I've contributed a few times to a chipin, but like rather to contribute and communicate directly with the maintainer for certain specific features. I think there are 3 main ways: - chipin: for popular much wanted features, a lot of people contributing a small amount. - bounty: gathering a few sponsors that contribute a larger amount for a specific feature - direct contact with the maintainer: for urgent needs or really custom changes to the module for a specific project. I think chipin is suitable to gather a rather small amount with a lot of people giving very small amounts. So its mainly suitable for popular much wanted features, not something that only a few are really interested in. For my company I would like to have an invoice of expenses and with chipin this is more difficult. Also if you contribute a larger amount it would be nice to be mentioned as "sponsored by" on the project page; with chipin normally every contributor is anonymous, if you pay half of the total amount or 5$. I like the idea of "bounty" more for specific stuff, so gathering with a few sponsors and pay each a third or so, but it could be good to find a better way to show clearly which bounties are searching for extra sponsors for a certain module. There should somewhere be an overview. Same would be true for chipins if you would have more. For me it would be also good if contributors could state in a consequent and clear manner that they are available for paid customisations (and quite a bit do this allready, but maybe drupal.org should provide an structured way to do this) and give in their profile some more info about conditions, contact ways, timing and availability. Also to know if the maintainer is a fulltime freelancer available or somebody working fulltime in a non-drupal related company having only some weekend time to spend and no possibility to write an invoice is very important to me. Hans

I was not making a complete list of all possible ways to contribute (there are a lot more then), just giving the alternatives in my opinion for chipin/financial contribution. I prefer that the module maintainer writes the code instead of myself or somebody that works for me because - I think paying the module maintainer gives her the opportunity to make a living of Drupal modules and thus having the freedom to spend more time on the module, improving the quality of that module, implement faster improvements and make it better for everyone. Such a module will not get abandoned. - I also think that the module maintainer knows her module best (or should) so will not have to waste time to digg into the code just to understand how the module works before being able to start adding the feature. So we save time. - If you make yourself or let somebody else make a patch and contribute it it is not sure that it will finally get incorporated into the module code, the module maintainer will decide on that, and when she had started developing a similar feature in another way, you will be left with an ugly patch that makes updates harder. - Letting other people write an extra feature often gives you code which is too custom to be contributed, its often an easy fix that is specific for your installation; I rather prefer that the maintainer makes a generic solution that will get included in the next update of the module. And I'm confident enough in the enthousiasm of most maintainers that we will not get into a future situation where all modules would get stuck on a chipin, and nothing would be done anymore before the amount is reached. Its not about free/paid, but about liking what you do. Hans 2009/1/15 Brian Kennedy <brianpkennedy@gmail.com>

On Wed, Jan 14, 2009 at 1:12 AM, KOBA | Hans Rossel <hans.rossel@koba.be>wrote:

...

I've contributed a few times to a chipin, but like rather to contribute and communicate directly with the maintainer for certain specific features. I think there are 3 main ways: - chipin: for popular much wanted features, a lot of people contributing a small amount. - bounty: gathering a few sponsors that contribute a larger amount for a specific feature - direct contact with the maintainer: for urgent needs or really custom changes to the module for a specific project.

You seem to have left out the 4th way -- which is digging in and and writing some code yourself. If there's a feature that you're willing to pay someone else for, why can't you do it yourself (whether that means writing your own code, or if you're a PM having someone who works for you write the code)? After you write implement the feature yourself, you can contribute that code back in the form of a patch and the maintainer can apply that him/herself. One of the benefits of open source is that the source is open.

On Jan 15, 2009, at 11:09 AM, Brian Kennedy wrote:

So much for the F in FOSS.

Uhh, no. The "F" is "Free" as in "you don't have to pay to download the code I wrote". However, until the global victory of socialism, our rent isn't "free", our food isn't "free", and therefore, we all sell our labor power to survive. My labor is not free, even if the code I produce with it is. -Derek (dww)

Brian Kennedy wrote:

So much for the F in FOSS.

I’m not asking for *you* to pay for my time. But my rent is not free, nor are any of the bills I pay (like electric or internet), nor is the food that passes, occasionally, through my system. Those all benefit you, whether or not you pay to download the code I provide. But if I don’t pay them, you will lose support for that code. Have you ever seen a module that says “Supported by” or “Underwritten by”? That means that someone paid for that module you get for nothing and about which you are free to complain. I would have much more time and incentive to work on those modules if someone – anyone – was paying me to do it. Right now, Real Life* is hindering my ability to support my 20+ modules. I feel very bad about that, but it is a reality that I must face – and so must my adopters. There are many large companies that would otherwise be paying a large chunk of change to some vendor for the benefits they get from Drupal core and contib maintainers. If they would contribute a portion of the savings, the entire Drupal community would be better off. BTW, how much are you making from Drupal? How much have you contributed back? Nancy