support requirement

[pvolcko at concentric.net]

What defines "supported" as far as ISO 9000 is concerned?  There's no way
for vendor X to "self support" their own product and remain ISO 9000
compliant?

On Mon, 30 Aug 1999 bruce at perens.com wrote:

> Vendor X plans on releasing software as Open Source. X makes a number
> of very interesting and useful research-derived programs, and also runs
> an ISO-9000-certified software development shop. Their ISO certification
> requires that they run only supported programs, and thus the development
> shop is prohibited from running the output of their own research
> department. Thus, one of X's _main_goals_ in making the software Open
> Source is that commercial vendors pick it up and _provide_support_ for it.
> 
> Thus, their license requires that if you distribute a derived work of their
> program _and_ you provide support on reasonably comparable programs,
> that you provide support for their program too. The provision has no effect
> on organizations like Debian that don't provide support.
> 
> This is currently the stumbling block for X's license being Open Source.
> Any ideas, folks?
> 
> 	Thanks
> 
> 	Bruce
>