On Mon, Sep 12, 2022 at 01:47:49PM -0400, Chuck Zmudzinski wrote:
Well, I suppose so, but I am pleased that a grub maintainer is now on the case. Still, there is another Debian bug that affects me that continues to be ignored, so I admit I have an attitude about that. I accept that what is of grave or important severity to me is not necessarily of grave or critical severity to the official Debian maintainers and developers. I wish to merely point out that what is often said about the advantages and disadvantages of free, open-source software that is maintained by volunteers is true:
No, it's a misguided conclusion that isn't supported by facts. I can think of any number of bugs in closed source software that aren't fixed. The only real difference is this: with open source software you might actually be told "I'm not going to prioritize this because I'm a volunteer and prefer to do something else", while with propietary software the discussion that concludes "this customer isn't important enough to require a change in the priority of the request" isn't going to be public and all you'll ever be told is that the request is being reviewed or somesuch. There is an exception that proves the rule, however: if you're a large enough customer, paying enough money, you may well get a team of people dedicated to implementing whatever you ask for. But here's the thing--you can get the same level of service for open source software, if you're willing to pay for it. (Not directly from debian, but there are consultants/etc that will provide such services.) Your complaint really boils down to "I can't get personalized/dedicated support with enforceable SLAs for free", which is just as true for proprietary software as it is for open source software.