Full time staff?

[opentoe]

Does LimeTech have employees or a staff? If not, would unRAID and its progress benefit from having an onboard programmer/staff? I think I read the owner of LimeTech has a full time job and just works on unRAID when there is available time. I guess I'm just curious.

[kizer]

They have us Moderators.

[PeterB]

... would unRAID and its progress benefit from having an onboard programmer/staff?

 

Almost certainly, yes .... but who is going to pay them?

 

I think I read the owner of LimeTech has a full time job and just works on unRAID when there is available time. I guess I'm just curious.

 

Just try to estimate what revenue stream is likely to be generated by unRAID sales!

[opentoe]

Throw a family member in there and make him work for free!

 

 

[boof]

... would unRAID and its progress benefit from having an onboard programmer/staff?

 

Almost certainly, yes .... but who is going to pay them?

 

I think I read the owner of LimeTech has a full time job and just works on unRAID when there is available time. I guess I'm just curious.

 

Just try to estimate what revenue stream is likely to be generated by unRAID sales!

 

Charge an upgrade fee for each major version release. Feed into staff, develop more features faster, release major releases more frequently for £, rinse repeat.

 

Granted none of us knows the existing financials but there are a bunch of folk registered on this forum (some will be using the free version, some won't be using it all and even more will have paid but not use the forum) and the numbers would look good for an ongoing revenue stream on the face of it.

[joshpond]

I kinda like things the way they are.

 

Having to pay for each revision/upgrade/bugfix means more cost. Sure you get more upgrades/features faster but you start heading towards M$ tactics.

 

Josh

[prostuff1]

I kinda like things the way they are.

 

Having to pay for each revision/upgrade/bugfix means more cost. Sure you get more upgrades/features faster but you start heading towards M$ tactics.

 

Josh

 

While I agree with the above, I have no problem paying an upgrade fee for significant new features.  Microsoft and OS X work this way, as does iOS on all iDevices (save for the iPhone).

[mrow]

I kinda like things the way they are.

 

Having to pay for each revision/upgrade/bugfix means more cost. Sure you get more upgrades/features faster but you start heading towards M$ tactics.

 

Josh

 

While I agree with the above, I have no problem paying an upgrade fee for significant new features.  Microsoft and OS X work this way, as does iOS on all iDevices (save for the iPhone).

 

Apple hasn't charged for iOS updates in over 2 years.

[prostuff1]

Apple hasn't charged for iOS updates in over 2 years.

That is NOT true.  I distinctly remember paying for an iOS update or 2 on my iPod touch devices.

[BRiT]

Apple hasn't charged for iOS updates in over 2 years.

 

That's not true for iPOD devices. They did not charge for iPHONE devices.

[mrow]

Apple hasn't charged for iOS updates in over 2 years.

 

That's not true for iPOD devices. They did not charge for iPHONE devices.

 

My mistake on the timeline, Apple stopped charge over the updates to iPod touches over a year ago, not two. Since the release of the iPad all iOS software updates for all iOS devices(iPhone, iPod touch, iPad and Apple TV 2) have been free.

[kizer]

I do fully belive they should be paying us to use that evil thing called iTunes thou.

[opentoe]

All the problems and questions I have ever had were all solved / answered by users on the forum. If I did have a real serious issue I would most likely try to connect with LimeTech themselves. I am computer-hardware literate so it has been a fun ride so far with minimal loss so far. I never thought I would be running a computer with 18TB only booting from a small flash drive. Hey, it works for what I need. I would love to see more presence of LimeTech on the forums. Not for just support, but for just contributing in the discussions and chat. Thanks!

 

[dgaschk]

All Apple OS versions used to be free. They had to start charging due to some stock regulation. They made their money on the hardware.

[jupilerman]

(...)I have no problem paying an upgrade fee for significant new features.  Microsoft and OS X work this way, as does iOS on all iDevices (save for the iPhone).

