It must be kept in mind that it is very unfair (to put it mildly) to expect free (as in beer, if not speech) software to come with a warranty. One cannot expect a certificate of quality and terms of warranty for software developed by volunteers.
However, when I buy some software (let's not get technical on whether I buy the software or a licence), it is quite reasonable to expect that the software developers give some sort of quality assurance (warranty or otherwise).
Aveek Bhattacharya M.Tech., Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay
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Sometime on Tue, Oct 04, 2005 at 05:06:41PM +0100, Aveek Bhattacharya said:
It must be kept in mind that it is very unfair (to put it mildly) to expect free (as in beer, if not speech) software to come with a warranty. One cannot expect a certificate of quality and terms of warranty for software developed by volunteers.
Also, most of the free software has been developed by their original authors to scratch their own itch. Its coincidental that the software suits fit for their purpose as well as ours.
Anurag
On Tuesday 04 Oct 2005 9:36 pm, Aveek Bhattacharya wrote:
It must be kept in mind that it is very unfair (to put it mildly) to expect free (as in beer, if not speech) software to come with a warranty. One cannot expect a certificate of quality and terms of warranty for software developed by volunteers.
why not? if free software is not professional and quality assured, of what use is it? since the software is free, the liability for breach of warranty or defect of quality would be different from the liability arising out of the same defects in commercial software. This is something to be worked on - but IMO responsible authors of free software should certainly give assurances of quality and warranties
On 05/10/05 11:21 +0530, Kenneth Gonsalves wrote:
On Tuesday 04 Oct 2005 9:36 pm, Aveek Bhattacharya wrote:
It must be kept in mind that it is very unfair (to put it mildly) to expect free (as in beer, if not speech) software to come with a warranty. One cannot expect a certificate of quality and terms of warranty for software developed by volunteers.
why not? if free software is not professional and quality assured, of what use is it? since the software is free, the liability for breach of warranty or defect of quality would be different from the liability arising out of the same defects in commercial software. This is something to be worked on - but IMO responsible authors of free software should certainly give assurances of quality and warranties
My software works correctly. If you use it in unapproved ways (and that includes running anything else on the system), the guarantee is null and void. Oh, and that includes hardware and software combos.
Remember the world of MSDOS? Thats what it will come down to.
Devdas Bhagat
On Wednesday 05 Oct 2005 1:08 pm, Devdas Bhagat wrote:
why not? if free software is not professional and quality assured, of what use is it? since the software is free, the liability for breach of warranty or defect of quality would be different from the liability arising out of the same defects in commercial software. This is something to be worked on - but IMO responsible authors of free software should certainly give assurances of quality and warranties
My software works correctly. If you use it in unapproved ways (and that includes running anything else on the system), the guarantee is null and void. Oh, and that includes hardware and software combos.
now that you have poured cold water on it, i think it would be an interesting exercise to come up with a formulation of a warranty that could apply to free software - key thing is what is the liability, how to formulate and define that? interesting, intriguing and challenging
On 05/10/05 13:27 +0530, Kenneth Gonsalves wrote:
On Wednesday 05 Oct 2005 1:08 pm, Devdas Bhagat wrote:
why not? if free software is not professional and quality assured, of what use is it? since the software is free, the liability for breach of warranty or defect of quality would be different from the liability arising out of the same defects in commercial software. This is something to be worked on - but IMO responsible authors of free software should certainly give assurances of quality and warranties
My software works correctly. If you use it in unapproved ways (and that includes running anything else on the system), the guarantee is null and void. Oh, and that includes hardware and software combos.
now that you have poured cold water on it, i think it would be an interesting exercise to come up with a formulation of a warranty that could apply to free software - key thing is what is the liability, how to formulate and define that? interesting, intriguing and challenging
Go ahead. Software developers will issue warranties only in cases where they know and control the entire state of program execution. You can't complain if a car refuses to run under water and it was never advertised as doing so. If it fails under a set of controlled conditions, the manufacturer is liable. Multitasking operating systems just aren't controlled environments.
