From kde-core-devel Sat Aug 16 04:58:37 2003 From: "M. Fioretti" Date: Sat, 16 Aug 2003 04:58:37 +0000 To: kde-core-devel Subject: Re: OT: Siemens sees Linux desktops at 20% of market by X-MARC-Message: https://marc.info/?l=kde-core-devel&m=106102627304602 On Fri, Aug 15, 2003 15:28:30 at 03:28:30PM -0400, Navindra Umanee (navindra@cs.mcgill.ca) wrote: > > If Siemens wants to just use these arguments to get a better deal > > from Ximian -- fine. But what were the reasons to go over to > > Ximian at all, if they could have KDE for free? > > Ah, I suspect this *is* the key. They did not go over to Ximian. > > ==> Ximian went over to them. <== [snip] > > Plus, Ximian no doubt offers them something (perhaps: services, > internal company party-lines, "support", indemnification, comfort and > hand-holding) that we as an OSS community can't. Exactly. I can confirm by direct experience, working into one of those big multinationals which still think that IS/IT is not essential and strategic, just something to outsorce faster than a dead cat. At that level (corporate IT outsorcing) contracts, ISO 9000 and similar quality certifications, everything Navindra put in the parentheses above are an absolute "must have". Don't shoot the messenger, please. I'm just confirming an hypothesis, not saying it is the right/best way to do things. Ciao, Marco Fioretti -- Marco Fioretti m.fioretti, at the server inwind.it Red Hat for low memory http://www.rule-project.org/en/ A dream will always triumph over reality, once it is given the chance. Stanislaw Lem