On 12/30/2014 10:07 PM, William Unruh wrote: >> >> On 12/30/2014 5:49 PM, Don Armstrong wrote: >>> On Tue, 30 Dec 2014, Jerry Stuckle wrote: >>>> The people there have enough to do at work, and like to have a life >>>> outside of work. Believer it or not, not everyone is capable (or >>>> interested) in spending their life working on Linux. >>> >>> If Debian is important to their business, then they should hire people >>> to work on the bits of Debian that matter to them. Pretty much everyone >>> who is serious about using Debian in production does this. >>> >> >> That's a great idea. Who's going to pay these people - you? > > They apparently pay you. > Who pays the hardware people who design the boards/etc? >
Yes, they pay me because the device drivers are custom (and proprietary). Nothing exists in public or other private hands. And they have EE's who design the electronics. But that is a different division. You seem to think money is unending. It isn't, believe me. They have budgets, and must stay within them. There is no money available to hire consultants to maintain a distro. Of course, there's another option (and only one other one). The company could go out of business. Then the problem would go away. >> >> My clients are not IT folks. They don't need Debian per say - they DO >> need Linux. And, like all companies, they have a limited budget for >> software implementations. > > Fair enough, but then if it is critical to their business, they will > have to pay. > You don't get it, do you. THERE IS NO MONEY TO PAY! > ... >> >> Again - these companies are not NOT IT companies. They are >> manufacturers of equipment. Right now, Debian just happens to be the > > But now adays, software it the largest part of an equipment business. To > say they do not have software people is to say they do not have a > business. > Maybe YOUR businesses. Not all, by any means. And in these companies, software is only a very SMALL part of their business. Even the electronics is a small part of the business. The money is in the equipment being controlled. >> distribution they are using. Yes, they have a couple of people familiar >> with Linux administration, but that's about it. And these administering >> Linux is only a very small part of their job. That's why they hire >> people like me to write specific device drivers and other software. But >> they are not going to spend money hiring consultants to work on the OS. > > But they need to adapt the software for their use. > That is a critical part of their business. In fact it is the part that > sets them apart from all their competitors. Hardware is easy these days. > Electronic hardware is easy. But that isn't these company's business. That what you guys don't understand. Consider an automobile. It has a computer to control the car. But that computer is maybe a $500 part in a $35K machine. Sure, new cars NEED that computer. But it is one of the least important parts of the car. The engine, body, interior, handling and a couple of dozen other things are much more important to the buyer. And that's where the money goes. The computer is the minimum necessary to do the job. Although my clients are not automobile manufacturers, the comparison applies. >> >> They could use pretty much any distro. They liked Debian because of its >> stability. But they don't NEED Debian. If they wanted to spend lots of >> time trying to maintain the OS, they would have gone to slackware. > > Whether Debian is the best choice for them is of course something they > will have to decide. It is modular, stable, conservative, old > fashioned,... > > ??? > > And its continued stability is seriously being questions. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: https://lists.debian.org/54a372f9.4060...@gmail.com
