Hello All, For those on the lists who do not know me, I am the primary packaging manager for bacula linux binaries. I am the primary commit person on the rpm spec file as well as building *many* release files and managing contributions from other folks for platforms I don't build directly. I have also in the past produced Windows binaries and may do so again in the future. I'm not sure.
I began my involvement with this project on 3/30/2003 with the initial incarnation of the rpm spec file. I have received feedback in the past from companies and distributions praising the multi-platform approach we have taken with that spec file. I think there are very few projects out there that "out of the box" will build to the number of platforms that we do. And I spend a lot of effort to keep that up to date and growing with the help of many contributors on rpm based platforms. Many other folks do the same for BSD, Debian etc. bacula has come a long way in that time due to the contributions of *many* people and still has some way to go in some regards vs. comparable commercial software. In some ways it excels that very same commercial software. This is the essence of open source software. It is a commons that we develop collaboratively, and knowledge and capability advances in the same way that science in general advances. So where does this leave us in the present discussion? I work my primary job as a Director for USAirways. As such I am involved in many projects that include software. My position/expertise is in fleet management so I am involved with a particular commercial software package that I will not name, but suffice to say that it is business critical and costs the company a *lot* of money, both in terms of license fees and maintenance and support fees. A recent proposal to our finance department to implement a reporting module was in the neighborhood of one quarter million dollars. You read that right and now ask yourself how useful is a database driven application where the reporting capability is such a priced "option." My point is this. We all do this in an effort to provide a service and advance the general art. If we are to continue in the long run we need the support of those who utilize the efforts. If you are a private user we welcome you at no charge. If you are a commercial enterprise then please contemplate contributing a portion of what you save by accessing the commons. Otherwise the golden egg goose will not likely survive. As bacula moves into the enterprise mainstream there will be more and more requests for features and support. The way to do this consequent with the OSS model is that we need to generate an income stream to the project in some way, thus hire developers to build upon what is contributed. Kern and the other core developers can not do this alone. Neither can Linus do it with the kernel. IBM gets this. Others do not. Regards, Scott ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by DB2 Express Download DB2 Express C - the FREE version of DB2 express and take control of your XML. No limits. Just data. Click to get it now. http://sourceforge.net/powerbar/db2/ _______________________________________________ Bacula-users mailing list Bacula-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/bacula-users
