Estimating the Size/Cost of Linux

2bits writes "Wow... A Billion Dollars Worth Of Software On My System For Free! Check This Guy Out, He Came Up With A Counting / Pricing Method For Quite A Few Types of Source Code. Here is the Program. The results on the site are sorta dated, based on RH 7.1, but the app is pretty cool!... Hey, I can finally find out how much all my side projects are worth / costing me..."

Comments

lets see here.....

[Anonymous Coward]

[cmdrtaco@localhost]$ est slashcode
Analyzing slashcode.....
Result: $6.66

[cmdrtaco@localhost]$

bad news for Linux?

[tps12]

This looks like a serious problem for Linux distributors like Red Hat, Mandrake, and Debian. They sell their products (which consist of software and support and manuals) for $40-$100, usually. Now we see that what they put into their product (i.e., the cost) is orders of magnitude beyond that. Even if Red Hat sold every single copy it packaged (it doesn't even come close), and even if nobody downloaded it for free or copied the CDs for a friend (again, an incredibly optimistic assumption), it would still be looking at huge losses.

This might have worked a few years ago, but with accounting practices coming under scrutiny across the board, I fear that these companies are headed for trouble.

Linux's true cost:

[Anonymous Coward]

Priceless

visible man, with invisible shirt

[Dr. Awktagon]

Note to Mr. Wheeler: when your shirt is the same color as the background of your web site, you might want to put a thin border around the picture with your favorite free image editing software.. though I'm wondering why exactly your picture is there at all..

funny, but actually closer to $1,000,000

[Pinball Wizard]

Sloccount run on Slashcode 2.25 gives us this:

Total Estimated Cost to Develop = $ 996,916

I would have posted the entire output of the program, but unfortunately, their million-dollar lameness filter wouldn't let me!