Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site brl-tgr.ARPA Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!think!harvard!seismo!brl-tgr!tgr!vortex!lauren@RAND-UNIX.ARPA From: lauren@RAND-UNIX.ARPA Newsgroups: net.micro Subject: software support Message-ID: <418@brl-tgr.ARPA> Date: Sun, 4-Aug-85 13:58:40 EDT Article-I.D.: brl-tgr.418 Posted: Sun Aug 4 13:58:40 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 7-Aug-85 02:14:43 EDT Sender: news@brl-tgr.ARPA Lines: 53 Source is a two-edged sword. While many people enjoy hacking away at fixing problems themselves, some don't have the time or knowledge. Even worse, sometimes when source for something is floating around all over the place it makes any kind of real support impossible. I still frequently get irate phone calls and messages from people regarding a program I put into the PD quite a few years ago. My name sits at the top of the change list. People call and yell and scream that it doesn't work (you'd be AMAZED how irate they are, especially given that they didn't pay anything for it! It's really incredible.) In any case, what I find is that these people inevitably have obtained versions of that program that have passed through a number of people who have tried to "fix" or "expand" it in various ways, and broke it in the process in one way or another. Sometimes these people added their changes to the change list--usually not. I've seen at least 60 unique versions of that program, 55 or so of which were broken. These people who called up complaining had spent hours, days, or sometimes weeks trying to figure out what was wrong. I don't have the time or, frankly, the desire to debug all of these broken variations on my original code. All I can do is offer to point people at the original working program, which hasn't undergone significant change by me in a fair while. Then the people start screaming that they want the fancy features that so and so says they added to the program (which broke it) and that I really should support that program. Damn, what am I supposed to do with that code after everyone and his brother has modified it to death? I can't take responsibility for the changes that other people make in code that hasn't been under my control for a long period. As you can imagine, this experience with this old program has left a rather bad taste in my mouth. I wish I *could* support that program, but having released it the way I did to the PD made that impossible once everyone started their modifications. I think what really hurts is the way people call you up and scream you're a jerk for not supporting your code when they got it for free from some BBS and the code has been heavily modified by umpteen different people in any case. Most of us are only human. Obviously this doesn't happen to everyone. But it sure has happened to me! When you pay money for software, you have a right to expect reasonable support. The fact that some (especially, sometimes, large) companies often provide lousy support is unfortunately beside the point. Many companies try damned hard to provide good support. "Little" private companies, in particular, may often try especially hard and especially need the income from every copy to keep their heads above water (not everyone is "lucky" enough to have their time paid for by university or government jobs). Companies (whether big or small) that make a genuine effort at support deserve a crack at getting our business. Buying software from these companies should help to make our industry evolve in the "proper" direction, where good support will be the genuine norm. --Lauren--