On Tue, Sep 24, 2002 at 12:30:55AM -0700, T. Kenji Sugahara wrote: > Open Source is great but how about support? There are legions of MS > trained support people but how about Linux/UNIX trained folks? I'm afraid you've completely missed the point. :) Crispin's suggestion of requiring vendors to use Open Source licenses for all software the State of Oregon uses has _nothing_ to do with Unix/Linux vs Windows. Nothing at all. Re-read that last sentence. :) The state can require their database vendors to supply source code and sufficient license to allow the state to modify it at will. The state can require their billing-form-printing vendors to supply source code and sufficient license to allow the state to modify it at will. Requiring source code and sufficient license to modify it at will would allow the state to farm out maintainence, upgrades, new features, etc, to third parties, helping to break the buy-in monopoly on software development. Whether the state would benefit from requiring the same levels of access to operating system source code is another matter. I'm not sure what the state of oregon would do with windows source code. Maybe requiring a "source-available" clause in licenses when operating systems are end-of-lifed... I expect the state would see the most benefit with requiring source from bespoke software. > Which brings about another question of Open Source - Uniformity. > What do you think the repercussions are of the kind of mods that you can > make in an open source environment? Most everything can be modified - > and will be. It tends to require a different perspective than out of the > box solutions. I wonder what IT support is like in that environment? A friend of mine works for A Large Corporation. He has told me that they modify practically everything in-house. Including Microsoft's stuff. > In addition, how will software developers react to Open Source and Open > Standards? Will service contracts work as a business model for SW > developers? It is sort-of a throwback to the old IBM model of sell the > HW for under cost and then make em pay for the maintenance. I don't know if maintainence work on software is a significant portion of software revenue or not. If it is, I expect many will react rather poorly. :) If it isn't, it shouldn't matter much... -- http://sardonix.org/
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