Something I’ve been thinking about for quite some time is what makes developers choose between FOSS, free proprietary software and paid proprietary software. Also, if developers choose FOSS tools, do they/we decide to support those developers by donations?
An example being that B4i is paid for software but B4A is free - I buy and use B4i and opt to donate to use B4A.
When I predominately used macOS this issue was less of a problem as so often the app I wanted to use was paid for via the App Store and the developers got some remuneration. With my switch to Linux more and more of the apps I opt to use are free but these developers still need remuneration.
I don’t think it is quite as simple as that. I used VB (paid) in the past, RB/RS/Xojo (paid) in the past, and having recently walked away from Xojo, I know use Swift/Xcode which is technically free, but does require a $99 dev account to make it the most useful… So I consider that paid as well
Most developers will change tools over time as their needs/skills change and when the current tools change (as Xojo did with API2 and the current corporate attitude)
Yes even linux devs need to earn a living - somehow - from the work they do
How they do that varies
Lots of people who contribute work for a company that pays them a salary to do something else and they happen to contribute to FOSS as part of earning that salary
So those companies are in part sponsoring FOSS
Redhat is one that springs to mind but even MS and Apple have people that do this
And I’m sure lots of large & small companies do either directly or indirectly
Some use FOSS as part of their consulting and make fixes & patches as part of that independent work
Lets face reality - people HAVE to earn a living somehow
FOSS isn’t free from the economic realities of the world
Looping back on my thoughts here; I was thinking about how much cost impacts choice on what tools to use, or is it more based on features, developers responsiveness, etc - what factors do developers put most emphasis on?
I cant speak to what everyones choices involve but I can speak to mine
Mty primary consideration is usually that the client wants ME to do work in a specific tool set
I recently had one ask me to do some work in MS Access
Thats what their code base is written in and what we determined, collaboratively, ma de sense for them to move forward with. They’d originally contracted me to move their Access apps to Xojo but through a long series of events we put that decision off until some other major issues were resolved. Once they were we could examine their needs, the cade they had, etc and after several week s of asking lots of questions of their internal staff, users, etc it was determined such a move made NO sense for them.
But I did buy a copy of Access to help figure this out
Cost is often NOT a consideration as I get to write that off as an expense, and sometimes the client buys it for the work to be done so they own a copy of that tool when the work is delivered
