Why Users Drop Open Source Apps For Proprietary Alternatives

maximus1 writes "Hard as it may be to imagine, 'free' is not always the primary selling point to open source software. This article makes some interesting points about subtle ways Open Source projects might lose to the competition. Lack of features is a common answer you'd expect, but the author points out that complicated setup and configuration can be a real turn-off. Moreover, open source companies may not do enough to market major upgrades. If they did, they might lure back folks who tried and dumped the earlier, less polished version. This raises the question: what made you dump an open source app you were using? What could that project have done differently?"

Comments

Stability

[Ada_Rules]

On the verge of dumping firefox after years of use. 3.5.2 was horrible. 3.5.3 crashed within the first 5 minutes of use. The #1 reason I would dump any SW product is stability. If it can't perform its intended function without crashing then nothing else matters. Lets just hope I don't need to switch to Chrome to get this to post.

Re:Stability

[MrNaz]

Stability isn't the only issue. GIMP and Cinelerra under Linux are heaps more stable than Photoshop and Premiere under Windows, but that doesn't draw me away towards the open source side. In that case, as mentioned in the summary, feature set is high on the priority list there.

I have done my best however to stick to FOSS as much as possible. I do prefer MS Office over OpenOffice, but I've stuck with the latter nonetheless, more because I *want* to like OO more than MSO. However, in the office, I've *had* to stick with MSO because while OO can read MSO originated files, doing a save/send in OO and then again in MSO and back again results in badly broken formatting. This isn't even MS's fault.

Try creating a file in AbiWord. Save it. Open it in OO. Edit and save it. Open again in AbiWord. Broken formatting. ODF is not the panacea of perfect cross compatibility that it could and *should* be, and you can blame the elitism in the ODF committee for sticking to a misconceived notion that they should only set the semantics of the file and leave the syntax up to the implementers. The result? ODF implementations that, while semantically compatible, break each others' formatting syntax.

Point? Oh yea, I have one. The reason that I moved my workplace away from open source software was because my illusion that ODF was the perfect answer to cross compatible documents was shattered when I accidentally opened an ODF file in AbiWord on another Ubuntu box, edited it, saved the changes, and found that it had made a mess when re-opened in OO. For me, the biggest draw away from MSO was destroyed, and my incentive to push upstream for ODF use was stymmied.

This is an example where a community effort concentrates on solving the *technical* problem and forgets that there's a real, on the ground problem that needs to be solved as well, that may or may not be totally technical in nature. It represents for me the largest endemic problem within the open source community, and it really needs to be addressed if we are to present the open source model as a serious alternative to the proprietary/patent/copyright system.

Re:Stability

[frisket]

Stability isn't the only issue.

Indeed not. Cross-compatibility is a pain, for sure; I don't know if OO and Abi talk to each other, but they shouldn't be making life hardes for the users by pursuing different models.

For me, it's two things:

• Documentation: it's written by developers for other developers, not for end users. A lot of it simply lists the menus and menu items, explaining the File|Save can be used to save your file. While this is needed at some level, it's not useful when you're looking for a function that is probably in there somewhere, but unfindable. I write tech doc; I'd love to contribute to the FOSS material, but I cannot do this while the interfaces are so broken...which brings me to #2...
• Interfaces: Interaction design is one of hardest tasks around, and without substantial sums to do testing, releasing it and getting feedback is the only solution. Unfortunately, while the feedback on bugs and breaks seems to function, I don't see a whole lot about ease of use. GIMP (originally quite unbelievably bad) did eventually make a few small changes, and OO/Abi aren't bad now either, but far too much else has all the much-sought functionality buried levels deep in menus, and all the rarely-used stuff at the top. Worse, there is still very little consistency between apps, because freely contributing developers understandably want to push their own idea of what the interface should be like (for them) rather than following the prevailing guidelines and expected methods of working.

