The IT Skeptic - Comments for "Open source systems management tools: an informal directory"

Exploring

Andew Shafer — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 23:34:27 +0000

There is nothing wrong with exploring business models.

I work on a product that we give away for free.

Puppet has an ecosystem that never would have existed if Puppet started as a commercial product.

Does Puppet create more value than we capture? Probably. But with a healthy community driving adoption, we run a cash business adding value, supporting and consulting around Puppet.

Trying to force collaboration never works and you have created a chicken and egg problem for yourself. On one hand you lamented that no one seemed interested, on the other you want to force me to collaborate by submitting something before I have a basis for knowing what I am even contributing to.

Experiment all you want, but realize an experiment's value is in analyzing the data.

contribution before benefit

skeptic — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 09:14:14 +0000

I'm exploring other business models. What's wrong with a collaborative site that requires contribution before benefit? (other than the fact that everybody is so used to a free ride on the internet that they - like you - don't buy it)

Ops4less.com

Andew Shafer — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 08:47:15 +0000

I work full time on Puppet. http://www.reductivelabs.com/trac/puppet

I love reading your candid thoughts, and I was excited to see what you had at ops4less.

But then I got there, and you won't let me read anything.

Not only do you make people register, but then they have to do a little dance:

Welcome to Ops4Less

This is a collaborative website. To read the full text of many entries, you need to become a member. To obtain a membership, simply register and log in (so you can be recognised) and then contribute some content. If the content is accepted for publication, you get a membership for a year, giving you full access to the site. So get thinking and then submit an idea.

I'm not pretending to understand your motivation, but I do think that presents a roadblock for many people who would otherwise benefit.

point-focused

skeptic — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 22:06:16 +0000

At the moment I'm looking at the backbone of operations, the NSM, the framework, the consolidator, the service manager. ZipTie seems a bit point-focused on networks ??

ZipTie for Network Configuration

Michael Nels — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 15:37:56 +0000

You should add ZipTie (http://www.ziptie.org). Its a mature open source tool to gather network inventory, configuration backups, and to perform change automation on all your network devices. It is complimented by ZipForge (http://www.zipforge.org) which has adapters to let ZipTie connect to new types of devices and tools to view device details or perform common change automation tasks on your network.

Zabbix

Lomo — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 07:55:57 +0000

You are definitely missing Zabbix in the list (http://www.zabbix.com) - a good one, but often overlooked.