i may be in the position of recommending that a sizable client take a look at centos as a supported platform in the near future, but if one goes to the "Support" -> "Commercial Support" page, it reads:
This Section or Page is coming soon.
that is *not* going to give this client any warm fuzzies. from a promotion perspective, either that page should get some actual content, or the link should be dropped entirely. or something.
rday --
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
On 21/06/09 12:09, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
This Section or Page is coming soon.that is *not* going to give this client any warm fuzzies. from a promotion perspective, either that page should get some actual content, or the link should be dropped entirely. or something.
That page does indeed reflect the current state of play - there is *no* centos approved or recommended commercial support entity - but it *is* something that is being worked on.
- KB
On Sun, 21 Jun 2009, Karanbir Singh wrote:
On 21/06/09 12:09, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
This Section or Page is coming soon.that is *not* going to give this client any warm fuzzies. from a promotion perspective, either that page should get some actual content, or the link should be dropped entirely. or something.
That page does indeed reflect the current state of play - there is *no* centos approved or recommended commercial support entity - but it *is* something that is being worked on.
i realize that page is *technically* correct, but its wording is quite discouraging:
http://www.centos.org/modules/tinycontent/index.php?id=12
"This Section or Page is coming soon.
"This page is a holder for Content that is not yet available for publication.
"This page will not go away when the content is available, so booking marking it will be of no value. The URL of the link you followed will be updated when the real content is published."
even if there's no support right now, you *need* to give readers the unmistakable impression that it's coming, that it's a work in progress, that you're negotiating with potential support providers ... *something*. as it is, that page can be summarized as simply admitting, "support? we got nuthin'"
i haven't yet proposed to my client that they should consider centos instead of rhel but i can *guarantee* that, the instant i do, they will be at the centos site, checking it out, and when they hit that page on commercial support, that will be the end of that discussion. guaranteed.
rday --
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
On 21/06/09 13:28, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
That page does indeed reflect the current state of play - there is *no* centos approved or recommended commercial support entity - but it *is* something that is being worked on.
i realize that page is *technically* correct, but its wording is quite discouraging:
If you want to propose a blob of text that might replace whats on the page right now, I am sure we can plumb that in.
- KB
On Sun, 21 Jun 2009, Karanbir Singh wrote:
On 21/06/09 13:28, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
That page does indeed reflect the current state of play - there is *no* centos approved or recommended commercial support entity - but it *is* something that is being worked on.
i realize that page is *technically* correct, but its wording is quite discouraging:
If you want to propose a blob of text that might replace whats on the page right now, I am sure we can plumb that in.
i'm not the right person for that as i am utterly clueless about what possibilities you're exploring at the moment. that has to be done by someone at centos who's involved in it.
rday --
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
i'm not the right person for that as i am utterly clueless about what possibilities you're exploring at the moment. that has to be done by someone at centos who's involved in it.
More to the point, what is in the works? I certainly provide Centos support to my customers who have Centos. Does that make me eligible for the list on that page (hypothetically)?
-geoff
--------------------------------- Geoff Galitz Blankenheim NRW, Germany http://www.galitz.org/ http://german-way.com/blog/
i'm not the right person for that
This is strange. You asked for something to be changed. The people in charge asked you for a suggestion and now you are putting it back on them. If I were in charge of this, I would say that you are not very serious and ignore your request.
Neil
-- Neil Aggarwal, (832)245-7314, www.JAMMConsulting.com Eliminate junk email and reclaim your inbox. Visit http://www.spammilter.com for details.
On Sun, 21 Jun 2009, Neil Aggarwal wrote:
i'm not the right person for that
This is strange. You asked for something to be changed. The people in charge asked you for a suggestion and now you are putting it back on them. If I were in charge of this, I would say that you are not very serious and ignore your request.
wow, neil ... misunderstand much? i didn't "ask for something to be changed" so much as i *suggested* a change that might have benefit for the centos community, and for me in particular that would help me immensely in being able to promote centos to my clients.
i *cannot* suggest what content should go on that commercial support page since i have *no idea* what avenues the centos developers are currently exploring.
seriously, neil, what part of that confuses you? or should i try again with shorter and simpler words?
rday
p.s. this was my first interaction with the general centos community and, if this is the level of wilful obduracy i can expect to run into, it's probably going to be the last.
--
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
On Sun, 2009-06-21 at 10:31 -0400, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
On Sun, 21 Jun 2009, Neil Aggarwal wrote:
i'm not the right person for that
This is strange. You asked for something to be changed. The people in charge asked you for a suggestion and now you are putting it back on them. If I were in charge of this, I would say that you are not very serious and ignore your request.
wow, neil ... misunderstand much? i didn't "ask for something to be changed" so much as i *suggested* a change that might have benefit for the centos community, and for me in particular that would help me immensely in being able to promote centos to my clients.
i *cannot* suggest what content should go on that commercial support page since i have *no idea* what avenues the centos developers are currently exploring.
seriously, neil, what part of that confuses you? or should i try again with shorter and simpler words?
rday
p.s. this was my first interaction with the general centos community and, if this is the level of wilful obduracy i can expect to run into,
It's not.
it's probably going to be the last.
