Date: Tue, 2 Apr 1996 12:01:39 +0930 (CST) From: Michael Smith <msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au> To: cat@ghost.uunet.ca (Cat Okita) Cc: current@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: Advice/Recommendation needed Message-ID: <199604020231.MAA09482@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.91.960401143608.9710x-100000@ghost.uunet.ca> from "Cat Okita" at Apr 1, 96 02:39:56 pm
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Cat Okita stands accused of saying: > > I *need* to know that I've got a support contract for the OS, and have > someone to hang out the window if things aren't working. (Hell - someone > to sue, if it comes to that). Heh. You should read your support contracts more carefully, unless you're spending _large_ sums of money on them, you _still_ don't have anyone to 'hang out the window' at the end of the day. And as for someone to sue - I can't imagine a vendor offering a contract that would make them vulnerable to that sort of abuse. 8) If having a team of trained monkeys paid to try to understand your problem lets you sleep at night, that's wonderful. Don't insult us by suggesting that any of the major vendors are any quicker at identifying or responding to faults in their code than any of the 'serious' free operating systems. > Free OS's are a wonderful thing - they let people use UNIX that > might never otherwise be able to afford to do so; they offer source > so that people can learn about how things work...but they don't > offer a place for the buck to stop. Er, yes they do. It stops with _you_. For a lot of us, that's just fine; I spend too much of my time second-guessing flaws in commercial software - having the source means I can find and fix them and then _get_on_with_my_business_ - something that would be totally impossible if I was at the mercy of a vendor. Sure, it's not for everyone, but there _are_ reasons to avoid the McDonalds mentality, and for those that can cook, the alternatives are pleasantly refreshing 8) > Cat -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@atrad.adelaide.edu.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control (ph/fax) +61-8-267-3039 [[ ]] Collector of old Unix hardware. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[
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