Denys writes:

>In a message dated 97-01-14 17:02:08 EST, [log in to unmask] (Paul F.
>Dorius) writes:
>
><< The advice to be rid of a working solution (Novell) in favor of a
> competitor's offering only in order to fix problems caused by that
> competitor seems somehow convoluted.  In this case, maybe the onus is
> Microsoft's, as it is its "competitive" offering which is being
> disruptive, and therefore criticized.
>  >>
>Novell on the HP 3000 was designed as a stop gap measure and probably created
>more problems than it solved.  Witness some of the other comments which were
>posted on this thread supporting my proposed fix.
>
>I am not one to say dump the working stuff to put in new stuff.  I have
>always been cautious, comes from supporting large environments.  But I am
>also not one to butt my head against a wall trying to keep a bad environment
>working when I can just dump whatever is not working right (and will never be
>fixed!) and replacing it with something that works.
>
>Sometimes, for your sanity, you continued enjoyment of life and the well
>being of your customers/employeers, you need to get rid of things.  Do so
>wisely.

Change for change sake doesn't make sense to me. Lack of change because of
an unwillingness to explore options also doesn't make sense to me. What
makes sense to me is change for a valid reason.

Our experience is similar to Denys' comment. We put Resource Sharing
on our 937 as a way to get shared disk and other 'server' benefits
without having to deal with another box or learn another o/s. That
worked well for us until we had needs that could not be met by that
solution. By then we had some experience so we were able to make a
better evaluation of our options. We eventually moved off
Resource Sharing onto NT3.51 (now 4.0). Its been 2 1/2 years and we
have been delighted by the switch. Just another 'use the best tool
for the job' situation. Besides, we could see that MS was investing
and going to invest a lot more into NT than HP would EVER invest in
Resource Sharing/Netware on the 3k.

Our small environment (~ 15 desktops) makes such decisions
substantially easier than those of large corporations. But I think the
reasoning is still sound.

Sidebar
-------
BTW - 'Change for a valid reason' is what a lot of s/w vendors are saying
      these days. They are seeing it easier to sell a system on a platform
      other than the HP3k so they are switching. In some cases it looks to
      me like they are taking 'the path of least resistance'. We are taking
      a different position, even if it makes our job more difficult. Our
      customers have invested a lot in their HP3k solutions and we believe
      it is the best platform for our customer base. So, while we might
      use NT at QSS for certain functions, we are still actively
      writing/selling solutions for the HP3k. In fact, we have 4 new
customers being implemented and 3 of them are new to the
      HP3k world. Ask your s/w vendor one simple question:
      'Are you changing the application system to another platform for my
       benefit, or for your benefit?". And don't be fooled by the
      'if we succeed, our customers will benefit' answer.

Sorry for the longish message....I didn't expect it to be so long ;-)

duane
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