Sunday, den 20. February 2005: > > Hi Community! > > yesterday evening I had the pleasure to meet with > Serguei Beloussov. we had excellent Dinner at the > 'Schnitzelwirt' where we talked about - who would > have guessed - different virtualization techniques > and various commercial and non commercial products > in this area ... > > he clearly pointed out that his company has some > interest, that virtualization techniques - like the > one linux-vserver uses - 'gain momentum' in the face > of system emulators like VMware(tm) and partitioning > approaches like Xen. he also told me that they are > watching this project very closely and that, while > it is small compared to their products, it's quite > interesting ... > > after that we had some fun with Billards (Carambol) > and right afterwards I was basically offered a job > where I would be able to do some kernel development > and get payed for doing so ... > > let me know what you think! > > TIA, > Herbert > > > _______________________________________________ > Vserver mailing list > [email protected] > http://list.linux-vserver.org/mailman/listinfo/vserver _______________________________________________ Vserver mailing list [email protected] http://list.linux-vserver.org/mailman/listinfo/vserver
