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Java Forum / General / August 2006100% Open Source Job Opportunities???
Is there anyone out there that actually works at a 100% Open Source company, and actually makes a decent salary? IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, Sun, and the like, are all making gazillions of dollars off of open source products and ideas. As a Java developer, I find that I am becoming more and more reliant on open source tools and less reliant on commercial products. With Java as a language, and the projects by Apache, Tigris, Source Forge, and the GNU, it's a wonder why some of these big names are even still in the software business. Is it just that companies don't know about the power of open source ?!?! What does an Exchange server "really" give me. What is $20K for a Portal engine? $10K per database? Photoshop or GIMP?!? $1-5K for an IDE? For what?!? With a little more up-front work, and a few free online resources... my open source stuff works a thousand times better. What's in a name? Besides RedHat, JBoss, and a handful of others, you don't really hear about enough open source success stories. Is anyone out there interested in starting a Java, LAMP, and open source solutions company? Who wants to shake things up a little bit? Maybe start a new campaign ?!?! Java 4 Life, Pavel :) >>>>> "Pavel" == Pavel <neoglobe_2000@yahoo.com> writes: Pavel> Is there anyone out there that actually works at a 100% Pavel> Open Source company, and actually makes a decent salary? No, but I believe Orbitz is in that category and probably "pays well." http://www.cio.com/archive/070105/cendant.html Some time ago, I read in an article that Orbitz wrote 100% of its own internal software, using open source applications as the basis. Obviously, the software used by travel agents and airlines is not OS. It's running on Linux, though. From my observation, most of the big kahunas in OS are consultants in real life and they use their OS work on their resumes. Jordan Hubbard of FreeBSD told me once that he had vendors sending him hardware unsolicited and job offers in the 6 figures. Consulting has many advantages (I'm a consultant myself) but you put in a lot more hours than you would in an office job. In fact, I'm pretty much "on the job" 24x7x365. mp  Signature'cat' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file. > From my observation, most of the big kahunas in OS are consultants in > real life and they use their OS work on their resumes. Jordan Hubbard [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > > mp Thanks for the reply. I'm looking to create an open source consulting firm, probably even not-for-profit, in the NY/NJ/PA metro area, and if you know anyone giving away free hardware, and/or interested in becoming the next big Open Source thing, you be sure to let me know. :) I'm extremely interested in the same 24x7x365, as long as I'm getting paid for it and I have unlimited access to coffee. Any startup advice from someone that is already doing this? Pavel > Is there anyone out there that actually works at a 100% Open Source > company, and actually makes a decent salary? [quoted text clipped - 21 lines] > Java 4 Life, > Pavel :) Sun evidently thinks it can make money (and I agree) by creating and supporting Java. IBM is adopting Linux because they can sell hardware running it. As far as I know, neither Oracle nor especially Microsoft are supporting any open source products and in Microsoft's case they have actively tried to undermine Java if favor of their very closed source .NET. I use a lot of open source products and, as far as I can, try to support their development. But for my own company and our customers, there is no way open source products will any time soon replace all the commercial software they run. One critical issue is support. If you are a medium to large business and your application has a problem with either the OS or the database, you want to be able to call someone who is responsible for fixing your problem. With open source, you are dependent on newsgroups or contacting a developer who is willing to help. I have tried calling both Red Hat and Suse/Novell when I have had issues with Linux and if the problem wasn't with their own small part of the distribution they were of no help. One question I have is how do you intend to get money to support an open source solutions company? If it's truly open source, why should anybody pay you? Jeff Coffield > Sun evidently thinks it can make money (and I agree) by creating and > supporting Java. Sun is by far the least offensive because of Java and their intention to finally release Java as open source. But some of the things they do are bewildering... like creating Sun Java Studio Creator and Sun Java Studio Enterprise, but showing only the JDK Bundle with NetBeans upfront. I'm happy that they're now offering Creator and Enterprise for free to members, but why not just make one killer IDE and charge for training, support, and conferences? I would love to see them go on a massive global learning campaign in support of learning the language. IMHO, Sun SHOULD be earning huge profits, and directing more attention to destroying Microsoft based on an idea rather than from a product (Hardware excluded). Focusing on the people, not the products, and I think they would turn 100 times the profit, no? > IBM is adopting Linux because they can sell hardware > running it. I am thankful for IBM, and have kept a career