Side effects?

[Ryan Schmidt]

On Jan 30, 2013, at 22:10, Kevin Walzer wrote:
> On 1/30/13 10:57 PM, Jeremy Lavergne wrote:
>> One time funding (pay for a task) is (arguably) different than routinely asking for money. We have had trolls in the past like that, simply feeding off people.
> 
> Well, I don't think I'm a troll...for a long time PortAuthority was the only viable GUI tool for MacPorts. See this ancient blog entry calling for a MacPorts GUI at GSoc:
> 
> http://ihack.us/2008/03/24/building-a-gui-for-macports/
> 
> Dr. Ernie called PA a "clever" product and the "state-of-the-art" at the time.
> 
> GUI programming is hard. I think that's one reason why a free, open-source GUI tool for MacPorts has never really taken off: I have literally watched such tools come and go over the past eight or nine years that I've been a MacPorts (formerly DarwinPorts) user.
> 
> One reason I'm still at it is PA provides a modest amount of income for me. And if PA makes MacPorts more usable to some, and attracts more users, then that's to MacPorts' benefit as well.
> 
> If a professional-level, full-featured, open-source GUI tool for MacPorts came along, I'm sure the community would embrace it. I would certainly welcome the competition. But finding someone devoted enough to do that level of work, for free, as a volunteer, is a real challenge. No free/OSS GUI tool for MacPorts comparable in professionalism to Fink's FinkCommander has ever emerged.

I've glanced at PortAuthority before but haven't used it because of the cost barrier and because I'm happy working in the Terminal. (I've also only glanced at Pallet, even though it's free.) But I'm glad PA exists for those users who would rather use a nice polished GUI. I've wondered whether PA is profitable, and I'm glad to hear that it is. Kevin is following the time-honored tradition of adding a paid closed-source component on top of a free open-source offering. (OS X itself is another example of that business model.) We should all be so lucky as to pull that off successfully! :)