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Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1998 13:25:03 -0400 (EDT)
From: Todd Vierling <tv@pobox.com>
To: Eric Fox <eric@fox.phoenix.az.us>
cc: netbsd-advocacy@NetBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: Testimonials
In-Reply-To: <XFMail.981001093158.eric@fox.phoenix.az.us>
Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.4.02.9810011317380.24320-100000@duhnet.net>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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On Thu, 1 Oct 1998, Eric Fox wrote:

: I ended up pointing them to the list of commercial & non-commercial
: sites when it dawned on me that we should solicit a testimonial from each
: business, governmental, and organization on that list.  I belive this would add
: quite a bit of weight when attempting to convince businesses or organizations
: to use NetBSD rather than an alternative un*x.

Definitely we need to try to get a couple out of NASA.  (Well, after all,
there's a few developers, one Core member working there anyway.... :)

I had an interesting run-in earlier today.  The person in the cube on the
other side of the rear cubicle wall is the test leader for the various
printing products we design here (mainly mainframe).  She came over to my
cube and asked if I was the same Todd Vierling listed on the NetBSD web
pages.  (I resisted the temptation to say `You've heard of NetBSD?'.)

We talked about it for a bit, and it turns out she wanted to have some kind
of stable and well-known UNIX variant at home to fine-tune her own skills.
She already can move around a Solaris system with reasonable ease.

She said she considered Linux, and from looking at the packaging and
constant updates in nearly a Microsoft fashion, it wasn't worth the effort.
She looked at FreeBSD, and said that it looked too `complicated' from the
web site.  She looked at OpenBSD, and asked me what I thought of it.  <g>

So, she'll be installing 1.3.2 shortly, and I project some sysinst
suggestions will follow.

This showed me that just a little nudge can go a long way with the
technically inclined.

-- 
-- Todd Vierling (Personal tv@pobox.com; Bus. todd_vierling@xn.xerox.com)