on most of their products until now. I know that they support Linux and of course Eclipse, both of which I am also thankful for. But at this point, couldn't they crush their competitors by creating a better support model? I know some of their customers that buy their products just for the name alone. I guess what drives my rant is the fact that I have to pay heavily for the products AND the support, and it seems they don't give a damn about small business. Websphere? Workplace? Rational? Tivoli? All excellent products, but Microsoft is still dominating small businesses and personal computing. > As far as I know, neither Oracle nor especially Microsoft > are supporting any open source products and in Microsoft's case they > have actively tried to undermine Java if favor of their very closed > source .NET. Oracle seems to support and embrace Java in all of their products. Like IBM, I honestly can't say too much bad about them, except that I wish they, too, would change a few things about their distribution and support. > I use a lot of open source products and, as far as I can, try to support > their development. But for my own company and our customers, there is no > way open source products will any time soon replace all the commercial > software they run. What can't you replace, and why? I'll need to know when I start my venture. And, in my spare time, if I can help you replace one product, I will do it free of charge. Then, what would replacing all of the products be worth to you? Anyone else interested? Who else on this newsgroup will offer to help me help Jeff? If I can turn one person to Open Source, I can turn two. Eventually, someone is going to pay. > One critical issue is support. If you are a medium to > large business and your application has a problem with either the OS or [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > the problem wasn't with their own small part of the distribution they > were of no help. Finding support for open source seems to be the only reason that most companies go with the brands. But have you ever sat on the phone with IBM support. I don't know how many times I've called IBM for support on Websphere and Lotus Domino, only to find that the solution was posted by some Joe Schmoe message board. Have you ever tried to deal with companies like Business Objects, Apple, or Dell? I've been on the phone for hours and I've waited for patches for weeks. How about Microsoft? No thank you... I took the plunge, and learned Linux and OpenOffice, and I will never own a personal copy of Microshaft-Anything ever again, so long as I live. All I am saying is that, sometimes, even when you pay for support... are you really getting any? Would you rather have outsourced support personnel over the phone from only God knows where, or an in-house MIT graduate looking to pay for tuition or the beer and strip-club fund? > One question I have is how do you intend to get money to support an open > source solutions company? Jeff, I believe whole-heartedly that the previous response about support in open source truly sets the stage. I believe open source needs to become more organized, and people in this realm need to come together more than they compete. Therefore, I see an unlimited earning potential, and hope to start down that path, soon. > If it's truly open source, why should anybody pay you? > Jeff Coffield Open Source should be the only way to go. Pay for hardware, time, knowledge, and support - not products, or technology. RedHat, Apache, Tigris, MySQL, JBoss, and SourceForge should be an example to everyone who shares my vision. If anyone else is interested in an unlimited earning potential using open source solutions please contact me. I just want to know who is coming with me? Sincerely, Pavel neoglobe_2000@yahoo.com P.S. - Will work for food. > Sun is by far the least offensive because of Java and their intention to > finally release Java as open source. But some of the things they do are [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > members, but why not just make one killer IDE and charge for training, > support, and conferences? The "offer the software for free, charge for support and training" model has worked quite well for some companies, but to switch wholesale to that business model would, IMHO, not work well for Sun. They just have too many years behind them doing business they way they always have. SignatureSteve Sobol, Professional Geek ** Java/VB/VC/PHP/Perl ** Linux/*BSD/Windows Apple Valley, California PGP:0xE3AE35ED It's all fun and games until someone starts a bonfire in the living room. >But some of the things they do are >bewildering... like creating Sun Java Studio Creator and Sun Java Studio >Enterprise, but showing only the JDK Bundle with NetBeans upfront. I'm >happy that they're now offering Creator and Enterprise for free to >members, but why not just make one killer IDE They have announced their intention to do exactly that. Most of Java Studio seems to be in the next release of NetBeans. I have been eagerly visiting the NetBeans Creator web page <http://www.netbeans.org/products/creator/> but it remains blank :( The two products you mention are relics of the days when Sun imagined they could make money selling software. > Is there anyone out there that actually works at a 100% Open Source > company, and actually makes a decent salary? The entire Venezuelan government supposedly uses only Open Source software. >> Is there anyone out there that