Re: [Gnumed-devel] Re: GNUmed install made easy - maybe

[Sebastian Hilbert]

On Saturday 01 October 2005 12:44, Adrian Midgley wrote:
> On Sat, 2005-09-17 at 18:47 +0200, Andreas Tille wrote:
> > IMHO an end user should ask a service company to install his box with the
> > software he needs (at least for practice management systems).
>
> This implies - demands - an ecology of such companies.
>
> Commercial
> ----------
> In the UK, and to a degree in mainland Europe we now have the Open
> Source COnsortium, who would be a suitable source of such companies.
>
> www.opensourceconsortium.org 
>
> I'm a contact for them and on the mailing lists.
>
Good to know.

> Public
> ------
> In the UK there is the National COmputing Centre, in Manchester, which
> among other things maintains a testing lab for public bodies.  These are
> specifically local government bodies - city and county councils - but
> health orgs can get in under sponsorship from one of them which would
> not be impossible to arrange.
>
> I have a contact at NCC...
>
>
> Task
> ----
> So the task, whcih is part of productionising the system, and therefore a
> background task but one that needs to not be put off forever, is to
> construct that ecology, which implies making it easy for a company to
> discover what they need to know about installing and supporting the
> software, and the users.
I don't understand this completely. This is interesting and I would like to 
discuss this a little more.

Are you saying that the OpenSource project itself should pick up the task of 
'productionising' ? I have always wondered about this. Do you mean the 
members of the project should give hints regarding a business plan or revenue 
generating aspects ? Or do you mean that a project needs good documentation 
so a company easily finds what it needs to craft a good product from it 
and/or extend the project ?

Good documentation such as installation guides should make it easy to install 
the software at a customer's site.

I don't know what you mean by 

>'what they need to know about installing and supporting thesoftware, and the 
>users.'

In my opinion the project cannot help the company to support the user. The 
project will offer the best documentation it can but the hand-holding part in 
support is up to the company. If the company in turn needs support/training 
it can ask the project members but the project itself has no obligation to 
help.

Wouldn't it be better if the company looks at the project's documentation, 
installs it in-house and decides if the information provided is enough to 
offer paid-for support to clients ?

Why (if so) should the members of any OpenSource project make sure that 
someone else is able to make money from their work ?
>
> This is I think subtly different from producing an easy install for an only
> slightly experienced user.
Yes and no. If the enduser can install it any IT/IS trained personell should 
be able to handle the install. 

In Australia there seems to be a shortage of companies with Linux knowledge. A 
fact I cannot quite understand. This should be golden times for Australian IT 
students. Just set up a company and *be* the missing companies. Right now 
there might not be many companies but I cannot think of reasons why this 
situation is not about to change.

IOW. Either there is demand and it is up to the IT people to set up a business 
or there is no demand and consequently no need to set up a business.
>
> It is also a large task.
It is but unless I got it all wrong much of it is not the project's duty but 
the companie's duty. If they lack the skills they have to invest time and 
money to skill themselves or forget it.

Seastian Hilbert
- not speaking on behalf of the GNUmed project -
-- 
Sebastian Hilbert 
Leipzig / Germany
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