Snap decision based on incomplete information? Tsk, tsk! ;-)
--
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
<snip sig stuff>
On 06/21/2009 03:31 PM, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
i *cannot* suggest what content should go on that commercial support page since i have *no idea* what avenues the centos developers are currently exploring.
Well, thats an easy one to answer.
One of the major reasons I spend days and nights and pretty much every breathing moment of free time I get on CentOS is because I feel that the CentOS platform is a fantastic leveler that allows individual[1] and small[2] companies / support entities to build their base on - and its also something that allows a shared knowledge pool to build up around the common code that everyone has an interest in. From there, one might also infer that it allows these small market players the ability of deliver and support a client at the same or similar levels that larger clients would expect from larger companies.
Therefore, for me - the 'official' support process must also do everything to encourage these small players and bring them up into a stream where they find a sustainable business model around CentOS - the project *and* the distro - but more importantly - the project, not the distro. For me, the product has always been the people - not the code.
Now - whatever commercial 'endorsement' process gets adopted - it needs to reflect that ( for me anyway, or I would fight for it ). I'd even go to the extent of saying that if the process penalised people larger than a certain size ( either in financial terms or market terms ), I'd not mind that one bit.
Lets not forget, were not going after Red Hat's market - or even trying to create a situation where we compete with them; on the other hand we are trying to bring the same benefits of using the RHEL codebase down into the trenches so that people who cant get access or would not need access to the Red Hat support / legal / business process could still benefit from the very open source friendly state of play that exists within Red Hat. And also create and encourage the knowledge pool that builds around this shared code base.
Anyway, this is my personal opinion - its not that of the entire development / management team; and something of this nature would need to go through at-least a few iterations with everyone involved before it gets put into practice.
I guess this is a good place to put in the disclaimer that I have zero financial gains from CentOS - I get NO access to any donations or advertisement revenues.
- KB
[1] one or two people [2] less than 10 man
Karanbir,
what about putting up something along the lines of:
"Commercial support is currently unavailable, although this is being investigated by the community. The difficulty is that CentOS is a volunteer run effort.
"Help is available via the mailing lists: http://centos.org/modules/tinycontent/index.php?id=16
"IRC Chat: http://centos.org/modules/tinycontent/index.php?id=8
"and the online Wiki: http://wiki.centos.org/
"On top of this, there are countless forums, mailing lists, and websites that offer Linux support at no cost. If paid commercial support is required, it is recommended that you use RedHat Enterprise Linux [redhat.com]."
+1 on this.
-- Neil Aggarwal, (832)245-7314, www.JAMMConsulting.com Eliminate junk email and reclaim your inbox. Visit http://www.spammilter.com for details.
-----Original Message----- From: centos-bounces@centos.org [mailto:centos-bounces@centos.org] On Behalf Of Spiro Harvey Sent: Sunday, June 21, 2009 4:10 PM To: centos@centos.org Subject: Re: [CentOS] link to "commercial support" page isn't really helpful
Karanbir,
what about putting up something along the lines of:
"Commercial support is currently unavailable, although this is being investigated by the community. The difficulty is that CentOS is a volunteer run effort.
"Help is available via the mailing lists: http://centos.org/modules/tinycontent/index.php?id=16
"IRC Chat: http://centos.org/modules/tinycontent/index.php?id=8
"and the online Wiki: http://wiki.centos.org/
"On top of this, there are countless forums, mailing lists, and websites that offer Linux support at no cost. If paid commercial support is required, it is recommended that you use RedHat Enterprise Linux [redhat.com]."
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Spiro Harvey wrote:
Karanbir,
what about putting up something along the lines of:
"Commercial support is currently unavailable, although this is being investigated by the community. The difficulty is that CentOS is a volunteer run effort.
from a promotional standpoint, i would avoid getting into that centos is a volunteer effort, and i would *seriously* avoid using the word "difficulty." all i was suggesting earlier is that there are a number of ways to admit that centos has no *official* support channel, and that it would be useful to, even in admitting that, word it in such a way to not scare away potential adopters.
talk to someone with a marketing background. seriously. all you need to do is admit that there's no support, but word it carefully so that it doesn't seem like a big deal. just give people the warm fuzzies. that's all they're looking for.
rday --
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
from a promotional standpoint, i would avoid getting into that centos is a volunteer effort, and i would *seriously* avoid using the word "difficulty." all i was suggesting earlier is that there are a
What? You'd prefer we lie to people?
If we don't tell people that it's a community run volunteer effort, expectations change. The C in CentOS stands for Community.
number of ways to admit that centos has no *official* support channel, and that it would be useful to, even in admitting that, word it in such a way to not scare away potential adopters.
Potential adopters are those who:
a) are happy to get free community support b) those who can't or won't pay Redhat's fees
Redhat charge per license, but that comes with support. So if you really want paid support, Redhat is what you should be looking for.