Devdas Bhagat
On Wednesday 05 Oct 2005 5:08 pm, Devdas Bhagat wrote:
Go ahead. Software developers will issue warranties only in cases where they know and control the entire state of program execution. You can't complain if a car refuses to run under water and it was never advertised as doing so. If it fails under a set of controlled conditions, the manufacturer is liable. Multitasking operating systems just aren't controlled environments.
spose i gave a warrantee like: warranteed to work with
os distro x version y apache version x python version x wxpython version x
and that the defect complained off should be demonstrated on my box with the above setup? (this is just a rough idea, to be refined before we issue the GPW)
On 05/10/05 17:25 +0530, Kenneth Gonsalves wrote:
On Wednesday 05 Oct 2005 5:08 pm, Devdas Bhagat wrote:
Go ahead. Software developers will issue warranties only in cases where they know and control the entire state of program execution. You can't complain if a car refuses to run under water and it was never advertised as doing so. If it fails under a set of controlled conditions, the manufacturer is liable. Multitasking operating systems just aren't controlled environments.
spose i gave a warrantee like: warranteed to work with
os distro x version y apache version x python version x wxpython version x
No. You have to guarantee exactly what is running on the CPU. And you need the exact same model of CPU. If you CPU switches registers too early, too late, has a few cycles more, the guarantee is void. You would want something like kernel version x.y.z, glibc a.b.c, apache version x with compile time flags C,O,M,P.I,L,E running with priority X and every file matching MD5 hashes...., and running on CPU <foo> over motherboard <bar> with hard disk model M from vendor v with firmware version F.v, etc running no other programs (including interactive shells)...
and that the defect complained off should be demonstrated on my box with the above setup? (this is just a rough idea, to be refined before we issue the GPW)
This is about what you get currently. If a bug can be reproduced, it can be fixed. Just no formal warranties.
Devdas Bhagat
Sometime on Oct 5, DB cobbled together some glyphs to say:
No. You have to guarantee exactly what is running on the CPU. And you need the exact same model of CPU. If you CPU switches registers too early, too late, has a few cycles more, the guarantee is void. You would
Can you point me to any other product in the world that has such a warranty? My electric kettle comes with a warranty. They make no assumptions about what I put in to it and also give me a fairly broad range of power that I can run it on. The warranty is void if I subject it to too high a power, or dismantle it.
On 06/10/05 00:33 +0530, Philip Tellis wrote:
Sometime on Oct 5, DB cobbled together some glyphs to say:
No. You have to guarantee exactly what is running on the CPU. And you need the exact same model of CPU. If you CPU switches registers too early, too late, has a few cycles more, the guarantee is void. You would
Can you point me to any other product in the world that has such a warranty? My electric kettle comes with a warranty. They make no
Can you point me to any other system as complex as software running on a general purpose CPU along with other software?
assumptions about what I put in to it and also give me a fairly broad range of power that I can run it on. The warranty is void if I subject it to too high a power, or dismantle it.
Your kettle is a relatively simple device. So is a car, or even a space shuttle. Then look at the budget for the shuttle, which does very few things.
Devdas Bhagat
On Thu, Oct 06, 2005 at 12:33:23AM +0530, Philip Tellis wrote:
Sometime on Oct 5, DB cobbled together some glyphs to say:
No. You have to guarantee exactly what is running on the CPU. And you need the exact same model of CPU. If you CPU switches registers too early, too late, has a few cycles more, the guarantee is void. You would
Can you point me to any other product in the world that has such a warranty? My electric kettle comes with a warranty. They make no
I think... I *hope* that was the point.
Most warranties don't guarantee much. Software warranties, the few I've skimmed, mostly seem to say "whatever you do or don't do it's not our fault!!"
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Anurag -
Aveek Bhattacharya -
Devdas Bhagat -
Kenneth Gonsalves -
Philip Tellis -
Satya