I hardly use any proprietary or commercial software these days, largely because the FOSS offerings do almost everything I want -- at the cost of some effort and the occasional cuss. But I would hesitate to recommend it to the averagely naive user simply because it's not as self-evident as it ought to be. That's not to say the commercial stuff is much better, but they have the money to polish the turds -- we don't.

Re:Stability

[commodore64_love]

Precisely.

I've used all kinds of OSes over the years, including Commodore BASIC/DOS and GEOS and AmigaOS (1,2,3) and MacOS (6,7,8,9,and 10) and Windoze (3,4,95,98,XP,wista) and Linux Ubuntu. When I was young and had tons of time to spare, I enjoyed hacking into my Commodore or Amiga to see what I could make them do, but now that I'm middle-aged I don't have many years left. I want my OS to "just work" like my car just works, so I can use my remaining time for other fun projects.

I gave Linux a fair shake, found it as frustrating as driving a Volkswagen Old Beetle that keeps breaking-down, and decided to go back to XP and MacOS. They cost money, but not that much, and that cost is offset by all the other free/libre programs like Firefox, Utorrent, Opera (not liberated but it is free), and so on.

BTW:

One other annoyance with Linux Ubuntu is when I switched my screen size to 640x480 to play some Atari and NES gaming. I found it impossible to switch it back to 1280x1024. Why? Because the dialogue box did not fit, and the "okay" button was off the screen! I ended-up stuck. That was pretty much the final straw that made me reach for my XP restore disc. What Linux needs is a user-friendliness consultant who is tasked to find all the problems that make the OS difficult for average people to navigate. Linux should be as easy to use as the Mac, or at least XP, and right now it's not even a quarter of the way there.

Re:Stability

[Bigjeff5]

"Lots of users" does not equal "a large percentage".

The number of people who use Windows but loath it could be twice the number of total number Linux users combined, and it would still be less than 5% of number of people who use Windows. There are not that many people who hate Windows, the vast majority of windows users love it, especially XP and even Vista now that they've got most of the bugs ironed out.

There will never be an open source replacement for Windows, if anything replaces it it will be a closed-source OS like OSX, because programming the bits that make Windows easy to use and acceptable to a large user base are the very bits that nobody likes to write. They are, in fact, a pain in the ass to write and there is no real sense of accomplishment. That is why GUIs in Linux are horrible. Not just bad, but horrible. The rare GUI that is easy to use is a pleasant surprise.

With Windows, as well as with most proprietary software, some schmuck got paid to make sure all the bits that nobody likes to program work the way they are supposed to, and what you get is a GUI that is so easy to use nobody even thinks about it. This is one thing that open source developement is terrible at. Not bad, but terrible, and it is an area closed-source developement excels at. Usually the poor schmuck doing the GUI work is an intern or new guy making his way up the ranks, being told what to do by the high-paid GUI designer. Neither of those two exist in an open source project. If they do, it's very rare.

Ease of Use

[illumastorm]

For me it really wasn't about the lack of features. It was more on how easy it was to use as program. You have Feature X,Y, and Z on there, but if I have to navigate Menus A, B, C, and D to find that feature then I will not use that program.

Difficulty In Using

[smpoole7]

... is my key principle. I'm capable of RTM'ing and Googling to find answers, but especially as I get older, I don't have the time I used to. Just yesterday, I was struggling with an Open Source mail server. Having to read separate (and usually incomplete) (not to mention incomprehensible at times) documentation on each component, THEN figure out how it all played together ... just to be honest, I briefly (briefly!) considered telling Corporate that we needed to just bite the bullet and go with an Exchange Server with full support. Fortunately, I got this one working (again), and it's holding for now. But my #1 complaint is the lack of clear, easy-to-follow documentation. I love F/OSS -- I run Suse at home, and I've fallen head-over-heels for VirtualBox -- but this is my biggest complaint. We have a lot of brilliant coders working in F/OSS. We need to attract some equally-brilliant technical writers to donate time to explain how the stuff works in the real world.

