This is partly why I base the open source software I use primarily on the project's community first and the technology second.
jQuery and PHP are good examples of software which might not be the "best", technically. However their community is rock solid and you can get support or find workarounds to bugs (which might not be fixed soon) pretty easily.
Please don't downvote me for saying something positive about PHP....:)
The central promise of Open Source is not that you can get workarounds for bugs — it's that you are free to fix any bug yourself (or pay someone else to). Lots of non-free projects have great support too, but when you fall through those cracks there's nothing you can do about it. Open Source gives you a much better promise instead.
I agree. The appeal is that your options for workarounds are orders of magnitude larger than with non open sourced software. You have a multitude of options...
- Workarounds are still important and easier since the software is more transparent
- The communities are larger so paying someone else is easier
- Forks exist for a reason
- You could fix it yourself
jQuery and PHP are good examples of software which might not be the "best", technically. However their community is rock solid and you can get support or find workarounds to bugs (which might not be fixed soon) pretty easily.
Please don't downvote me for saying something positive about PHP....:)