Indeed. Now what we could do as a community is to - have a list of companies that are available (but no contract because of the reasons you raised). - that the consortium set up a kind of certification process - questions… - running moose on the software :). Stef On Dec 21, 2011, at 9:54 PM, Johan Brichau wrote:
Hi Rob,
The issue you raise is indeed very pertinent.
But I wonder how any company can agree _beforehand_ to serve as a replacement to the original developers. There are many concerns that make it very hard to commit to such an agreement. For example, I would find it dangerous to commit to taking over a project without knowing the state of the source code.
Because of that, I see more possibilities in a traditional escrow agreement between the company and its customer, combined with an association of companies using Smalltalk (Pharo?): - the traditional escrow agreement makes sure that the customer gets the source code so he can contact another Smalltalk Pharo company to continue the development - the existence of the association and its members demonstrates to the customer that he can always get in touch with other development companies that can continue working for him.
There are discussions in the Pharo community to create such a consortium. Personally, I would prefer aligning like that.
What do you think? What do the Pharo people think?
cheers Johan
On 18 Dec 2011, at 14:31, Rob Vens wrote:
Dear Smalltalkers, This issue has been raised by a small Dutch company that delivers (Pharo/Seaside) Smalltalk solutions. When you, as an individual or small company, deliver Smalltalk solutions there is an implied risk for your customers in case of illness or such. This risk can be mitigated through an agreement with other developers/companies in which they state that they are willing and able to take development and support upon themselves, temporary or (semi-) permanent. Of course the process to get this formally agreed is a bit more complex, but this mail is only to ask whether there are (in this case preferably Dutch) Smalltalk developers willing to cooperate on this issue and possibly participate in some kind of legal agreement to provide more robust support to our customers. Please reply to me personally, unless of course you want your response to benefit the broader Smalltalk community on this mailing list. Rob Vens - rob@sepher.nl
_______________________________________________ Esug-list mailing list Esug-list@lists.esug.org http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org
_______________________________________________ Esug-list mailing list Esug-list@lists.esug.org http://lists.esug.org/mailman/listinfo/esug-list_lists.esug.org