Re: simple question
On Wed, 4 Nov 1998, Davide Duran wrote:
>
> Linux is great thanks to over 1000 programmers who hard worked on
> it in their free time. It was a passion, an hobby.
> For sure, the best valuable passion or hobby I ever seen, but I ask:
> who can say me that I can be sure that this programmers will continue
> their great job? I know that there are a lot of programmers, but
Well, given that Linux already is as good as or better than a commercial
OS, then more programmers aren't a necessity. And I think it unlikely that
a significant number of programmers would suddenly get bored and give up.
> the problem is that, IF LINUX would reach (and I hope) a BIG MARKET SHARE,
> a lot of people will buy it and use it. How can this programmers to
> support such a market ??
Well, if you mean support as in "continue programming", then I don't see
having a BIG MARKET SHARE would cause anyone to *stop* programming. I
think it would more likely have the opposite effect.
If you mean support as in "who's going to answer my questions", then the
answer is: not the programmers (in general). Support comes from fellow
users through mailing lists like this one, usenet and local linux groups.
As the market share increases, so will the number of users, and so will
the support. This support already wins awards. Failing that, you could
always buy a commercial distribution which comes with a degree of support,
or you could pay someone to support it for you.
> They are not paid (economically) from their job. They're Linux system
> programmers
> in their free time. I know they're paid from their first job (most of them
> are
> programmers), but imagine that Linux would gain a lot of market.
> How can I put my firm in the hands of their free time ???
Well, you've said it yourself in your parenthical "economically" comment.
They are paid not with money but with things which are worth more:
satisfaction of creating something good, the joy and frustration of day to
day hacking, kudos from their peers, slavish fans ready to do their every
will and (of course) loads of free software from other programmers.
Why, when they're getting paid like this, would they want to walk away
from their job any more than if they were getting paid money?
> And if they don't have anymore free time, what can we do??
Learn to program yourself? I'm only half joking. You seem to be under the
misconception that because any individual programmer may run out of time
and impetus the whole lot might. This is a very faint possibility. The
number of free software developers is growing, so there is always more
people to take over the ones that leave. Having the whole free software
community die is rather less likely than everyone at Microsoft resign to
spend more time with their families.
The other thing to take into account is that if you buy commercial
software, you are actually have *less* gaurantee that the product will be
continually supported. At any time the company could go under or simply
stop supporting it. Free software on the other hand never dies. Because
the source is always available you can (in priniciple, anyhow) support it
yourself if nescessary.
k>
Andrew Tarr
"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate"
Reply to: