Date: Fri, 21 Jul 1995 16:53:49 -0600 From: nate@sneezy.sri.com (Nate Williams) To: Karl Denninger <karl@Mcs.Net> Cc: nate@sneezy.sri.com, jkh@time.cdrom.com, freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Support charges ( was Re: SUP target for -STABLE...) Message-ID: <199507212253.QAA21981@rocky.sri.MT.net> In-Reply-To: <199507212143.QAA00359@Jupiter.mcs.net> References: <199507212130.PAA21799@rocky.sri.MT.net> <199507212143.QAA00359@Jupiter.mcs.net>
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[ Paying for support ] > > If I'm going to pay for "support", defined as I report problems and some > organization works on fixing them, where the person(s) time that is used is > amortized over a lot of people, then that organization "owns" the fixes and > I get them under what is essentially a license. That depends on how the person who is working for you sets up the policy, but yes I agree to some extant. > If I am going to pay the person's salary substantially in total, then > they're mine as a work product. Herein lies the rub. First of all, I don't think Jordan was implying that you alone would bear the burden of a full-time support person. Secondly, You and I have a different opinion on what I believe Jordan is proposing (He may be proposing something different than what I believe, so if I'm incorrect I'll let him correct me). As I understand it, 'support' is responding in a timely manner to bugs and problems that exist in the system. In my former life as a system administrator, my salary was paid for me being there and doing my job. The code I developed on the job was mine to do with as I please, although most of it was written to make my job of 'supporting' the users better. In my current role as a 'Research Engineer', I'm no longer in a support position but instead my sole responsibility is developing new software and fixing bugs in already existing software. However, in a similar situation to that above, I don't hoard the fixes to software which I've freely obtained from other folks even though SRI is paying me to fix them (indirectly). But, I also don't give away software/fixes to customer's w/out a support contract of some kind either. > If you don't see the difference here, then you obviously have never employed > someone to program for you. I've been employed enough to know the difference. > > What you are paying for is the timeliness of the fix, and a guarantee > > that the fix itself will be done to the best of the person's ability. > > Right. You disagree by saying that not only do you pay for the timeliness of the fix, but for the fix itself. That is where we disagree. > > What do you gain by keeping the fix all to yourself? I'm not trying to > > be a software socialist here, but I fail to understand the logic of > > hoarding fixes which everyone can share. FreeBSD was created by a large > > number of volunteers who have spent *thousands* of hours of their time > > w/out compensation to fix bugs. Isn't it only *fair* to give the fix > > you've received back in return? > > If I am going to pay for a person's livelihood in total or substantially in > total (ie: thousands of dollars a month) then I own their output. > Period. Are you hiring them as a programmer, or as a support person. There is a subtle difference in my mind. When Cygnus was paid to develop gcc for Solaris, the members did *not* own the resulting software, but they did pay for the right of early access and *support* throughout the development process, along with easy access to the developers. I would venture to guess that each of the contributors contributed substantially to a single developer's total livlihood. > If I'm contributing to a pool, that's different. That's the traditional > support model, and it isn't nearly as expensive. We disagree on what Jordan is proposing, and I suspect part of my understanding comes from a post he made a couple weeks back regarding drivers for a communication cards. Jordan writes: > What this means, essentially, is that those who contact me should also > be willing to donate something reasonable in the way of time, money or > manpower to the project. They should also be willing to see the > results released for general consumption with an unrestrictive > (e.g. "BSD style") copyright. But please, read on. There's more in that article if you're interested. Anyway, to summarize I think it's only *fair* (right and wrong are not the issue here) to donate whatever you think is fair back into FreeBSD. If you think hiring a full-time staff person is asking a bit much, then don't. But, if you think it's justified to hire a full-time person to do FreeBSD support, would it be too much to ask that this person be able to donate at least a portion of the work back to the FreeBSD Project? Nate
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