Re: demand for Kawa support?

[Jocelyn Paine <popx at pop3 dot ifs dot org dot uk>]

OK, here are some thoughts, from a point of view which may not be typical
of most of this group.

This kind of technical support would be extremely useful to me, and I'd
already discussed it with colleagues before seeing Per's mailing, because
I'd noticed the remarks on his home page about undertaking Kawa
consultancy. However, the terms suggested are way beyond what a UK
university would pay for per-user support, unless perhaps the system is
being used by every student in a department.

For example, I'm using Kawa in a project for Bristol University. My share
of this project's funding is 5000 quid, which pays me a notional 200 quid
per day for 25 days on this work. Now, it's true that I have spent several
days - a week, maybe - trying to diagnose and circumvent various problems
with Kawa, as well as discovering that some things I thought were bugs
were due to misunderstanding the specifications, or indeed being unable to
find the specifications. You've seen my postings. It's also true that I
have other problems outstanding which I've no idea how to solve, notably
one concerning environments in compiled modules. So at this academic rate
of pay, I've spent perhaps 1000 quid, and may spend more, on Kawa
difficulties which an expert might solve in an hour or two. This isn't too
much below the $2400 that Per quotes, which I believe is about 1650 quid
at the moment. So in that sense, the price is justified.

On the other hand, the funding for that project has already been
allocated, and can't be increased. Other projects are being applied for
and some will eventually get funding, but because we can't say in advance
which ones these will be (and there have been delays of up to two years
between applying for money and getting it), it is extremely difficult to
divide up these types of cost between projects.

So my point is that in this kind of academic use of Kawa, where a
department gets most of its money from one-off grants, and doesn't have
much recurrent fundung to cover overheads, Per's terms are unlikely to be
administratively feasible. But buying support a month at a time might be.

It would also be useful to have an estimate of roughly how many hours of
support the $2400 would buy; it's the kind of thing one has to fill in in
the budget form when making applications. 

Jocelyn Paine
http://www.ifs.org.uk/~popx/
+44 (0)7768 534 091 


On Sun, 30 Sep 2001, Per Bothner wrote:

> I've been thinking about offering some kind of technical support for Kawa.
> So I thought I'd ask the people on this list if they think that would be 
> valuable.
> 
> I haven't nailed down terms, nor do I know much about what is a reasonable
> rate.  I was thinking $2400 per year per contact person (i.e. for each 
> individual
> in an organization enititled to send a request).  This would entitle you to
> priority support by phone or email, where "support" does not mean that
> problems are guanteed to be fixed.  However, it guarantees a speedy 
> response,
> perhaps answering how Kawa can do something, why Kawa does something
> unexpected, or a workaround when that is suitable.  Sometimes, the response
> may include a patch, in case of an easy-to-fix bug or missing feature or 
> poor
> documentation.  The contract can be cancelled by either party, with "unused
> support" refunded.  (This is partly an "out" to protect myself from 
> abuse - or
> in case I get way too busy and cannot provide proper support.)
> 
> Would there be interest in something like this?  Do the terms seem 
> reasonable?
> 
>     --Per
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>