[Info-vax] New VSI Roadmap (yipee!)

[David Froble]

Kerry Main wrote:
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Info-vax [mailto:info-vax-bounces at info-vax.com] On Behalf Of
>> David Froble
>> Sent: 28-Feb-15 10:03 PM
>> To: info-vax at info-vax.com
>> Subject: Re: [New Info-vax] New VSI Roadmap (yipee!)
>>
>> Kerry Main wrote:
>>
>>> OpenVMS has had its days of being the big guy in town and it did
>>> have a few hacks .. however, even at its height of popularity, it did
>>> not have the 10-40+ security vulnerabilities each and every month that
>>> exist today on commodity OS's.
>> Ok, we got it, we understand the 10-40+ stuff.  We don't need to
>> continue to have it shoved up our noses.
>>
>> For the many years I've worked with VMS, the security issue has
>> never,not once, been a consideration.  Yes, we always tried to keep
>> things as secure as possible.  But it wasn't why we used VMS.
>>
> 
> Now, isn't that interesting. A Customer with no monthly security 
> patches to apply does not worry about security. That in itself says
> something.

> Contrast that with a Lottery Cust I was working at where they were 
> so frustrated because they had a regulatory requirement to apply all
> vendor security patches above a certain level with a fixed timeframe
> (I think it was 45 days). They had some OpenVMS and it just worked,
> but some of their newer systems were Windows and Linux and that
> Is where the OPS folks were so frustrated.
> 
> As he stated "we gave up trying to retest important apps with all of 
> these monthly security issues .. we just go with the flow like the rest
> of their company and roll out the patches."
> 
>> Last year, as I was trying to discuss security with a customer, he said
>> this.  "You want to know something, my boss doesn't care one bit about
>> security."  Now, I think that is a bad attitude, but, the guy's business
>> wasn't security, it was selling and shipping product.  And yes, he gets
>> the effort on security, whether he wants it or not.  Somebody has got to
>> be responsible.
>>
> 
> I wonder if their shipping was down for a day or two because of a virus
> or some hack if they would say the same thing?

Well, that's never happened.

> I wonder if the folks at Sony would say the same thing? 

Different environment.  But, honestly, if it wasn't hacked, but leaked 
info, that can happen to any system.

>> VMS is used because it does such a good job.  Not a good job with
>> security, a good job running the entire organization.
> 
> Problem is that when a good system is doing its job right, no one knows
> about it. Oh yeah .. marketing, but we all know that was not HP's forte.

Believe me, Codis customers KNOW what they have.  In addition, the 
several other software vendors have given up.  Codis dominates the small 
power engine distribution market.  I don't know the actual numbers, but 
I'm guessing over 90% of the market is using Codis.  We've had our cases 
of someone thinking they could do better.  People running these sizes of 
businesses are self made men, with big egos.  Takes them a while (and 
significant money) to admit they made a bad decision.

> With the right marketing, testimonials like the following should become 
> much more common: (from 2007)
> 
> http://www.vista-control.com/itanium_success.htm
> "Windows to OpenVMS Integrity Migration"
> " After implementing mission-critical systems on Windows-based 
> computers for many years, a customer experienced a virus in one 
> of these systems that shut down production for two days while 
> the infected systems were diagnosed, restored and tested. The 
> impact was that plant production was severely impacted at no 
> small cost. Despite internal opposition because of the established 
> standard, Vsystem on HP Itanium servers running OpenVMS was 
> chosen for the next system to be replaced"
> 
> "...Mission-critical applications require rock-solid 365/24 operation. 
> The costs of any down-time far out-weigh any initial savings of using 
> Windows-based computer systems let alone the additional costs of 
> on-going security upgrades and other security costs are considered."
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Kerry Main
> Back to the Future IT Inc.
>  .. Learning from the past to plan the future
> 
> Kerry dot main at backtothefutureit dot com
> 
> 
>