If you're in camp b, then you must also be a part of camp a. Personally, I think you're barking up the wrong tree as you aren't interested in free community support.
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Spiro Harvey wrote:
from a promotional standpoint, i would avoid getting into that centos is a volunteer effort, and i would *seriously* avoid using the word "difficulty." all i was suggesting earlier is that there are a
What? You'd prefer we lie to people?
ok, this is getting frustrating. no, you don't lie about that. *of course* you have to describe centos as a volunteer project. but that bit of information is *not* *relevant* on the alleged *support* page, unless it directly affects how you're describing how to get support. otherwise, since you've already described the volunteer aspect of centos on something like a "what is centos?" page, there is no need to repeat it elsewhere.
here, let me make a suggestion. get someone with a marketing background to peruse centos.org. ask for their honest opinion. and take it from there.
rday
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
Robert P. J. Day wrote:
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Spiro Harvey wrote:
from a promotional standpoint, i would avoid getting into that centos is a volunteer effort, and i would *seriously* avoid using the word "difficulty." all i was suggesting earlier is that there are a
What? You'd prefer we lie to people?
ok, this is getting frustrating. no, you don't lie about that. *of course* you have to describe centos as a volunteer project. but that bit of information is *not* *relevant* on the alleged *support* page, unless it directly affects how you're describing how to get support. otherwise, since you've already described the volunteer aspect of centos on something like a "what is centos?" page, there is no need to repeat it elsewhere.
here, let me make a suggestion. get someone with a marketing background to peruse centos.org. ask for their honest opinion. and take it from there.
rday
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ======================================================================== _______________________________________________ CentOS mailing list CentOS@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
marketing is mainly half-truths around a kernel of truths. Depending on the marketer it's lies around a kernel of truth. I would rather not have that anywhere on the Centos site.
-----Original Message----- From: centos-bounces@centos.org [mailto:centos-bounces@centos.org] On
Behalf
Of Spiro Harvey Sent: Monday, June 22, 2009 1:49 AM To: centos@centos.org Subject: Re: [CentOS] link to "commercial support" page isn't really
helpful
[...] and i would *seriously* avoid using the word "difficulty." [...]
"Commercial support is currently unavailable, although this is being investigated by the community. The difficulty is that CentOS is a volunteer run effort."
Don't overreact Spiro. I really like your blurb, but the difficulty sentence has a negative ring. Please rephrase that single line and you get a gold-star. ;-)
I see Day's point, this is really a "soft value", the touchy feely stuff, nothing technical, and it's not about lying either, it just sounds negative, that's all.
And yeah, I've been down this road writing resumes and stuff for friend, myself and wife. Wording is important, some words are negatively resp positively charged. 8-)
On Sun, 21 Jun 2009, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
from a promotional standpoint, i would avoid getting into that centos is a volunteer effort, and i would *seriously* avoid using the word "difficulty." all i was suggesting earlier is that there are a number of ways to admit that centos has no *official* support channel, and that it would be useful to, even in admitting that, word it in such a way to not scare away potential adopters.
talk to someone with a marketing background. seriously. all you need to do is admit that there's no support, but word it carefully so that it doesn't seem like a big deal. just give people the warm fuzzies. that's all they're looking for.
What about "We cannot fix bugs in CentOS" ? (*)
I am sure that is a terrible thing to say to someone who wants CentOS support, but I wouldn't want anyone to believe otherwise.
Only Red Hat can fix bugs in CentOS, so if you say "support" and you mean "fixing bugs", then Red Hat is where you need to get support.
(*) In my presentations about CentOS that is exactly what I say. I want people to move to CentOS for the right reasons, not for some wrong assumption because someone with a marketing background wants to hide the truth.
If your business relies on CentOS, you'd better be sure Red Hat stays in business and is a market leader. Because you benefit from that as much as any Red Hat customer.
Robert P. J. Day wrote:
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Spiro Harvey wrote:
Karanbir,
what about putting up something along the lines of:
"Commercial support is currently unavailable, although this is being investigated by the community. The difficulty is that CentOS is a volunteer run effort.
from a promotional standpoint, i would avoid getting into that centos is a volunteer effort, and i would *seriously* avoid using the word "difficulty." all i was suggesting earlier is that there are a number of ways to admit that centos has no *official* support channel, and that it would be useful to, even in admitting that, word it in such a way to not scare away potential adopters.
talk to someone with a marketing background. seriously. all you need to do is admit that there's no support, but word it carefully so that it doesn't seem like a big deal. just give people the warm fuzzies. that's all they're looking for.
rday
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ======================================================================== _______________________________________________ CentOS mailing list CentOS@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
I disagree. Let everyone know upfront that this is run by volunteers.
On Mon, Jun 22, 2009 at 1:27 AM, Robert P. J. Day rpjday@crashcourse.cawrote:
talk to someone with a marketing background. seriously. all you need to do is admit that there's no support, but word it carefully so that it doesn't seem like a big deal. just give people the warm fuzzies. that's all they're looking for.
