[Info-vax] How about RdB for x86 VMS?

[Bill Gunshannon]

In article <lud2m5$1vm$1 at dont-email.me>,
	Thomas Wirt <twnews at kittles.com> writes:
> On 9/4/2014 1:33 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>> On 2014-09-04, JF Mezei <jfmezei.spamnot at vaxination.ca> wrote:
>>> On 14-09-04 10:09, Stephen Hoffman wrote:
>>>
> <snip>
> 
>> long it's going to take to port VMS.)
>>
>> And yes, 3 years is an eternity which is why there needs to be specific
>> information made available which is good enough to convince people,
>> here in 2015, to delay any porting efforts.
>>
>> That's criticial because once they actually start a port (instead of
>> just planning one), you have lost them as a future VMS customer.
>> Just _saying_ "we will have something shipping in 3 years" isn't good
>> enough. You need to convince people with credible and solid evidence
>> to back this up and which they can take to their bosses.
> 
> You seem to be forgetting that most VMS sites probably still have at 
> least one VMS advocate.  

True.  But i suspect that that person is like me, here at the University.
No one takes them seriously and they are considered IT dinosaurs to placated
but generally ignored.  :-)

>                         Yes we will need to see progress from VSI.  At 
> some point we need to see proof that their road map is meaningful, but 
> for now the commitment to x86 is enough.  I don't really care about a 
> port to x86 for my business anytime soon.  I just got new hardware 2 
> years ago and am very happy with the performance.  I doubt I will need 
> new VMS servers in the next 6 years.
> 
> With that said, the promise of x86 means that 7 years from now there is 
> a supported VMS and an improved path.  Possibly even a slightly growing 
> installed base.  For others I know they will want those x86 boxes for 
> VMS right away, but the promise and eventually proof of the promise is 
> enough to allow us to keep our businesses committed to VMS indefinably.
> 
> It was the 2020 EOL that concerned businesses, not the limits of the 
> hardware.

I still think the key to an expanding user base is going to be getting
back into the .edu market.  Sadly, I don't expect to be around long
enough to head up the charge to do that.  brief conversations with
people here involved in teaching things like OSes  show promise, but
any educational program is going to have to offer something that a 
college professor sees as valuable.  It takes time and effort to write
a curriculum and it there is a lot of buerocracy getting it into use.
The professor has to see value in it before he begins or he won't.

It is interesting that after all the years I spent trying to convince
this place to get involved with the IBM Academic Alliance (with no
success) one of the professors just pointed out the great new program
from IBM he learned about -- The IBM Academic Alliance.

bill

-- 
Bill Gunshannon          |  de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n.  Three wolves
billg999 at cs.scranton.edu |  and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
University of Scranton   |
Scranton, Pennsylvania   |         #include <std.disclaimer.h>