actually works at a 100% Open Source >> company, and actually makes a decent salary? > > The entire Venezuelan government supposedly uses only Open Source software. Hmmm.. Maybe I need to move to Venezuela... :) >Is there anyone out there that actually works at a 100% Open Source >company, and actually makes a decent salary? I assume that the huge staff that IBM and Sun assign to projects like NetBeans, Eclipse and Apache earn the same salary as those assigned to their in-house projects. >IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, Sun, and the like, are all making gazillions of >dollars off of open source products and ideas. I doubt it. IBM and Sun contribute large amounts to open source projects. All of them have had a substantial proportion of their sales cut by free or open source competitors. >Is anyone out there >interested in starting a Java, LAMP, and open source solutions company? > >Who wants to shake things up a little bit? Maybe start a new campaign ?!?! I think you are far too late. Free software has won and open source is not far behind. There is no major database that does not have a freely distributable version. Only IBM does not have a free version of their Java IDE and they pay the salaries of many (most?) of the programmers at Eclipse. Sun offers most of their software at no cost and has, or is the process of, open sourcing it. Even Microsoft has capitulated. They spent millions offering a free alternative to Netscape, they have free versions of all their development and database software and have even announced a cooperative deal with JBoss. > I assume that the huge staff that IBM and Sun assign to projects like > NetBeans, Eclipse and Apache earn the same salary as those assigned to > their in-house projects. Let's hope so. I plan on investigating into and contributing to the source code pretty soon. > I think you are far too late. Let's hope not. There's still a lot more that can be done. > There is no major database that does not have a freely > distributable version. Any row limits? Are they 100% Customizable? Have you been turning back the clock for any trial-period software lately? > Only IBM does not have a free version of their > Java IDE and they pay the salaries of many (most?) of the programmers > at Eclipse. Sun offers most of their software at no cost and has, or > is the process of, open sourcing it. I recognize that IBM and Sun are leading and/or moving towards open source, but do you feel like anything is still missing? > Even Microsoft has capitulated. > They spent millions offering a free alternative to Netscape, they have > free versions of all their development and database software and have > even announced a cooperative deal with JBoss. Not to flare up the Microsoft vs. Open Source debate, but Microsoft will support any effort that keeps their products relevant, and they only embrace open source when it seems like a good idea. I imagine this is just a ploy to keep JBoss customers on Windows Server rather than switching to RedHat, which now owns JBoss. But the fact that Microsoft seems to have cloned everything, or destroyed anything through acquisition, is just nauseating to an open source enthusiast. They will never open-source their Operating System, or their Office package, and they will continue to clone and acquire, until there is nothing left except patents and lawsuits. Instead of becoming a hamster in their wheel, I'd love to find some Java developers and Linux system administrators that have morals and ambition. That's all I'm saying :) Pavel >> I think you are far too late. > >Let's hope not. There's still a lot more that can be done. Of course there is a lot more work to be done in producing free software and I hope you prosper doing it. I was simply commenting that it was too late to "shake things up a little bit" or "start a new campaign" >> There is no major database that does not have a freely >> distributable version. > >Any row limits? Are they 100% Customizable? The database majors have always had a layered pricing model. I am arguing that the open source movement has won because the bottom layer price has dropped by thousands of dollars to zero. > Have you been turning back >the clock for any trial-period software lately? No need. I'm a developer and an early indication of the open source victory was being offered the full versions of DB2 and Oracle at no cost. They did not want me developing using PostgreSQL in case I deployed PostgreSQL. >> Even Microsoft has capitulated. >> They spent millions offering a free alternative to Netscape, they have [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] >support any effort that keeps their products relevant, and they only >embrace open source when it seems like a good idea. That was my point. I don't doubt that Oracle and Sun also resented losing to the open source movement but the abundance of free and even open source software from the industry heavyweights indicates that your proposed crusade is unnecessary. >>Is there anyone out there that actually works at a 100% Open Source >>company, and actually makes a decent salary? > I assume that the huge staff that IBM and Sun assign to projects like > NetBeans, Eclipse and Apache earn the same salary as those assigned to > their in-house projects. NetBeans and Eclipse both make money for their publishers, don't they? There are open-source version available, and then there are closed- source products that you pay for, that are based on the