Re:Difficulty In Using

[Anonymous Coward]

When a network application doesn't work .. the first thing I would do is to use tcpdump (or ethereal/wireshark) to see whether the packets arrive properly. If they do, 'lsof' or 'netstat' to check whether something listens on the port the packet is destined for.. and finally 'strace' to see if the receiving application actually receives anything.

And there you go, the problem in a nutshell. Expecting end users to do stuff like this is bullshit.

Really?

[DewDude]

Maybe I'm entirely different than most people. I used to use a bunch of propritary applications...Office, AIM, Yahoo, mIRC....I switched to the open-source alternatives and I never looked back. For me, it was being able to jump between Ubuntu and Windows while maintaining the same "feel" as the other apps. Market major upgrades are lame. How many times does someone make a major upgrade that's really just more annoying features....didn't AOL just "upgrade" ICQ to use the same rendering engine as AIM Triton...quite honestly, AIM Triton was enough to make me switch to Pidgin full time. Obviously the windows people will stick with the applications that they're used to.

Why surprising?

[GF678]

Hard as it may be to imagine, 'free' is not always the primary selling point to open source software.

Why is it hard to imagine? People will pay money for something if it saves them time, or is simply more pleasant to use. It's software after all - free isn't the best drawcard if the software is crap to begin with, and goodness-knows there's a ton of crap open source software out there.

Re:Security

[LaughingCoder]

First, it was not a bug ... it was a design flaw that was spread throughout the whole source tree. The code was awful, beyond repair. If it were a simple bug I would have just fixed it.

Second, you conveniently ignore the fact that I was hacked through this hole. So, that means the breach is known and actively being exploited.

Sure, the new application I chose *may* have a security hole as well, but the one I dropped *did* have a hole (and a big one I might add). Which would you choose given that knowledge? No, my logic is completely sound. It is yours that is suspect, perhaps influenced by ideology.

Re:Lack of user-testing

[dissy]

So, my complaint list:

1. Lack of user-testing
2. Incomplete, incomprehensible, multi-format documentation.
3. Lack of quality control (eg. automated testing)
4. Unannounced drop of support on certain projects.
5. A plethora of linux distributions makes it difficult to choose.
6. Too many configuration formats.
7. The UNIX framework is not mature anymore and because of its design flaws, responds horribly to new demands.
8. Too many different programming languages make it difficult for new talent to drop in or to integrate different approaches.
9. KISS principle is broken too many times.
10. Featuritis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feature_creep)

Ironically (Other than #5 and #7 needing rewording) that is the exact list of complaints I have against most of the commercial software packages I have to work with!

If you replace the word 'linux distro' with 'windows release' in #5, and replace 'unix' with the list of 20 frameworks used in windows for #7, then it is an exact match.

My experience with Ubuntu

[schnikies79]

I thought I would try Ubuntu (Intrepid Ibex), again, out on my Dell Inspiron 640m. I got everything installed but the wireless wasn't working, so I plugged it into the lan and did some googling. I had to edit several config files and use some ndiswrapper. For someone who doesn't code and doesn't work in IT, it was a pain but whatever. I got it working.

A couple days later, Ubuntu tells me I have auto-updated to install, so I say okay. It hoses the wireless. I go through the same procedure again and get it working. A couple weeks later, the same thing.

I've told this story before and got all kinds of apologist telling me various reasons why it happened. The fact is, I don't care what the reasons are. I went back to windows.

Users "Graduate" to Proprietary

[RobotRunAmok]

I've lost count of the number of "casual" graphics designers to whom I have introduced to open source tools... they want to "do stuff," either within a web site or with their photos, but the name brand graphics tools are too expensive, so... they'll try anything, even something with a name as ridiculous and off-putting as "The Gimp." Then, once they become proficient, once they start to understand "layers" and "filters" and the like, they understand the required reading a bit better, and wonder what they are missing with the Adobe software. Well, they don't wonder, it's very clear: all the web and design magazines each month provide specialized step-by-step tutorials on how to do neat stuff with the popular tools, and never once mention open source beyond the "Annual Condescension" summary article about the "other" tools. These people take a stroll down the aisles at B&N and see tome after tome designed to help the Adobe user, and maybe -- in a particularly well-stocked store -- a copy of "Beginning GIMP, which just sounds icky. I've seen the same scenario play out with Audacity and Pro Tools: people learn how to edit with free Audacity, and then when they become savvy enough to realize what they are missing with the proprietary stuff -- either in the form of missing features or widespread community and commercial support -- they step up.

