One more note, though I"m sure you all have thought through this:
The real situation that we are trying to deal with is that the
> project-based model can only go so far in sustaining free software
...
> From talking from time to time with people at HDF Group, one of the
> problems is everyone wants to use it, no one wants to pay for it, my
> Agency no exception (in fact we are probably one of the worse in this
> regard). They will gladly buy software from Microsoft or ESRI, but not
> just make payments to support things like the HDF Group or for that matter
> Unidata.
>
I'm not sure "wants" is the right word. There are two problems:
(US) Government agencies are not allowed to "donate" to a project. They can
give grants, but the paperwork overhead is huge for that, so it'll never
happen for a modest project, and most users of software like HDF are
working with individual small budgets -- i.e. I work for NOAA, but have no
say in how big NOAA spends money, though I may be able to influence modest
purchases.
So if there is a way for an open source project to "sell" something, rather
than accept donations, you may get people to buy it, even without putting
any additional restrictions on the software.
A couple options off the top of my head:
Support
Documentation
I can go to my boss, and say: "I'd like to buy the full tech doc for HDF5
for $100", and he'd likely say sure, go ahead.
Even if those same docs are available for free online :-)
Just a thought.
As I said, I don't have a lot of good answers. But maybe people can
> start thinking about ways to insure that formats that are important to our
> scientific communities are properly funded.
>
yeah, I've thought for years that NOAA (or even better GSA) should have an
office of Open Source Software that could pool resources and support open
source projects for the entire agency.
But I'm not the kind of Bureaucrat (sorry, institution builder) that could
get that kind of thing rolling...
-CHB
--
Christopher Barker, Ph.D.
Oceanographer
Emergency Response Division
NOAA/NOS/OR&R (206) 526-6959 voice
7600 Sand Point Way NE (206) 526-6329 fax
Seattle, WA 98115 (206) 526-6317 main reception
Chris.Barker@xxxxxxxx
