On Tue, 2008-12-23 at 22:07 -0600, Rajko M. wrote:
On Tuesday 23 December 2008 07:30:45 pm Carlos E. R. wrote:
Would we call all such boxed releases 11.1.1 and so on?
Yep, perhaps.
It would take time for people to get used to idea of 11.1.1 and start using benefits, but that would help a lot everyone that want to install openSUSE on friends computer.
Now, you install in 20-30 minutes and then run all updates. With basic broadband it can take some time after half year of bugfixes. After that, you can test that all important stuff actually work, and show new user perks that come in mind. This limits opportunities to present openSUSE to times when you and potential new user have some half day free. It would be much better to have pretty clean installation with few MB of updates, so that all doesn't take more then 1 hour.
Combined with professionally printed DVD face and couple of stickers, all in paper pack something like AOL, it will make better impression.
To me is much easier to present openSUSE as real goodie, when I bring DVD from box, or better a whole box with manual. People that know that I use something called Linux, usually have no idea what is that, and make assumptions about quality based on package. Home brewed stuff doesn't cut well in that case.
BTW, this can be the answer how to organize development. One year cycle with release x.x.0 and then half year after x.x.1 with bugfixes as retail box, or simple DVD, with visit us on http://www.novell.com/products/opensuse/ printed on packaging, and browser that opens on that page, similar to Knoppix.
-- Regards, Rajko
I very much like the idea of an openSUSE boxed version with the initial bug fixes included. But there are several things I wonder about: 1) As the x.x.x version is specifically marketed as a perfected version, we're selling an expectation to potential customers. The expectation being that this version really does work and is better than the original version x.x. That means we would have to go through a testing process to ensure the validity of our claim. Because this is specifically designed for situations where money changes hands, we have to back up the marketing claim of the media. How do we do this in a way that doesn't conflict or become a drag on our regular x.x testing process? 2) The obvious goal here is to increase purchases of packaged openSUSE (in whatever format is decided upon.) If we do this, how do we market it? It is already determined that stocking shelves has become cost-prohibitive. There's also the problem that the media may not consider it a big enough story to write about like they do for standard releases. So there's no guarantee that we'll get the publicity we need to boost sales. I do think we should adopt a model that many software companies are adopting in which they leave most sales in the hands of resellers. Community members can be considered as resellers. They can purchase packaged media in bulk at a discount rate and then resell them at whatever venue or face-to-face they choose, and at a price they choose. It has two benefits: 1) Potential resellers are more motivated to push openSUSE to the masses and 2) Potential resellers understand their local markets better than any mass global marketing effort could. (okay, not always) -- Bryen Yunashko openSUSE Board Member -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org