[Foundation-l] Concern with performance issues

[David Gerard]

Ray Saintonge (saintonge at telus.net) [050118 07:20]:
> Robin Shannon wrote:

> >Why, what is wrong with having "people dependent on the Foundation for
> >a regular source of income."? If we were to use only contract workers,
> >a new person would have to learn the whole system every 3 months, and
> >it would also make longer term projects more difficult to
> >do. Contract workers, for sys admin is just crazy talk.

> If you are looking at this from a strictly logical mechanistic 
> perspective, you are of course right.  Certain efficiences are a normal 
> by-product of system experience.  This all presupposes that the employee 
> has a very free hand in the decisions that he must make, and that his 
> orders come from a single responsible source.
> Wikipedia is as much a human environment as it is a technical one.  Not 
   [....] 
> At the same time the employee will be under pressure to produce, even if 
> that pressure only comes from within himself.  Contracts to perform 
> specific pre-determined tasks that have already been approved by the 
> community will allow the person to focus on the task at hand, without 
> the need to schmooz for the purpose of continuing his employment beyond 
> the contract period.


If the planned employee is a sysadmin, I can tell you (as a sysadmin who
knows *lots* of sysadmins) that there are any number of highly skilled and
professional [[BOFH]]s who would *jump* at the chance to tend machines for
the Foundation. And be clueful about the Wiki way in all its interesting
glory. These people have survived Usenet, after all. Now you just need one
in St Petersburg :-D

(Dev is not my field so I cannot offer free advice worth every penny there
;-)


- d.