Unofficial Snippets from the HP3000 Roundtable:

Listed Panelists included: Winston Prather, Dave Wilde,
Christine Martino, Dave Snow, Kriss Rant, Dave Duplantier,
moderated by Bill Lancaster.

o Oracle

The panel said they worked with Oracle for over the past
year and Oracle simply has no interest in supporting the
HP e3000 platform.  They mentioned Oracle did not just
drop the HP e3000, they dropped several other platforms
as well.  Although one said they're happy Oracle is NOT
going to be on the box.  [Applause]  Someone then stood
up and said, "ten years ago we were fighting the
unbundling of Image and trying to keep Oracle off the
box, now were fighting to keep it on."  [Applause]  That's
when Bill Lancaster made his marketing slogan suggestion,
"...and the horse you rode in on."

o College Plans

Someone mentioned the fact that there was no one present
was under 30.  A panel member said there was a "grant"
program being considered regarding colleges and universities
(ostensibly) to give them away in order to recruit the
younger (Unix) geek crowd.

o Partnerships

"We've seen them come and go.  How long will they last?"
HP admitted to dropping the ball in the past and they
committed to trying to make them last.

o Fibre Channel and SAN

When?  SCSI/Fibre avail on XP512 OEM product.
Native Fibre Channel is in investigation phase
don't expect it in near future.

o HP-IB

HP-IB was commented on vs. 6.5  As show of hands
was asked as to whether Fibre Channel was a more
important issue than HP-IB.  No comment was made
on HP-IB to SCSI conversion.

o HP Spooling and 3rd Party Printers

Releasing OUTSPJ to vendors at the low level
was suggested as a possible solution for 3rd
Party Printer vendors.  Ideas should be
forwarded to SIGPrint.  There was a show of
hands on "robustness" on MPE Spooling about
40% raised hands.

o Superdome?

A choice to be invested in.  A decision will
be made but funding of other decisions need
to be made also.

o JDBC Benchmark

Jon Dierks mentioned problems with JDBC drivers
and said he had a hard time for getting support
on JDBC.  (I don't recall the answer he got.)

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

o The Vendor Haul

Having a wife that is in class that teaches
8 autistic children I was on the lookout for
squishy toys.  It helps calm them down.  To
wit:

13 Norco squishy PCs
8 Merant squishy balls (that retain new shape)
9 Sungard squishy moons
8 Roc squishy rocks
8 SMA squishy lions
1 CA squishy planet earth.
8 Digiterra stuffed leopards
5 SCB miniature telescopes.
3 Logical Slinkys
1 Modus Slinky
1 EDS blinky bounce ball
1 Lawson Software blinky bounce ball
1 Acorde blinky bounce ball
2 ATS flashlights
1 Symark flashlight
1 Server Workstation Expert flashlight
4 Logical metal clips
3 Unikeep plastic CD holders (with 10 sleeves for CDs0
1 searchHP.com ball cap
1 DISResearch Earplug radio.
1 Norco ball cap
1 Logical racecar flashlight
1 Inflatable neck pillow (don't remember source.)
2 Fuji Film baseballs
3 "Seized FBI" buttons
1 Netplex luggage tag
1 Netplex coffee cup
1 Norco coffee cup
1 "Official" HPWorld Forsythe Solutions bag.
1 Ted Dasher cloth bag.
1 360 Technologies Adhesive paper clip.
1 EMC2 T-Shirt
1 "got hp" T-shirt (from NHCSI)
1 "official" HPWorld pin
1 ijob pin
1 Aldon wrist purse
1 Roc Software T-shirt
1 Smith-Gardner Ecometry T-shirt
1 Lund T-shirt
1 QAD T-shirt
1 Cognos T-shirt
1 Epic systems T-shirt
1 hp pen
1 Engineering Automation pen
1 Norco pen
1 Abtech pen
1 Quest pen

o Evening Eats

I was invited by one notable HP3000-Lister and
ate at a great Kosher restarant called "Maccabean"
specializing in Mediterranean foods.

Tracy Johnson
Justin Thyme Productions
Sponsors Empire on the HP3000 at:
http://198.190.228.6/