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I think a part of this is that engineers in particular have a preference to use software which can be treated as a transferable skill if/when they move on. They
by nrmitchi 6y ago
I think a part of this is that engineers in particular have a preference to use software which can be treated as a transferable skill if/when they move on. They would rather use the OSS version of Nginx, of Envoy, because they know they will have access to it in the future. I think there is some aversion to becoming familiar with the features, functionality, and characteristics of a piece of software that your current employer is paying a non-trivial amount for, when you know that chances are your next employer will refuse. This may not be in the best interest of the current company, but it's a bias that I think impacts a lot of engineers.
- pjmlp 6y agoIt is a generation thing, back when I started the only free beer software was my own. Even for code listings I had at very least to buy the medium where they came.
- FireBeyond 6y agoYou can purchase the commercial version of Nginx and not use its specific paid feature subset. Alternatively, "I am familiar with this, and we can do x% of what we need with the OSS version, but we had to pay to get the last part."
- nrmitchi 6y agoI see what you're saying, but this is basically suggesting that Dropbox should have made a donation to F5 (a public company with an $8B market cap). I think there is a valid point you're making for smaller companies that are providing both open-source and commercial versions of software, but I don't think Nginx is a great example of that.