Neil Harvery, Duane Percox, and John Hornberger replied:

FIRST NEIL:

>Why not just levy a percentage of current support costs?

That would be another way to do it;  might be just as good.

I didn't mean to suggest that it had to be exactly what I
suggested;  not at all.  The key criteria is to do it in such a
way that it can be easily and cleanly separated from other
support money, so that not of it gets "lost" in transmission.

>I'd also like to think that it could made voluntary, but then
>it would have to be VERY well motivated by H-P themselves.

Well, I'm sort of afraid that would turn out like making income
taxes voluntary....  Plus if it was only a portion of the installed
base, I would think internal HP administration would be much
more complex (which would increase the overhead cost).... I
suspect it would need to be everybody or nobody.

>And I agree it MUST be used for R&D. Give some to Lars :)

:-))

>..... it seems to be that it's commitment that's required more
>than raw cash.

I certainly agree that money is not the only issue.  That's why
it's so important to keep the key HP R&D engineers that are
actually writing code for the 3000 happy and feeling like they
have a long-term future in CSY.  But without the $$ to cover
paychecks, on a large scale things won't get done without
adequate direct funding for the Labs.

>..... small teams or single developers would be prepared to
>develop for the HP3000 platform, knowing that it's future was
>assured.

That is of course the long-term crux issue:  It's the applications.

>.... a collective sigh of relief from the mainframe users that
>they are no longer being forced to UNIX.

Lo and behold, AS/400, WindowsNT, and....  MPE/iX:
Integrated, PROPRIETARY solutions, BUT:  Solutions that
support open interconnectivity and interoperability with the
rest of the world.  That's the key.

>Let's reverse all this talk of migrating from MPE to UNIX.

I haven't heard much if any mention of UNIX in our end of the
DOD for a long time.  Besides MPE/iX, seems like it's NT
everywhere.


THEN DUANE:

>Very nice Ken. I will not be at IPROF this year, due to a
>scheduling conflict, so I will vote here.

Shoot.  You're the third or fourth usual suspect I'm personally
aware of that can't make it to IPROF-97....  We're going to
have to start thinking of real-time web access to the sessions
or something.  Sorry you can't make it.....  But thank you for:

> YES.YES.YES.YES.YES.YES.YES.YES.YES.YES.

>Interesting enough, I sent HP a proposal to up the cobol
>support fees so we could get the '97 enhancements from
>HP, not from another compiler company. I didn't get a
>response, ......

At least we got an answer with Transact... Of course answer
was NO....  I suspect getting sufficient R&D funding at the
individual product level is going to be difficult;  it may actually
be easier to get a global solution....   Stay tuned.

>And we, as you clearly indicated have also, have $$$$$ invested
>in HP3k s/w solutions that cannot and hopefully will not be wasted.

That is one sentiment that I would expect is shared by many
if not most HP 3000 sites.  Evolution, not revolution....  But it
can't just be "run in place" either.


AND FINALLY  JOHN HORNBERGER:

>I like your funding idea for the HP3000 development.  But,
>thinking like my management for a moment, I suggest one
>small change to the model.  Since this additional money is
>"customer-provided", then the customer, namely the HP3000-L
>and Interex community, should have the guiding hand in what
>the funds are used for.

Oh, absolutely.  That was one of those "it goes without saying"
things that I guess I didn't specifically mention (it was late;  I
was tired).  We need to get earnest money on this one;  i.e.:
like I said, something signed by Dick Watts or higher.....

Although note I don't think HP will give the user community the
absolute final say on enhancement details and priority;  they
will want to retain final technical management review.  And I
think that's O.K. (let's face it;  sometimes we the users ask
for things that end up not making a lot of technical sense from
the big picture standpoint (been there;  done dat) ).  But I
definitely agree that the SIG - Interex SIB ballot process
should be the formal driving input if this ever happens.

>I'm sure that most, if not all, HP3000 sites will be willing to
>kick in the extra bucks provided we (our management) are
>guaranteed a payoff.

Yup;  I think so do.  And agree the operative word immediately
above is "guaranteed".

Thanks to all for comments....  With a little more synergy at
IPROF, who knows what we might come up with...

Ken Sletten