No, let's NOT talk to marketing people about this - all they care about is making money by making stuff look nice and remove all the wrinkles in photoshop! Kinda like the above....
IMNSHO, commercial support for Centos comes from consultants that could use the page for small advert blurbs. The community advantage to that comes from the safety net this spins under end-users: if the consultant which set-up your company's servers goes away, then you as a user can look at this list and find somebody that can take over the job.
BR Bent
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Bent Terp wrote:
On Mon, Jun 22, 2009 at 1:27 AM, Robert P. J. Day rpjday@crashcourse.ca wrote: talk to someone with a marketing background. seriously. all you need to do is admit that there's no support, but word it carefully so that it doesn't seem like a big deal. just give people the warm fuzzies. that's all they're looking for.
No, let's NOT talk to marketing people about this - all they care about is making money by making stuff look nice and remove all the wrinkles in photoshop! Kinda like the above....
are people on this list being *deliberately* obtuse or addled? the only point i was originally trying to make was that the current wording of no current commercial support found here:
http://centos.org/modules/tinycontent/index.php?id=12
seemed, well, a bit abrupt and dismissive. even if there's no *official* commercial support, someone can certainly be a bit more expansive on why. and what other options are. or *something*. as it stands, that page is little more than "this page under construction," which might not inspire readers with confidence.
have i clarified the point i'm trying to make? because, seriously, if you're still too clueless to get what i'm trying to say, then please save everyone the pixels and don't waste any more of your time or mine. i was *trying* to be helpful.
rday
p.s. what also doesn't inspire readers with confidence is obvious grammatical errors: "booking marking it will be of no value." ^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^
*you* might not care about proper english, but others who are considering adopting centos might be put off by that. occasionally, you *do* have to take off your geek hat and put on your marketing hat when it comes time to promote your product.
--
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
Karanbir:
Therefore, for me - the 'official' support process must also do everything to encourage these small players and bring them up into a stream where they find a sustainable business model around CentOS
Along these lines, I would like the support area to have a consultants directory. That will give consulting companies (Like mine) a place to list themselves as providing CentOS support.
People interested in finding a consultant can then search the directory by geographic area and/or name.
I am willing to contribute what I can to make this happen. I do web programming and I use CentOS as my platform.
Let me know if I can be of any help.
Thanks, Neil
-- Neil Aggarwal, (832)245-7314, www.JAMMConsulting.com Eliminate junk email and reclaim your inbox. Visit http://www.spammilter.com for details.
"Neil Aggarwal" neil@JAMMConsulting.com wrote:
Along these lines, I would like the support area to have a consultants directory. That will give consulting companies (Like mine) a place to list themselves as providing CentOS support.
This can be a very fine line to walk.
A list of consultants can easily be misinterpreted as endorsement. If a bad consultant rips someone off or does bad work, this can reflect on the people hosting the list... and if that's the people who release the product, this can get even worse.
It's my belief that this list needs to be done by a 3rd party.
At Mon, 22 Jun 2009 14:46:13 +1200 CentOS mailing list centos@centos.org wrote:
"Neil Aggarwal" neil@JAMMConsulting.com wrote:
Along these lines, I would like the support area to have a consultants directory. That will give consulting companies (Like mine) a place to list themselves as providing CentOS support.
This can be a very fine line to walk.
A list of consultants can easily be misinterpreted as endorsement. If a bad consultant rips someone off or does bad work, this can reflect on the people hosting the list... and if that's the people who release the product, this can get even worse.
It's my belief that this list needs to be done by a 3rd party.
Yes. And the CentOS site can include Links to the various third party directories, with a disclaimer that the 'CentOS organization' does not specificly endorse, etc. either the third party listing/directory nor the people listed on these sites -- the standard legal mumbo jumbo.
On Sun, Jun 21, 2009 at 9:31 AM, Robert P. J. Day rpjday@crashcourse.cawrote:
<snip>
I wouould say that you are not
very serious and ignore your request.
wow, neil ... misunderstand much? i didn't "ask for something to be
changed" so much as i *suggested* a change that might have benefit for the centos community, and for me in particular that would help me immensely in being able to promote centos to my clients.
i *cannot* suggest what content should go on that commercial support page since i have *no idea* what avenues the centos developers are currently exploring.
seriously, neil, what part of that confuses you? or should i try again with shorter and simpler words?
rday
p.s. this was my first interaction with the general centos community and, if this is the level of wilful obduracy i can expect to run into, it's probably going to be the last.
WOW and GOODBYE..... If you had subscribed to this mailing list, and read it, you would have found that the people participating (including the developers) include some of the most helpful and knowledgeable people on the planet. There is also a Forum on the web. None of the developers make *any* money from the centos project.
More than one RHEL user has come to CentOS because the support here is excellent.
I believe that link did work (recently?) and listed several people who were offering consulting services. There are probably some people on the list who could help your clients, if they have time available.