The pro creative tools have great "wannabe" appeal: working with Adobe and Pro Tools, the amateur wannabe artists feel like they're "more connected" to that professional world to which they aspire. Using the free open source tools just underscores -- in their mind -- that they are second tier. This is not to say that the open source tools are second-rate technically, just that -- in the eyes of the latte-infused graphics and sound editor pretenders -- they may not be quite as "fashionable."

Re:Users "Graduate" to Proprietary

[Zero__Kelvin]

"I've seen the same scenario play out with Audacity and Pro Tools: people learn how to edit with free Audacity, and then when they become savvy enough to realize what they are missing with the proprietary stuff -- either in the form of missing features or widespread community and commercial support -- they step up."

... to Ardour you mean ? Because Ardour is the "Pro Tools" FOSS equivalent. Obviously if you choose the wrong tool to compare to, the FOSS version will seem inadequate.

Re:Support

[quixote9]

Same where I work. It's a college with about 6000 people, and an IT department that isn't merely useless. They make our jobs *more* difficult. They just recently talked the higher-ups into switching over to M$ server software (from Apache, etc, which was great) at a cost of hundreds of thousands per year to a cash-strapped district, because then they could outsource support. They talked the higher ups into going with proprietary course management software, more hundreds of thousands per year, again, because then somebody in Pennsylvania would be so-called "supporting" it.

There are several people on campus who use Linux. None of us has ever considered switching back to either Windows or Macs. Sure, there's a learning curve. As someone who had to learn DOS in the Good Old Days, it's no worse than that. Easier actually, because these days there are forums. I can't remember when I heard a useful answer from tech support for a commercial product.

The other massive advantage is software repositories. When something comes up and I need some new program to solve that problem, I google to find out what can do the job, download, install, and some five minutes to half hour later, I'm ready to go. No credit cards, no registration codes. When I have to use Windows to help out a colleague, I can never understand why anyone puts up with the inconvenience of it now that Linux has distros like Ubuntu.

So, anyway, this is a longwinded way of saying that, yes, support is the big issue in getting people back to proprietary software. But that's not support as a non-IT person understands it. That's "support" in the sense that there's someone else to blame when things go wrong.

UI polish, documentations

[klubar]

For many FOSS applications the UI isn't nearly as polished as the commercial alternatives. This might be partially because UI designers want to get paid for the work (perhaps not a dedicated to the free community as sofware developers). The commercial alernatives invest in easy-to-use (watered down) configuration utilities that make it easy to set up. Contrast apache (perhaps the best of the FOSS) with IIS. Apache is in many ways a much better program, but the configuration is via a really obscure configuration file--and if you do something wrong you've broken it. ISS has a slick UI with nice dropdowns and checkboxes. MS spent as much effort on the UI as they did on the actual product. This is very different than FOSS.

Secondly, the documentation is typically better on commercial software than FOSS (there are some expections, mostly badly documented commercial software rather than well documented FOSS). Again, writers, proofreaders and editors want to get paid for their work.

I the long run there are probably only a score or so of free software applilications that are substainable. With the exception of these star applications (apache, linux, etc.) the real reason for using FOSS is that it's free. For example, if both MS Office and OO were both free, which would people choose? If they were both $99 (the home/student price of Office) which would they choose. Mostly free software is exploiting programs to give their work away for free--designers, editors and proofreaders don't fall for it.

Re:Spot On!

[Joebert]

Mod parent down as offtopic, and then mod this up as funny, so that people with re-parented replies see it attached to something completely unrelated and have their heads explode trying to figure out why on earth they should mod down a perfectly good post !