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Unisys suddenly loves Linux: Should Linux users return that love?
By Robin 'Roblimo' Miller
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August 16, 2004 (8:00:00 AM)
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Unisys has long been the main booster -- possibly the only one besides Microsoft -- of Windows as a mainframe operating system. Now Unisys says it loves Linux -- but still claims to be a staunch Microsoft partner -- and it seems like most of its contributions to the Linux kernel are only useful to Unisys customers. And then there's the specter of the Unisys GIF patents (now expired), and how the company used them as weapons against free and open source software projects only a few years ago. In light of all this, should we welcome Unisys as a "member of the Linux community" with open arms, or maintain a skeptical distance until the company proves that it has truly seen the open source light?
Last week I spoke by phone with Anthony Gold, Unisys vice president of engineering for ES7000 server products. It was a PR-monitored, tightly-controlled conversation. When I asked about how Unisys planned to make amends for its use of GIF patents against open source projects (and companies that used online GIF tools, including OSTG predecessor Andover.net), the only reply I got was "No comment." When I asked a few minutes later why Linux and open source developers should trust Unisys after the GIF nastiness, he said, "I can't comment on past activities. I can only talk about where we're going."
Fine. We're all supposed to forget about past Unisys hostilities toward free software -- and toward Unix. We get the message. We won't mention the last Unisys attempt to sell Linux servers, either. After the sidesteps about GIF patents, I didn't even bother to ask Gold about the previous Unisys attempt to crack the Linux marketplace, which involved a partnership with SCO -- just before SCO stopped selling its Linux products and shifted its legal attack on Linux into high gear.
Unisys contributions to Linux
Gold told me Unisys now has a mainframe Linux team made up of "about 50 people." They are primarily working on dynamic partitioning (allowing different processors or groups of processors to work across multiple partitions at the same time) for Linux, a feature of the 2.6 kernel (contributed by Unisys, according to Gold) that helps make use of several Unisys ES7000 proprietary hardware features. But these contributions are not necessarily valuable unless you happen to have a Unisys ES7000 handy. Gold said these kernel additions work best when used in conjunction with "proprietary extensions" from Unisys.
At least in its latest Linux incarnation, Unisys is working with Novell and Red Hat, a pair of Linux vendors that probably won't sue customers and business partners who desert them for competitors. And Gold told me that on the patent-war front, as it now relates to Linux in Unisys-land, "Our plans are to release the code, not to use any strong-arm tactics."
Perhaps Unisys is smartening up. Gold told me Unisys is "looking at various open source projects to participate in, OSDL being one of them." A "Unisys joins OSDL" announcement might help dispel doubts about Unisys's willingness to make open source contributions. And there is apparently no worry in the Unisys ranks about Microsoft getting testy about Unisys consorting with the (Linux) enemy. Gold said, when asked about this, that the Unisys move toward Linux "hasn't hindered our relationship with Microsoft at all."
There seems to be a tentative feel to all this, including the way Unisys is releasing code. Gold said the company is releasing some components "that make sense to release to the open source community." However, this does not include what Gold described as "our own value-add software."
Why Unisys is 'embracing' Linux
Gold claimed he didn't have sales figures handy for the ES7000 product line. I have heard estimates from people who follow the mainframe market ranging from "a few hundred" to "maybe 1000." This is not a sterling success for a heavily-marketed enterprise hardware product that's been out since 2000. The fact that it has been a Windows-only system until recently may be part of the reason the ES7000 has sold so poorly. As Gold said in another context, "It's hard to know how many deals we didn't get to bid on without Linux."
He also said, "What we see is a tremendous amount of activity in the public space. The public sector is a hot area where we see a lot of activity around Linux." And, he said, there are many applications vendors "that want to move into the Linux space."
