Re: FyRE, I'm Curious About You Too...
From: Tony Lawrence (apl_at_shell01.TheWorld.com)
Date: 12/27/03
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Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2003 14:22:29 +0000 (UTC)
FyRE <FyRE@toktik.demon.ku.oc.x> wrote:
>On Tue, 23 Dec 2003 11:52:26 +0000 (UTC), Tony Lawrence
><apl@shell01.TheWorld.com> wrote:
>>FyRE <FyRE@toktik.demon.ku.oc.x> wrote:
>>>That experience polarized my opinion of proprietary OS' so much that I
>>>decided to make every effort to encourage the use of open source when
>>
>>In other words, you have a political opinion that open source is
>>better for the world than closed source. I don't necessarily
>>disagree, but that is an OPINION, and one that can be argued
>>against on a number of points.
>Please don't use the "p" word. There's enough effluent flowing from
>Darl and his merry band without adding to it. I'd say my opinion has
>been shaped by personal experience of the problems proprietory
>software brings. Chaining yourself to a single vendor; having crucial
>parts of your business held ransom by a single company is madness.
Again, nothing I personally disagree with. But nothing that
says proprietary systems have no place, either.
>Time and again I've encountered companies paying absolutely ridiculous
>amounts of money for pretty pedestrian, in some cases just plain bad
>software for which better, open source alternatives exist. And I do
>mean better. As an example, whilst working on part of a local council
>project to bring home-learning to problem kids I discovered a company
>developing a "group chat" system using java and a proprietory back-end
>costing tens of thousands of pounds and requiring numerous Microsoft
>servers to handle a few thousand clients (text only). The software was
>slow and buggy. An obvious, and free alternative was simply to use IRC
>on a closed network; which they implemented, costing them zero and
>working far better than the java software.
OK. But I can as easily point to proprietary systems that have no
open source equivalent. Long term, I don't think that will remain
true, but that's opinion also, and can be argued against.
>>You certainly have a right to your opinion, just as we have rights to
>>ours. MY opinion is that I do what the customer wants. If they
>>want to dump SCO, I'll help them. If they want to keep it, I'll
>>help with that. I do offer my own advice and opinion if asked,
>>or even unasked if it seems appropriate given the situation, but
>>I don't get up on a high horse and insist that it is my way or no way.
>I don't insist upon OS software when it's not appropriate. I just
>don't help with anything else. I certainly wouldn't help to install
>and configure a SCO product, even if they wrote decent software. It's
>a dead-end product, and I'd feel compelled to explain exactly why I
>believe that (throwing in Darl's comedic press briefings would no
>doubt add plenty of weight to my case). Hell, I'd even recommend MS
>over SCO - they're probably even worse scum than SCO, but they do have
>a future.
But I DO NOT believe that it a dead end product. Even if I
had foreknowledge of SCO's corporate demise (and that's not
the sure bet you think it is), I still believe that the products
will continue to exist for at least several more years. Certainly
I advise my customers to be aware of available alternatives, particularly
if their software is becoming unsupported on Unix (RealWorld, Mas90, etc.)
Those folks need to make plans, and those plans should include
evaluating whether or not to stay on SCO. But other customers
have software quite firmly wedded to a SCO platform, and there's
no need for them to get overly excited by any of this. Even the
orphaned folk need not panic: their software works, and we could
keep it working for at least several years if necessary, and sometimes
much longer.
Heck, if it hadn't been for Y2K, many of us would still have Xenix
customers. I knew an accountant who (last I saw him, around 15 years
ago or so) was running his own software on a TRS-80 Model I !!! Talk
about dead end :-)
This is political. Nothing most businesses need concern themselves
with.
-- tony@aplawrence.com Unix/Linux/Mac OS X resources: http://aplawrence.com Get paid for writing about tech: http://aplawrence.com/publish.html
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