A question for the open source people

[Rick Stevens]

Michael Harpe wrote:
> What I have always been curious about is this: how many of you actually take advantage of the open source? In other words, how many of you really take the source code and do something with it?
> 
> Personally I don't. I can program in C, i'm pretty good at it. I've just never felt the need to alter the software I use. I'm fine with waiting for the new versions as they come out.
> 
> I'm really not trying to start a fight. I am just curious. I love free software. I think the free software movement has enabled a lot of people who could not afford to operate a computer to do so. Having Linux source code available has trained a generation of system programmers. There's no disputing the value of free, open source software.
> 
> Anyway, that's my question. Feel free to respond to me directly.

I made serious mods to vsftpd to have it trigger some event upon the
successful upload of a file.  I've also "convinced" a number of programs
to do very specific things we needed in our environment.

When I don't have the time or resources to write what we need from
scratch, I'll find an open source solution and bugger it to do what is
needed.  Some of my changes have made it back into the distribution
source tree...some haven't.  Some are so "me-specific" that absolutely
no one else in the world would give a toss about them.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Rick Stevens, Systems Engineer                       rps2 at nerd.com -
- Hosting Consulting, Inc.                                           -
-                                                                    -
-      A day for firm decisions!!!   Well, then again, maybe not!    -
----------------------------------------------------------------------