Devdas Bhagat wrote:
On Tue, Feb 19, 2008 at 09:27:31PM +0530, Rony wrote:
There are not many FOSS engineers available to service FOSS based computers. It brings to my mind a question for all:-
Computer servicing needs a technician, not an engineer. Given good hardware, and reasonable maintainance (like installing needed upgrades), Unixy solutions work _very_ well. Given bad hardware, it's just easier to fix Windows temporarily.
Computer maintainence involves a sound knowledge of installed software. Plain hardware is of no use to the customer.
Another problem is that FOSS is ready for the people, but people are not ready for FOSS. Both users as well as programmers/developers. A guy working for one of the biggest software companies in India told me that FOSS programmers are few and too expensive. Windows based pros are
FOSS programmers are exactly as expensive as Windows programmers. Actually, except for those who need to work at the really low end, the skills needed are pretty much the same.
I got the information from a programmer working for a giant Indian software company.
available in lots. Software giants that make banking software use things like dot net for banking solutions. How can such software be expected to run on FOSS? Everyone is looking at the economical side of hiring cheaper programmers who are available by the dozen.
Average programmers are more expensive. It is actually cheaper to hire a few good programmers than to hire a hundred average ones. There is plenty of stuff in the computing management literature about this. (Ref: Facts and fallacies of software engineering - Robert Glass, Peopleware - DeMarco and Lister, The Mythical Man Month - Fred Brooks for example).
Agreed. Since closed platforms are popular, training and learning is concentrated in that area, so getting programmers for that platform is easier.