Hi all

As all interested in this thread have presumably read the other posts,
they will not be repeated here. 

Several good points both pro and con have been raised.

One such point is the idea that PostgreSQL is not up to commercial
standards, maybe a few versions back this was true, but not now.
After all, commercial standards are not very high, take a look at M$ --
SQL Server, VFP -- these products have there share of problems, I know,
I've used them.  So you core developers, don't be bashful, you've done a
fine job and have a great program to offer the world that is as good or
better then any commercial product out there.

And as one person pointed out, commercial licenses are very limited.

And as for all the details of such support, yes it would all need to be
worked out, that is what I meant by "debugged" in the orig. post.
Jan raised a good list of starting issues.
Maybe some sort of "Certification Program" as well?

But over all, I have found PostgreSQL to be as good or better then any
commercial db products I've used.

Also, this idea is for the long term, and as such is looking forward to
the time when no only will PostgreSQL be even more mature then it is
now, but also such support will be in high demand, and will need to be
already in place and worked out, not just being thought about.

There is that saying:
"Dig the well BEFORE you need the water."

Commercial support is a well that all open-source software of any
popularity and size are going to need to have dug in the years to come.
And yes, while we are no where near it, it is some thing that we should
start walking toward now.

A local paper here (St. Pete Times) just ran a collection of articles
about Linux and related software.  Over all it was very positive, the only
real down side to the article was that it indicated that help was very
hard to find.  This is THE major problem that is still left to over come
in the open source community.  Yes, if you are already plugged into
things, help is easy to find, but if you are just getting started, it all
seems very far away with no help in sight.  And if your a company,
chances are that this will be the main reason not to use open source
(I've seen exactly that happen).

Have a great day
Terry Mackintosh <terry@terrym.com>               http://www.terrym.com
sysadmin/owner                  I'm excited about life! How about YOU!?

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Mon, 8 Feb 1999 11:00:37 -0500 (EST)
Terry Mackintosh <terry@terrym.com>
Commercial support, things considered