Those on the list highly recommend our upstream vendor (RHEL) if that would be better suited to your clients. GL
Neil Aggarwal wrote:
i'm not the right person for that
This is strange. You asked for something to be changed. The people in charge asked you for a suggestion and now you are putting it back on them. If I were in charge of this, I would say that you are not very serious and ignore your request.
Just as with life in general, or with the place we choose to work - most people are good at some things and not so good at others.
I figure that if a person chooses to not contribute to the project, it should not reflect negatively (contribution being voluntary, based on what you bring to the table).
I'm sure that there are people involved that can do a proper job.
Robert P. J. Day wrote:
On Sun, 21 Jun 2009, Karanbir Singh wrote:
On 21/06/09 13:28, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
That page does indeed reflect the current state of play - there is *no* centos approved or recommended commercial support entity - but it *is* something that is being worked on.
i realize that page is *technically* correct, but its wording is quite discouraging:
If you want to propose a blob of text that might replace whats on the page right now, I am sure we can plumb that in.
i'm not the right person for that as i am utterly clueless about what possibilities you're exploring at the moment. that has to be done by someone at centos who's involved in it.
rday
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ======================================================================== _______________________________________________ CentOS mailing list CentOS@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
if you are going to be the consultant and you are recommending Centos then you are definitely a good person to make a suggestion as to what should go in there. Take a whack at it.
On Sun, 21 Jun 2009, William Warren wrote:
if you are going to be the consultant and you are recommending Centos then you are definitely a good person to make a suggestion as to what should go in there. Take a whack at it.
again, no, i'm *not* the right person. i'm not a centos developer and, therefore, i have no idea what options the developers might be looking at in terms of support channels.
i have an extensive red hat/fedora background so i can certainly address the *quality* of the product. but if a client wants to know what might be backing *me* up in terms of support from the community or from commercial entities, i simply don't know.
rday --
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
On 06/22/2009 12:32 AM, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
again, no, i'm *not* the right person. i'm not a centos developer and, therefore, i have no idea what options the developers might be looking at in terms of support channels.
lets assume for a minute, that there is no real 'endorsement' or 'commercial support venue' that the CentOS developers are considering - What would then be the reasons to choose CentOS ?
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Karanbir Singh wrote:
On 06/22/2009 12:32 AM, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
again, no, i'm *not* the right person. i'm not a centos developer and, therefore, i have no idea what options the developers might be looking at in terms of support channels.
lets assume for a minute, that there is no real 'endorsement' or 'commercial support venue' that the CentOS developers are considering - What would then be the reasons to choose CentOS ?
i may not have time to address this a lot more this evening as i'm hanging out at logan airport waiting to board my plane. but don't conflate the two issues here.
the first issue is: why choose centos? and i can certainly address that. it's easy to show that it's a good product and why. i have no difficulty with that.
the second (separate) issue is: where does one get centos support? and i *don't* know how to answer that. a previous poster listed a number of places: wiki, mailing lists, IRC. which is all well and good, but will mean *nothing* to a large company whose only concern is: "if something goes horribly, horribly wrong, who do i call to demand to fix it?" that's all they care about -- someone to yell at. they're not going to accept that they should start joining mailing lists or hanging out on IRC chats.
i can say that *i* could try to handle it, but a suitably large company won't find that acceptable. they'll probably want something more substantial in the way of support.
anyway, i'm starting to repeat myself so i'll give it more thought and see what else i can come up with.
rday --
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
"Robert P. J. Day" rpjday@crashcourse.ca wrote:
i can say that *i* could try to handle it, but a suitably large company won't find that acceptable. they'll probably want something more substantial in the way of support.
A suitably large company can afford RHEL. CentOS and RHEL are the same, only the latter has commercial support available.
Robert P. J. Day wrote:
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Karanbir Singh wrote:
On 06/22/2009 12:32 AM, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
again, no, i'm *not* the right person. i'm not a centos developer and, therefore, i have no idea what options the developers might be looking at in terms of support channels.
lets assume for a minute, that there is no real 'endorsement' or 'commercial support venue' that the CentOS developers are considering - What would then be the reasons to choose CentOS ?
i may not have time to address this a lot more this evening as i'm hanging out at logan airport waiting to board my plane. but don't conflate the two issues here.
the first issue is: why choose centos? and i can certainly address that. it's easy to show that it's a good product and why. i have no difficulty with that.
Or, you have experience with the RH admin tools and style, and you are the part of the community that Red Hat abandoned when they prohibited redistribution of their binaries. While CentOS has served this purpose very well, philosophically I can't help wondering if we wouldn't all be better off if the community they abandoned had just walked away. It's too bad Ubuntu LTS wasn't around at the time.
On Sun, 21 Jun 2009 19:49:45 -0400 (EDT) Robert P. J. Day wrote:
the second (separate) issue is: where does one get centos support?
Way back when, I remember reading something that said words to the effect of "If you can carry your own water, Linux is free."
