Business potential in open source frameworks

[Peter Penzov]

I'm interested are there any opportunities for making money in open source web frameworks like CakePHP and other simmilar software products. For example is there a demand for payed support.

[Mansukhdeep Thind]

There are many other ways of making money. Why are you bent on open source framework support? And what is CakePHP by the way? Is it something like apache struts?

[Devaka Cooray]

Open source are not meant to earn money from them. People who contribute in open source do so with the prime interest they have in open source, and not as a way of making money. There are, however, people who earn some big bucks from third parties involved in their big projects. Unless you have a fairly big open source product, this is probably not something you can go for. If you need some extra income, you may probably try out some remote/freelance jobs if you are interested.

[Luke Kolin]

Devaka Cooray wrote:Open source are not meant to earn money from them. People who contribute in open source do so with the prime interest they have in open source, and not as a way of making money.

Not directly, but there are plenty of people who make a decent living working on open source software, even if the software itself isn't directly sold.

Cheers!

Luke

[Peter Penzov]

Devaka Cooray wrote:Open source are not meant to earn money from them. People who contribute in open source do so with the prime interest they have in open source, and not as a way of making money. There are, however, people who earn some big bucks from third parties involved in their big projects. Unless you have a fairly big open source product, this is probably not something you can go for. If you need some extra income, you may probably try out some remote/freelance jobs if you are interested.

Thank you for your answer. Can you give some more information about successful business model based on open source product?

[Peter Penzov]

Mansukhdeep Thind wrote:There are many other ways of making money. Why are you bent on open source framework support? And what is CakePHP by the way? Is it something like apache struts?

I'm just making market research about business opportunities. Yes, CachePHP is a web framework similar to Apache struts.

[Ulf Dittmer]

For some projects, their authors make a living (or at least supplement their living) by providing documentation, source code examples, consulting etc. that center around their software. JFreeChart and JasperReports follow this model. In a different vein, iText switched to a license that generally requires businesses that use it to buy a license.

Devaka Cooray wrote:Open source are not meant to earn money from them. People who contribute in open source do so with the prime interest they have in open source, and not as a way of making money.

I wouldn't say that in this generality, neither the first nor the second part. It often works this way, but one can't make assumptions about person X working on project Y. And, of course, many do it to enhance their professional stature, because it looks good on their resume. In that way the project would very much be meant to make money :-)

[Winston Gutkowski]

Ulf Dittmer wrote:For some projects, their authors make a living (or at least supplement their living) by providing documentation, source code examples, consulting etc. that center around their software...

To whit: I believe that Linus Torvalds is now a very rich man.

Winston

[Michael A Hoffman]

One option is to provide a platform as a service approach. Look at a company like CloudBees. They provide Jenkins in the Cloud. While I do not personally use the service, I could see how it would be beneficial.

Another option is to sell starter or reference products. One of the challenges architects face is the time necessary to come up to speed and implement a proof of concept for a software product or framework. Mobile seems to be a good area to look at.