>On Tue, 3 Dec 2002, Phil Payne wrote: > >> > > $13K is a problem to most consulting companies ?? Surely not - >maybe most of >> > > the one-person consulting companies, but for anything of eg. 10 >people and up, >> > > would $13K really represent a problem ? >> > >> > Is that per consultant? >> >> I played with z/Flex - the zArchitecture version of Flex-ES - on an >850MHz ThinkPad. >> >> We got three z/OS TSO sessions going in ARCHLVL=2 with negligible >trivial TSO response time - >> a logon by any one session caused about a three-second performance >hit. For general >> development, I suspect four to six users on a 1.4GHz xSeries would >be very practical. >> >> Oh - when we did this, we were sitting at the cocktail bar in a >Virgin Atlantic Jumbo at >> 34,000 feet. > >And if you have it out of the office demonstrating to a client (as >someone else mentioned), what then do the others use? >
I find this entire conversation fascinating. Those who can afford the licensing think that maintaining the status quo is desireable. Those who can't think that it limits access to the platform and contributes to the 'slow death' syndrome. I think that anyone who believes that a successful business is going to argue on the side of increasing competition is being naive. Successful businesses want to maintain the status quo at *worst*. Let us pretend that the following is true: 1) Major corporations are throwing all 'extra' cash at 'open systems' solutions, because that is where they see all the new blood. Those who are experts on 'legacy systems' are, on average, middle-aged. 2) Major corporations have tightened their belts when it comes to training/education. SHARE attendance is down and there are few Universities teaching mainframe skills. 3) The 'legacy systems' experts, being older, have families and other obligations that prevent them from spending extra time at the office, or starting up an 'extra-curricular' business. At work, their employers prefer that they spend their time just fixing problems as quickly as possible vs. learning about all the newest features of the platform. 4) IBM has a problem because old code and old coders are 'breaking' zOS. This makes zOS appear to be unstable and creates problems both for IBM and ISVs. A lot of time/money/resources are being thrown at the problem by 'working with ISVs'. But, what is the incentive of the ISV to spend a lot of money to train their staff? It is better to let IBM spend the money/time to 'fix' the problems, right? Does it make sense to provide those who have the desire/motivation with a reasonably priced platform on which to hone their skills or even develop new skills - at home or in their own spare time? The Chicken and Egg question - in order to be approved for a license, you have to provide a development plan, but in order to have a development plan you have to have expertise on the platform you will be solving the problem on. Which one comes first, and where does the expertise come from? Open systems experts abound - why is that? Is there any correlation between corporations throwing money at open systems, that there is a lot of new blood in open systems development, and the fact that anyone can get access to an open systems platform to hone/gain skills? Successful businesses are, by nature, risk averse. What is the most common reason given for the licensing costs for zOS, zVM or VSE? "Because we have always done it that way". If nothing changes, how can you expect a different result? Just random thoughts as I read these messages... Regards, Dean > > > >-- > > >Cheers >John. > >Join the "Linux Support by Small Businesses" list at >http://mail.computerdatasafe.com.au/mailman/listinfo/lssb