The reverse is also true.
and i *don't* know how to answer that. a previous poster listed a number of places: wiki, mailing lists, IRC. which is all well and good, but will mean *nothing* to a large company whose only concern is: "if something goes horribly, horribly wrong, who do i call to demand to fix it?" that's all they care about -- someone to yell at. they're not going to accept that they should start joining mailing lists or hanging out on IRC chats.
If that's the situation, Centos will not meet their needs. RHEL is what they want, and the answer to the who-to-call question becomes Red Hat.
I've never used RHEL myself, but I get the impression that you don't get to "play the edge" quite as much as you can get away with on Centos because you need to insure that you keep a maintainable RHEL system, where maintainable is defined by Red Hat.
But RHEL is really the only answer to your question. Centos ain't it.
Robert P. J. Day wrote:
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Karanbir Singh wrote:
On 06/22/2009 12:32 AM, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
again, no, i'm *not* the right person. i'm not a centos developer and, therefore, i have no idea what options the developers might be looking at in terms of support channels.
lets assume for a minute, that there is no real 'endorsement' or 'commercial support venue' that the CentOS developers are considering - What would then be the reasons to choose CentOS ?
i may not have time to address this a lot more this evening as i'm hanging out at logan airport waiting to board my plane. but don't conflate the two issues here.
the first issue is: why choose centos? and i can certainly address that. it's easy to show that it's a good product and why. i have no difficulty with that.
the second (separate) issue is: where does one get centos support? and i *don't* know how to answer that. a previous poster listed a number of places: wiki, mailing lists, IRC. which is all well and good, but will mean *nothing* to a large company whose only concern is: "if something goes horribly, horribly wrong, who do i call to demand to fix it?" that's all they care about -- someone to yell at. they're not going to accept that they should start joining mailing lists or hanging out on IRC chats.
i can say that *i* could try to handle it, but a suitably large company won't find that acceptable. they'll probably want something more substantial in the way of support.
anyway, i'm starting to repeat myself so i'll give it more thought and see what else i can come up with.
rday
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ======================================================================== _______________________________________________ CentOS mailing list CentOS@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
Hello,
I think the point here is simple.
If you are building a Business case for Linux Systems then you have a few choices.
1. Only present them with Commercial Linux Alternatives (of which there are now a number of choices)
2. Explain the philosophy behind open source and the Free Software Movement (Clearly noting that the two are different things. This should also cover how community support works.
3. Identify a company that provides commercial support for the Linux Distribution that you think best fits the business need and establish a relationship with them arranging support contracts and etc.
I have had different situations that have led me to use each one of these options, It really is up to the system implementer to work with a business and decide what level of risk versus cost is appropriate for the project or organization that you are involved with.
Have a nice day :)
"if something goes horribly, horribly wrong, who do i call to demand to fix it?" that's all they care about -- someone to yell at.
If that is the case, why are they not buying RHEL? They will get exactly what they want.
Neil
-- Neil Aggarwal, (832)245-7314, www.JAMMConsulting.com Eliminate junk email and reclaim your inbox. Visit http://www.spammilter.com for details.
I would guess that listing commercial providers on the CentOS site could expose them to legal liabilities given the litigious nature of the U.S. so don't know if this is a consideration.
I can't speak for others, but I would guess that there are quite a few people/organizations on this list who provide commercial support for CentOS and other *nix distributions without being listed on CentOS's site or other sites.
We have been providing support for a variety of Linux systems since 1997 staring with Caldera, then SuSE, and now most of our clients are running CentOS on current systems. We have been supporting a number of clients since 1984 running various Unix systems including some old SCO OpenServer 5.0.x systems.
The critical issue for the client is that they have confidence in the organization that does their support, not that the organization is a big company such as Red Hat, IBM, etc. I ran into our oldest client today in town, a company that we have worked with since 1984, and is still running applications on SCO OpenServer 5.0.6a. We have other clients that we started working with as far back as 1988 when they were running SCO Xenix, and now have systems still running SuSE 9.0 Pro (it still runs liunx-abi to run SCO OpenServer COFF binaries), and have a couple of CentOS 5.x systems which are hosting the Caldera systems.
Bill
I agree almost completely with your points...
On Sun, Jun 21, 2009 at 10:44 PM, Bill Campbellcentos@celestial.com wrote:
I would guess that listing commercial providers on the CentOS site could expose them to legal liabilities given the litigious nature of the U.S. so don't know if this is a consideration.
I can't speak for others, but I would guess that there are quite a few people/organizations on this list who provide commercial support for CentOS and other *nix distributions without being listed on CentOS's site or other sites.
Very true...plus I'm more inclined to choose a vendor if they have demonstrated competence on the lists. I think that is the best advertisement: vendors who answer questions will increase my confidence in their skillsets. Plus I rarely read anything on the website except the list archives.
At Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:39:05 +0100 CentOS mailing list centos@centos.org wrote:
On 06/22/2009 12:32 AM, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
again, no, i'm *not* the right person. i'm not a centos developer and, therefore, i have no idea what options the developers might be looking at in terms of support channels.
lets assume for a minute, that there is no real 'endorsement' or 'commercial support venue' that the CentOS developers are considering - What would then be the reasons to choose CentOS ?
