[Info-vax] Trying to build a case for Benefit of OpenVMS Hobbyist Program being beneficial to HP

[Phillip Helbig---undress to reply]

In article <mailman.22.1321463230.28670.info-vax_rbnsn.com at rbnsn.com>,
"Bill Pedersen" <pedersen at ccsscorp.com> writes: 

> I personally believe that the OpenVMS Hobbyist program is a great asset to
> HP and OpenVMS.  But I have been challenged to show the return to OpenVMS
> from this program.  My hope in this process we can work toward getting
> access to patches for the OpenVMS Hobbyist community.  No guarantees, but I
> have to try.

OK, we'll give it a go, despite some REALLY DEPRESSING stuff I heard 
second-hand recently.  But I won't dwell on that for now.  One more 
chance.

> So I am asking you, the OpenVMS Hobbyists, what Open Source applications
> have you ported?  What utilities have you developed?  Where are they
> published?  What have you done as far as possibly participating in field
> test programs?

While SMS, Dave Jones, Hunter Goatley etc have certainly done admirable 
work here (some of which HP makes use of), I don't think this is the 
main value hobbyists offer.  Rather, I see two areas of emphasis.

One is testing stuff.  Many big customers don't install new patches 
right away unless they are really, really important.  Many hobbyists do, 
for various reasons.  They don't have millions to lose if something 
goes wrong.  Problems become noticed sooner.  Probably, someone with a 
support contract who a) is interested and b) can reproduce the problem
logs a call, but the real work was done by hobbyists.

Back when I was doing a lot of Fortran programming, I wasn't a hobbyist 
per se but was using a campus licence, but otherwise it was a similar 
situation (no high-level support etc).  When the Fortran 90 compiler was 
new, there were a few minor bugs.  I reported them, they got fixed.  
While I might still be able to find an inofficial channel for support 
(though I'm sceptical), no access to new software means no chance of 
finding anything.  This saved DEC/Compaq at least some face since bugs 
might have been fixed before a big customer noticed.

Another one is grass-roots evangelism.  While VMS has mostly disappeared 
from academia, for a variety of reasons, its presence among hobbyists 
kept it known in some circles (say, Info-Zip).  People with experience 
as hobbyists sometimes move on to become paying customers.  Such people 
used to be supplied by academia, but that is no more.

I don't know if they just don't get it or are intentionally ignoring the 
situation in academia.  At a DECUS meeting a few years ago I saw a map 
with little flags everywhere there was a DECcampus (or whatever it is 
called now) licence being used.  In one case, I knew it was one solitary 
VMS die-hard where, just a few years before, all students had VMS 
accounts.  Saying that VMS is still alive in academia is an 
understatement.  But maybe senior management sees just these maps.