Siebel is the main victim here.

Post #29,555 by Andrew Grygus 2/24/02 1:24:24 PM Reply	Siebel is the main victim here. Siebel "partnered" with Microsoft Great Plains, allowing Microsoft to inexpensively learn just how one would integrate CRM with Great Plains, so now it's time to eat Siebel's lunch. At last report Siebel was still waiting to hear from Microsoft about the current status of their "partnership" (victimhood). Of course, MS CRM is still in beta, but the impact on Siebel's product should be immediate. "Why go with Siebel now, when Microsoft will have their product ready "real soon now", and then Siebel will start having inexplicable problems. Lets wait." It does amuse me to watch one technology company after another walk eagerly through the feedlot gate, oblivious to the door on the other side clearly marked "Slaughterhouse.NET", and to the fact that the feedlot fence is built of the bones of previous feeders. "Our long range plan? Yes we're already working on where to have lunch!" Microsoft Great Plains is currently being recoded in C# for .Net compatibility. Release of the .NET version will be an excellent point at which to break Siebel's compatibility. "We gave them all the help we could to transition to .NET, but they just didn't try hard enough." Meeting the projected future revenue figures for the Great Plains group will require the demise of practically every other publisher of accounting software for Windows, and expansion into other sources of revenue. I'm sure they have compensated in their market figures for that fact that a number of software publishers will not, in the future, require accounting software of any kind. [link\|http://www.aaxnet.com\|AAx]
Post #29,557 by Andrew Grygus 2/24/02 2:02:55 PM Reply	Speaking of Accounting software . . I just finished a 3-day dealer certification and training class for Vigilant's PoS (Point of Sale) and Distribution software. I have been long familiar with the DOS version (most PoS systems still run on DOS) and knew they were porting to Windows. Here's the story. They've finally, after 7 years of programming around Windows deficiencies and bugs (some causes of seemingly random file corruption took three years to pin down), they've finally done a first release of the product. They recommend the product be deployed with caution and only in small stores. The certification class was not, however, on the new Windows product. In the mean time, they were having trouble with the multi-store polling system in the DOS version. It wasn't the system itself, similar to what is used in large store chains, but due to the small business customers. These customers didn't have IS staff that understood the polling process and they often screwed it up totally when a modem connection failed. Since polling was also secheduled for the Windows version, this was considered serious. Marketing asked programming "what can we do". Programming responded "Well, we can try running the DOS version over Linux with DOS emu and have the stores work from a central host". It was so decreed. It worked, so it was next decreed to port to 32-bit native Linux. This was done in a matter of a few months. But the customers said, "What if the host connection goes down? Aren't we out of business until it cames back up?" Weeeeeellll, yes, sort of. So the remote workstations were also set up on Linux, and if the host connection goes down for more than 20 seconds, the workstation continues in "local mode" (even if you were in the middle of an invoice, that invoice is not lost). When the link comes back up for more than 20 seconds, a queued resync is performed. Cool. The net result: the multi-store Linux product is now the flagship product. The painfully developed Windows product (an absolutely outstanding Windows product, by the way) has been relegated to "Mom & Pop store" status. Vigilant runs on Caldera Linux 3.1x, since Red Hat's product was found messy, inconsistent and lacking some needed products in the distribution. [link\|http://www.aaxnet.com\|AAx]
Post #29,570 by Ashton 2/24/02 6:07:44 PM Reply	Scary.. 7 years to find all the important glitches and then maybe - not see any significant revenue. :( You (Everyone in IT) Poor Bastards! BTW: Slaughterhouse.NET Cackle.. Cackle.. Cackle.. Cackle.. Cackle.. Cackle.. Cackle.. Cackle.. Cackle.. Cackle.. Kurt V would approve and open-source the title.. As to the impending demise of the collaborator: tough. I recommend a WW-II stigma for collaborators with Nazis (well, Billy's the obvious reincarnation of G\ufffdbbels) - shave head. Oh.. that's Fashionable now? never mind Ashton Abattoirs R'Us Redmond Div.
Post #183,043 by drewk 11/5/04 10:21:05 AM Reply	Andrew, care to update the current status? === Implicitly condoning stupidity since 2001.
Post #183,257 by Andrew Grygus 11/6/04 6:06:36 PM Reply	Update Vigilant is junking the SQL database in favor of a unified system where the Windows and Linux versions will run against the same database engine (Postgres, I believe) and will have similar though not identical graphic front ends. Caldera Linux was, of course, dropped. The business side wanted SuSE but the programmers insisted on Red Hat, a decision they may be regretting now that SuSE is Novell (Dell has just signed with SuSE/Novell for servers). Not a big deal to support both though. On the Microsoft front, everything is bogging down from failure to perform - particularly failure of the Longhorn group to produce the product everything else was supposed to leverage. The Unified File System won't be out now until at least 2008 and is ulikely to be widely deployed until 2013 if ever. By then the window of opportunity may be closed. Microsoft CRM is still a significant threat, but without "total integration" vs. "total incompatibility" as a selling point, it won't be moving fast, and it's now becoming a victim of "buzzword incompatibility" as CRM fades in favor of SOA (Service Oriented Architecture) Nobody seems to know exactly what that is except that it's hard to achieve. Without Longhorn, MS Great Plains / Navision have been as hard to sell as any other accounting systems and are waaaaay behind plan for world domination. IF MS CRM continues to hit heavy going I wouldn't be surprised to see the CRM/accounting products divested as a separate company to keep them from dragging down reported results. It's just too much work for too little return. The problem with total integration is it is totally vulnerable to failure of any part, and Longhorn / Shorthorn / Foghorn / Hornswaggle is filling that role. Microsoft's ability to manage product development has fallen way behind their ambition. [link\|http://www.aaxnet.com\|AAx]
Post #183,279 by folkert 11/6/04 9:16:48 PM Reply	And Thank God for that. -- [link\|mailto:greg@gregfolkert.net\|greg], [link\|http://www.iwethey.org/ed_curry\|REMEMBER ED CURRY!] @ *i_wethey* No matter how much Microsoft supporters whine about how Linux and other operating systems have just as many bugs as their operating systems do, the bottom line is that the serious, gut-wrenching problems happen on Windows, not on Linux, not on Mac OS. -- [link\|http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1622086,00.asp\|source] Here is an example: [link\|http://www.greymagic.com/security/advisories/gm001-ie/\|Executing arbitrary commands without Active Scripting or ActiveX when using Windows]

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