It is a lower-cost alternative to RHEL. You do get most of the benefits of RedHat's support, since CentOS gets (security) patches and updates indirectly from RedHat (RH SRPM => CentOS volunteers => CentOS RPM => CentOS repository). The main difference between RHEL and CentOS is the 'hand-holding' aspect -- you don't have 'toll-free' / 'instant' access to a technical support crew that you would have if you paid RedHat the annual support fee.
If you are enough of a techy yourself OR if there is someone in your company who is enough of a techy, it could be a cost effective option to go with CentOS rather then pay RedHat. Many small companies have enough random IT work to keep someone on the payroll (even if only part time). It is cheaper to have a local person to do in-person work (such as installing the OS on the physical machine and doing other admin work) and often such a person can really manage keeping the system(s) up-to-date, particularly if there is an up-to-date repository of updates, with only occasional need to get 'help', which is often provided by this E-Mail list. There are really two situations where it might be cost effective to actually pay RedHat for RHEL support:
1) a really *small* outfit that got a system with RHEL *pre-installed* (eg from Dell) and has no real clue about managing a Linux system.
2) a really *large* outfit that needs things like RedHat training services and has hundreds of machines (or a few really large systems) and has mission critical needs and wants to have access to a warm body (or three) from RedHat who can fly in for emergencies (or be fetched with the company Lear Jet).
For most of the companies in between, distros like CentOS 'fit'. Many of these companies don't need an outside commercial channel, since they often have an IT 'staff' (even if this is a single part-time position). I suspect that for case 1 above, there is a business opportunity looking for an enterprising geek... The hard part here would be finding the *small* outfits with (or looking to get) RHEL boxes and convincing them to 'buy local' and 'be a local hero' (eg the slogan can apply to more than just vegatables). I suspect most Linux geeks are not really expert marketing experts...
On Mon, Jun 22, 2009 at 1:32 AM, Robert P. J. Day rpjday@crashcourse.cawrote:
again, no, i'm *not* the right person. i'm not a centos developer and, therefore, i have no idea what options the developers might be looking at in terms of support channels.
You ARE the right person, as you want to sell CentOS support.
i have an extensive red hat/fedora background so i can certainly
address the *quality* of the product. but if a client wants to know what might be backing *me* up in terms of support from the community or from commercial entities, i simply don't know.
You do this for a living => you are a commercial entity. If you want to know what support YOU can expect from the community, and are satisfied with a marketing-written page that gives you "warm fuzzies", then you're way off mark. Instead, you should follow this list for several months and use that experience when you make your recommendations to your customers.
From my personal experience, we've received better support from CentOS than
from RedHat! What you don't get is a phone-droid that's being paid minimum wages to listen to phone abuse.....
BR Bent
Bent Terp wrote: <snip>
From my personal experience, we've received better support from CentOS than from RedHat! What you don't get is a phone-droid that's being paid minimum wages to listen to phone abuse.....
I'm with you on that one. My first stab at Linux was in '99 when I bought an official boxed set of RH6.0, which was supposed to include "installation support". Stuff wasn't nearly as automatic then as it is now. (Pre-CUPS) printing was a pain, network was a pain, dial-up was worrisome and even X-Window was iffy. I called, your phone-droid answered and I soon decided that if RH6.0 was gonna be a reality, I would be doing it myself.
Since CentOS, this mailing list has been amazingly helpful, often astonishingly quick with a right-on answer.
And, to RedHat's credit, simple networks now "just happen", printing is a breeze and I'm even tempted to allow this thing to boot directly into run level 5.
on 6-21-2009 5:28 AM Robert P. J. Day spake the following:
On Sun, 21 Jun 2009, Karanbir Singh wrote:
On 21/06/09 12:09, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
This Section or Page is coming soon.that is *not* going to give this client any warm fuzzies. from a promotion perspective, either that page should get some actual content, or the link should be dropped entirely. or something.
That page does indeed reflect the current state of play - there is *no* centos approved or recommended commercial support entity - but it *is* something that is being worked on.
i realize that page is *technically* correct, but its wording is quite discouraging:
http://www.centos.org/modules/tinycontent/index.php?id=12
"This Section or Page is coming soon.
"This page is a holder for Content that is not yet available for publication.
"This page will not go away when the content is available, so booking marking it will be of no value. The URL of the link you followed will be updated when the real content is published."
even if there's no support right now, you *need* to give readers the unmistakable impression that it's coming, that it's a work in progress, that you're negotiating with potential support providers ... *something*. as it is, that page can be summarized as simply admitting, "support? we got nuthin'"
i haven't yet proposed to my client that they should consider centos instead of rhel but i can *guarantee* that, the instant i do, they will be at the centos site, checking it out, and when they hit that page on commercial support, that will be the end of that discussion. guaranteed.
rday
If they want commercial support, what is wrong with RedHat? That is what they do. CentOS is a "community supported" enterprise distro. Most organizations that want support usually look for an established business entity.
