ClearFoundation

Hi Reynaldo,

Welcome to ClearOS and nice post.

In fact, your suggestion is exactly 'in the works'. In the 6.3 beta, there are new tags introduced in the Marketplace Details section...one for 'Warranty Policy'...and another for "Support Policy".

I'm thinking of using an icon system to explain at a glance what an app's policies are wrt to these two fields. Still mulling it over, but for "Warranty Support", something like this:

N/A - Not applicable...app is free
Red 'X' - No refunds/returns
Green '24hr' - Full refund, no questions asked, within 24 hours of purchase
Yellow '30d' - 80% refund, explanation required

Those tags are just suggestions at this point.

For Support Policy, a similar color-coded system that indicates where you can go for support. For example:

Green - Community Forum support
Blue - Developer can be contacted via email for support
Red - Developer can be contacted to request paid support
Orange - ClearCenter will provide best-possible support under terms of your Professional Subscription
Black - ClearCenter can be contacted to provide support on consulting basis

We'll have a binary selector here...so an app could have Green and Blue...or Green, Blue and Orange or Green and Orange etc., depending on how the developer wants to model support, and how ClearCenter perceives how much support could come in for an app, and how complex it is.

Here's a good example of why we'd want to go this way...Someone creates a VoIP app around Asterisk and places it in the Marketplace for $20. Someone buys it, and bases their business phone communications on it. We don't want the user thinking they can lean on us while we drop everything and try and fix a phone system we're not familiar with under a $480 all inclusive support plan. So in this example, Green, Red and Black would be appropriate, given that there's no way support could be included for $20. That figure represents the time savings to install Asterisk or a PBX/VoIP stack from source.

Does this kind of system make sense to everyone? Helpful? Too complicated? Of course, there will be a supporting web page detailing the colour coded icons out...that has yet to get created, but is my very next task once I fix Marketplace version control.

Ben

@James, FYI I've updated my build of Z-push to the final 2.0 release here. Hopefully we can get it up onto the repos...
ftp://timburgess.net/repo/clearos/6.2/x86_64/testing/zarafa-z-push-2.0-2.clearos.noarch.rpm

Hi Ben,

Yes, that system would make a lot off sense and it would make it very clear what to expect from the app and the developer.

I suggest to NOT give the ClearCenter support different colors as you would only add that on Apps that are made/provided by Clear and that info is also provided. Or are you thinking about giving support (in the community) on apps from developers?

I do agree that basic e-mail should be available as a free install and that should not have to be Zarafa. Paying $10 for a complete install off a community edition off any product I think is a good thing and would encourage a lot of developers to do the same..

Jeroen

Hi Jeroen,
Or are you thinking about giving support (in the community) on apps from developers?
Yes...that's exactly what we're planning...for example, any ClearFoundation free app is supported if the user is running Professional Edition with support terms.

So, part of the Marketplace submission process (which is a Work-in-Progress) will be to come to terms around support. If it's a small app that the guys providing ClearCenter support are already very familiar with, then sure, we'll provide support for the app for users who have Professional Standard or Premium, or want to pay us on a per incident basis for Professional Lite or Basic.

Ben

Just a quick one. But isn't that stepping on the developers feet whilst opening clearos to extra support requirements.

If you take joomla they have an extention directory. The joomla people maintain the core. Developers maintain their addon.
In fact it would be strange to expect ClearOs to support 3rd party offerings?

Hey Stuart,

Maybe we're mis-communicating here...

We (ClearCenter) would only provide support (not maintenance/updates) for an app if:

a) the app was under our support policy umbrella
b) the user requesting support had a paid ClearOS Professional subscription

This allows what I call 'convenience' apps - apps that for a small fee, I'd rather pay a guy like Tim than try and install it myself - to enter the Marketplace at low cost, but not expose anyone to the really expensive part of providing userland support - unless there has been a higher value exchange that's taken place (eg. purchase of a $480 ClearOS Professional Standard subscription).

Ben

I've been enjoying the read here on this thread. Hopefully there'll be a way to compensate developers for their work but not restrict options. Sounds like that's getting hashed out.

I'll be glad to pay a $10 download fee to Tim for his excellent work.

Still confused

"Hi Jeroen,
Or are you thinking about giving support (in the community) on apps from developers?"

So if you have a ClearOS Professional subscription then you would provide support for it?
I am not criticising in any way, just surprised that you would. Hopefully the marketplace will flourish and I am thinking of getting into development mode.
Alfesco would be my first port of call, Vtiger after that and maybe Open Bravo.

So if I provide modules for install and configuration would you provide support.

I can't see how you could possibly support a unknown and hopefully diverse offering?

The Zarafa config is simple but its a complex piece of software. So in your scenario are you saying that you will check that the settings are correct (firewall, ports...) after that its back to the developer?

I think like most that the $10 payment is fine but want to be sure if:

1. Will it be the Community edition or Free edition (with 3 licenses).
2. Will Z-Push will be setup as part of the app?
3. Will the new Zarafa WebApp interface will be installed too?

Last thing and I think it will be awesome, is if we could have access to the small business edition instead of community or free edition so as to buy licenses.

Hi Jay, ClearOS are offering the Community edition, and the Professional edition of Zarafa only via the Marketplace. The pricing of the Professional edition in the Marketplace is very similar to the Small Business Edition anyway, and you get the backing of ClearOS support. I don't think its stated anywhere but you can in theory manually install the zarafa-licensed el6 rpm provided by Zarafa and purchase your own or indeed make use of their 3 free licenses.

Z-push is not part of the app, but I'm hoping that the Z-push RPM will be available from the ClearOS repo soon. Once installed it doesn't need any further configuration (see the Z-push thread for details).
ftp://timburgess.net/repo/clearos/6.2/x86_64/testing/zarafa-z-push-2.0-2.clearos.noarch.rpm

EDIT: Zarafa WebApp is available once you have purchased the app, and can be installed from the command line using 'yum install zarafa-webapp'