After nearly a year of work, the OpenNMS iPhone App is now available from iTunes.

It costs US$4.99 and folks with commercial OpenNMS support subscriptions should just drop me a note for a free voucher code.

As I know there will be a few questions about this, I’ve tried to anticipate a couple of them.

Q: Hey, OpenNMS is free software. Why you chargin’ me $5?

OpenNMS is 100% free and open source software, and the iPhone app is no exception. The code is hosted in our git repository and there are complete instructions for downloading and building it on your own.

But, it was not a painless or inexpensive process to get this app created. In fact, the main reason it got completed is that we sent Ben off to the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference and he learned what he needed to finish it (as well as to make it iPad compatible). That little junket cost us about $2000 – or nearly 575 copies of the app once Apple takes their cut.

So we decided to charge for the app but make sure than those who want to take the time have full access to the code.

Q: What about an Android app?

I would love to have an Android version of this app, but at the moment no one has stepped forward to own it. We do have a Nexus One at the office so the hope is that it will happen, and happen soon, but no promises.