Besides, paid contracts at the top of the food chain keeps the scraps floating down to the rest of us. If RedHat ever sees CentOS as a competition, they will surely do something to make it more difficult.
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Scott Silva wrote:
If they want commercial support, what is wrong with RedHat? That is what they do. CentOS is a "community supported" enterprise distro. Most organizations that want support usually look for an established business entity.
Besides, paid contracts at the top of the food chain keeps the scraps floating down to the rest of us. If RedHat ever sees CentOS as a competition, they will surely do something to make it more difficult.
you're right, and i'm starting to appreciate the distinction people have been pointing out to me. that still means the "commercial support" page should be clarified to make that obvious in some way.
rday --
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ========================================================================
Robert P. J. Day wrote:
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Scott Silva wrote:
If they want commercial support, what is wrong with RedHat? That is what they do. CentOS is a "community supported" enterprise distro. Most organizations that want support usually look for an established business entity.
Besides, paid contracts at the top of the food chain keeps the scraps floating down to the rest of us. If RedHat ever sees CentOS as a competition, they will surely do something to make it more difficult.
you're right, and i'm starting to appreciate the distinction people have been pointing out to me. that still means the "commercial support" page should be clarified to make that obvious in some way.
The obvious way is that someone running mostly Centos can duplicate their problem on a supported RHEL machine if other approaches fail because of the degree of compatibility. I'm not sure if you'd want to come out and say that officially, though. However, if RH has any sense at all, they'll realize that the only reason they have any customers left after the fedora split other than a few companies that can afford to license every machine is because Centos lets them do this.
At Mon, 22 Jun 2009 15:14:20 -0400 (EDT) CentOS mailing list centos@centos.org wrote:
On Mon, 22 Jun 2009, Scott Silva wrote:
If they want commercial support, what is wrong with RedHat? That is what they do. CentOS is a "community supported" enterprise distro. Most organizations that want support usually look for an established business entity.
Besides, paid contracts at the top of the food chain keeps the scraps floating down to the rest of us. If RedHat ever sees CentOS as a competition, they will surely do something to make it more difficult.
you're right, and i'm starting to appreciate the distinction people have been pointing out to me. that still means the "commercial support" page should be clarified to make that obvious in some way.
And there are different levels of 'commercial support'. One option is indeed RedHat itself. For some companies / organizations RedHat's level of support is too costly (for some definitions of 'cost' -- not always a pure monetary issue in some cases). Many 'mid sized' companies / organizations have an in-house IT staff, who are capable of dealing with day-to-day management and are also capable of getting outside support via newsgroups, E-Mail lists, and Wikis. *Some* smaller companies / organizations might prefer a 'local' personal support structure, rather than support from an office in NC or some equally distant location. *I* suspect that many of these smaller companies / organizations might prefer to go with CentOS if they knew there was a local support person that they could put on a retainer contract. Yes, this probably does mean taking some business away from RedHat, but it is probably business RedHat might prefer to farm out anyway, since getting daily calls from Middle Of Nowhereville about 'trivial' issues probably costs RedHat more than they make on the lowest level of support.
rday
======================================================================== Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.Web page: http://crashcourse.ca Linked In: http://www.linkedin.com/in/rpjday Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday ======================================================================== _______________________________________________ CentOS mailing list CentOS@centos.org http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
On Sun, Jun 21, 2009 at 8:09 AM, Karanbir Singhmail-lists@karan.org wrote:
On 21/06/09 12:09, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
This Section or Page is coming soon.
that is *not* going to give this client any warm fuzzies. from a promotion perspective, either that page should get some actual content, or the link should be dropped entirely. or something.
That page does indeed reflect the current state of play - there is *no* centos approved or recommended commercial support entity - but it *is* something that is being worked on.
:D
I understand that Novell may be offering support for all distributions including commercial RedHat, CentOS, their own SuSe, Ubuntu. I prefer RedHat/CentOS myself, but it's an interesting move if it moves beyond the talk phase.
On 06/21/2009 05:33 PM, Kwan Lowe wrote:
I understand that Novell may be offering support for all distributions including commercial RedHat, CentOS, their own SuSe, Ubuntu. I prefer RedHat/CentOS myself, but it's an interesting move if it moves beyond the talk phase.
Afaik, Novel hasent spoken with anyone at CentOS about this. But yes, it would be quite interesting to see what they come up with. A very dear friend of mine, works in a mostly SuSe shop - and they are quite upset with the general competence level of support they get these days.
-
Bent Terp -
Bill Campbell -
Clint Dilks -
Dag Wieers -
Frank Cox -
Geoff Galitz -
Karanbir Singh -
Kwan Lowe -
Lanny Marcus -
Les Mikesell -
Michael Klinosky -
Neil Aggarwal -
Robert -
Robert Heller -
Robert P. J. Day -
Scott Silva -
Sorin Srbu -
Spiro Harvey -
William L. Maltby -
William Warren