So because they work that way, limetech MUST also works that way ?

I dont think so.

Tom does a great job with unRAID but the community also do a great job helping developping unRAID.

So, who deserves and gets the money ?

 

if it ain't broke, don't fix it .

[NAS]

The problem IMO (if there even is one) is that whilst the purchase of unRAID clearly states it comes with support, that support isnt defined. As such people project what they expect it to be. Rightly or wrongly expectations will never match reality, being either better or worse resulting in posts like these where one group has a better experience that they expected and other have a worse experience.

 

Then there is the split between official support and community support which is not clear.

 

Does this need fixed... probably not.... would it benefit from a better wording on the Limetech LLC support page... I would say so.

 

If you say you offer support, have a professional looking website and are an LLC people will quite rightly start thinking "this is how my Apple, M$, Adobe, hosting supports works so obviously this is how this will work as well". It doesnt unRAID is almost unique in that respect.

[aiden]

And not to add a morbid tone to this discussion, but I'm sure many of us are keenly sensitive to the idea of a single developer project that loses its developer.

[boof]

limetech has posted before that there is some sort of code escrow in place for that scenario.

 

Though, pragmatically, I'm not really sure what it would mean for the ongoing project. It may just be full release of all source.

[aiden]

limetech has posted before that there is some sort of code escrow in place for that scenario.

 

Though, pragmatically, I'm not really sure what it would mean for the ongoing project. It may just be full release of all source.

 

Yes, but software escrows do not house the experience and knowledge gained during product development.  They usually only hold the last snapshot of development, and without historical context, future developers can end up running backwards to rediscover why older solutions were abandoned in favor of the current methods.  Cross-training within a development team is much more robust against this kind of knowledge loss.

[boof]

Absolutely - hence why I said I have no idea what it would mean for the project. Release of source might be next to useless particularly if it's out of date.

 

Better than nothing though! (maybe )

[aiden]

Better than nothing though! (maybe )

 

Having the foresight to put the code into escrow is absolutely better than nothing.

[kizer]

I have one question to the masses.

What if the dev just stopped? Wouldn't unRAID continue to function just as it does now? I'm completely happy with what I have and honestly other than adding some features/functions now and then I'm completely content with what I have now. Other than insuring I have a working key I'm good to go.

 

Well all seem to understand the Business Model and way Developement works. Its very simplistic and honestly the simpler the better and it functions just as advertised.

[aiden]

I have one question to the masses.

What if the dev just stopped? Wouldn't unRAID continue to function just as it does now?

 

Yes, it would continue to operate as-is.  The problem comes from the advancements and changes made to hardware over time.  The 2.2TB issue is a prime example.

[boof]

I have one question to the masses.

What if the dev just stopped? Wouldn't unRAID continue to function just as it does now? I'm completely happy with what I have and honestly other than adding some features/functions now and then I'm completely content with what I have now. Other than insuring I have a working key I'm good to go.

 

Well all seem to understand the Business Model and way Developement works. Its very simplistic and honestly the simpler the better and it functions just as advertised.

 

As it does right now, snapshot in time? Sure.

 

But as it's distributed as an OS and as the md drivers are built against the kernel then your future security updates, driver updates etc would be problematic.

 

The community would have to stay on top of the distro (do-able) and make sure it continues to build against newer kernels (harder but do-able unless the kernel md stack gets a large reshuffle).

 

emhttp would eventually become an issue but you can start an array without it so a new one could be written using the hooks into the driver.

 

So yes, it would work as it does right now. But that won't do you much good if your motherboard goes pop and you can't get the same model or in a years time when controller cards and chipsets have all been updated. As with everything in the IT world it would slowly degrade in usefulness if left alone entirely.

 

 

 

[kizer]

Anything you tinker with will someday become outdated unless its constantly updated. You simply can not expect a Dev to continue to update forever. Last time I checked forever is a long time.

 

Maybe the front page should say updates for the life of your existing Hardware.