Guy Smith ([log in to unmask]) as part of an excellent rebuttal
wrote:
 
> The one common thread I see with each group is a distance
> from the trials of daily data processing.  It is easy for
> someone who doesn't carry a beeper, who doesn't reload forms
> in the middle of a 300,000 page billing run .... [snip]
 
Bingo!  I am frequently amazed at some of the "solutions" suggested by
consultants or marketroids(tm) who (among other things) thing that "open
system" automatically == U**X.
 
Terry: "Say, Andy, who's that over in the corner pounding their head
        against the wall?"
 
Andy:  "Oh, that's our Unix system operator.  They just had a paper jam
        in the middle of a thousand-page report."
 
Terry: "Well, can't you just back up a few pages and re-start the
        spooler?"
 
Andy:  "Nope.  We didn't get a third-party spooler.  We use lpd/lpr."
 
Terry: "Ohhhh...."
 
Now, I'm not saying that the MPE/iX spooler is the greatest in the world
(else we wouldn't see third-party spooler products for 'iX) but it is a
production-capable spooler.  The stock lpd/lpr is just a little better
than the MS-DOS "print" TSR, IMO.
 
Of course, there are other trivial :-) things like file system resiliency.
HP-UX is finally getting a journalled (sp?) file system as of 10.0; which
other Unix derivatives have or will have JFS in the near future?  Will
the third-party DBMS's take advantage of the JFS?
 
The list goes on, of course.  I guess I'm just often left wondering how
much (if any) experience in production-volume data processing these
people have who propose "open systems == U**X" solutions have.
 
Unfortunately, they all too often target the top management
(non-technical) folks with their marketing propoganda.  At our last IARUG
(Iowa) meeting, George Stachnik showed an excellent video (though not yet
finished) which should counter some of this "open-systems" disinformation.
Hopefully, it will be made available to us soon!
 
  Jeff Lindberg, Data Processing Coordinator
 
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5~