OSS products. > at Eclipse. Sun offers most of their software at no cost and has, or > is the process of, open sourcing it. Even Microsoft has capitulated. > They spent millions offering a free alternative to Netscape, they have > free versions of all their development and database software and have > even announced a cooperative deal with JBoss. Really! Wow. I thought their release of the Visual Studio Express Editions as free (closed source, but $0.00 cost) software was cool, but they're working with JBoss? They've spent the past half-dozen years stealing ideas from J2EE for .Net. :D SignatureSteve Sobol, Professional Geek ** Java/VB/VC/PHP/Perl ** Linux/*BSD/Windows Apple Valley, California PGP:0xE3AE35ED It's all fun and games until someone starts a bonfire in the living room. > NetBeans and Eclipse both make money for their publishers, don't they? > > There are open-source version available, and then there are closed- > source products that you pay for, that are based on the OSS products. Good point. >> Even Microsoft has capitulated. >> They spent millions offering a free alternative to Netscape, they have [quoted text clipped - 9 lines] > JBoss? They've spent the past half-dozen years stealing ideas from J2EE > for .Net. :D Ha... True story : Having never programmed in .Net, I was still able to direct a MCSD how to write a class... because C# is really just the biggest rip off of Java I've ever seen. :) Just another reason for a revolution against MS. I hope I live to see it. Well, the Open Source ideology of Richard Stallmann et al is pretty much an extreme Ideology such as Socialism. There was a time when virtually the whole world turned to socialism: Russia, China, India and a lot of other countries. So many people believed the crap theory that Socialism is the "destination" of history (just as the crap scientiest Karl Marx predicted it). IMHO the same is with open source: a lot of systems are going open source and many people think this is the future of software in general. Well, I am using Linux, MySQL, Java and PHP, but I know about the limits of that software. Linux is still not administerable by the laymen, while Windows is a piece of easy-to use software. MySQL is amazingly fast for small-scale applications, but it can become very slow if you do some heavy duty work (big result sets, complex (sub-)queries). And all of those "open-source" companies CHARGE for support or commercial use. RedHat, Novell/SuSe, MySQL, Zend and SUN all have to fund the paychecks of their employees. If you buy a RedHat support contract for your company, it can easily become as expensive as MS server licencenses... Also, IBM, SUN and HP are making a lot of money with hardware and at least IBM a lot with software (WebSphere). Also, why at all would you open-source ideologists be willing to pay for hardware ? Why not having a Ministry Of Planning that gives away hardware for free (for those few who can justify a need for that :-)). Just tell me about the software written by the GDR or the soviet union. Effectively NIL, they just stole IBM and Digital Equipment software and run it on their IBM/Digital clones. Socialism does not work; not even for software. >Just another reason for a >revolution against MS. I hope I live to see it. To my great surprise, I have lived to see the revolution against IBM that I hoped for when I started programming. Microsoft seems worse! The slogan used to be "You can't get fired for buying IBM". That now applies to Microsoft but, in addition, there is the McDonalds factor. Consumers, particularly those in the United states, want consistency and will not only pay more for it they will ignore superior quality products to get it. They know there are better, cheaper hotels than the Holiday Inn but will stay there because it is the safe choice. I don't see how you can turn open source software into the "safe choice" without destroying all the qualities of it that you, rightly, admire. > >Just another reason for a > >revolution against MS. I hope I live to see it. > To my great surprise, I have lived to see the revolution against IBM > that I hoped for when I started programming. Microsoft seems worse! Maybe the (current) revolution is the Internet. Google is already causing great pains for MS. MS is basically strong in PC applications, and I doubt anybody will endanger that business. Just like IBM still dominates the mainframe business, MS will still be the king of the desktop. But the desktop will soon be just a slowly-innovating field, while all kinds of internet applications pop up here and there. MS has MSN, but who cares about that ? The kings of the new world are Ebay, Amazon, Google and Skype. MS tries to catch up (as they have done with Internet Explorer), but I doubt that they can do very much. MS folks are already starting to get old; they just don't have the entrepreneurial spirit of a 25 year-old, such as the google founders. I guess Bill Gates' retirement will mean the long-term demise of the company. Do you really believe a 50-year old man like Ballmer or Ray Ozzie will be the leader of a businesses revolution ? MS will stay the king of client operating systems and word processors. But who really cares about word processors in 2006 ? Free MagazinesGet these publications absolutely FREE for up to 12 months. There are no hidden fees and no obligation. Simply choose a title, complete the application form and submit it. Read more ...
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