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Re: Why Aren't Open Source Tools Being Considered?

Subject: Re: Why Aren't Open Source Tools Being Considered?
From: Dick Margulis <margulisd -at- comcast -dot- net>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2005 14:37:44 -0400


Bruce Byfield wrote:

On Mon, 2005-08-22 at 10:44 -0700, Jefro wrote:


If such an organization offered support for GIMP, OpenOffice, Dia, etc. would it make a difference in the corporate community? My feeling is, probably not, at least not at first.


I wonder: How important is support for any software used by technical
writers? People often cite it as a reason for not using FOSS tools, but
does anyone make regular user of Adobe, Macromedia, or Microsoft
support?
I know that I never did. I was always far more likely to check on the
Internet, or ask a question to a list like ths one.


I may be wrong about this, but I believe "support" in this context, at least among technology-savvy corporate managers (not an oxymoron, really) means something like, "the likely future release of a version compatible with the next iteration of Windows."

In that sense, I think Lou Quillo's comment about open file formats, rather than open source code, is critical to an understanding of this issue. If companies started looking at insuring the future availability of their information through open file formats, the question of software "support" would go away.


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Follow-Ups:

References:
Re: Why Aren't Open Source Tools Being Considered?: From: Jefro
Re: Why Aren't Open Source Tools Being Considered?: From: Bruce Byfield

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