He also told me we all should buy our Intel-based mainframes from Unisys instead of from Sun, IBM, or HP because only Unisys has no Unix to protect. The gist of his pitch was that when the "big three" mainframers get into your office by promising Linux on x86 as a low-cost HPC (High Performance Computing) solution, they are going to put lots of energy into "upselling" you from Linux and low-cost x86 hardware to their proprietary Unixes and expensive RISC hardware, neither of which Unisys will try to offer you -- because Unisys has neither a Unix operating sytem nor RISC hardware available.
One university sysadmin I know, when told about this aspect of the Unisys ES7000 sales pitch, pointed out that buying Linux on Unisys hardware didn't save you from the biggest problem attached to buying enterprise-level systems from any top-tier hardware company: Vendor lock-in.
"It's still a proprietary hardware platform, right?" he said in an IRC conversation, "so what's the real difference? You're paying for an OS either way. The lock-in is in the hardware."
Not only that, the best way to lower enterprise-level server TCO and get away from those pesky Unix problems isn't Linux, but Windows 2003. I know this because I have been to the Unisys www.wehavethewayout.com Web site, which apparently exists in a world where there is no such thing as Linux -- or at least one where Linux isn't mentioned in polite company. According to this site, the best way to move away from Unix is to embrace Windows 2003. In fact, one page on that site specifically says, "Unisys is focused solely on enabling you to standardize your data center on Windows® —-both end-to-end or one application at a time."
(Here's the Google cache version of that page in case Unisys decides to take it down; now that the company is selling Linux servers, the information on it is no longer true.)
Unisys needs help, not flames
In the past, Unisys has been about as friendly toward Linux and open source as its longtime business ally, Microsoft. If there was a "Linux, Incorporated," surely CEO L. Torvalds would be all over the pages of the Wall Street Journal and other financial publications touting the new Unisys willingness to work with the Linux and open source communities as a "major win" and "evidence that the Linux tide will inevitably sweep away all obstacles in its path." The phrase "world domination" might even be used.
But there is no "Linux, Incorporated," so the best we're likely to see is a press release from OSDL about Unisys joining. And we shouldn't sell that short, nor should we be as nasty toward Unisys as Unisys has been toward open source and free software developers in the past. Instead, we need to encourage Unisys to move further into the open source camp.
It's obvious that Unisys, like many old-line computer companies, is in the habit of considering software as a patentable product that should either be sold for profit or used as a (proprietary) incentive to buy that company's other (proprietary) products. But when we say "Unisys," we are not talking about a monolith, but about a group of people who may not always agree with each other. I have met Unisys employees who are hardcore Linux advocates and use Linux at home. And, no doubt, there are others who love Windows more than life itself and regard all that free software stuff as commie claptrap. The trick is to encourage those Unisys employees who are on the Linux side of the fence to keep persuading their recalcitrant fellows, not to damn all of Unisys so that upper management turns off the little trickle of Linux awareness that seems to have started within the company before it can spread and become a flood of Linux and open source support similar to the ones that are now moving through HP, IBM, and Sun.
We must be as polite as possible to all Unisys employees, no matter what they say for public consumption. For all we know, Anthony Gold is a major GNU booster when he doesn't have a PR person monitoring his conversations. And maybe he uses Linux on his own computer and ducked my "Which Linux distribution do you use personally?" question because he runs Debian and didn't want to upset Unisys Linux partners Red Hat and Novell, not because he runs Windows (or FreeBSD or Mac OS X or BeOS) and didn't want to admit that he wasn't a Linux user at all.
I asked both Gold and the PR rep to put me in contact with customers who are running Linux on Unisys ES7000 servers. The ability to run up to 32 CPUs across multiple partitions, and to mix Windows and Linux across partitions and CPUs, means that the ES7000 might be able to do things the competition's hardware can't -- and will therefore help move Linux into enterprise settings where it otherwise might never penetrate.
That is the kind of Linux story I really like to write. And I also hope to cover many important open source code releases by Unisys, because those are also good, positive stories -- especially when those code releases help all Linux users, not just Unisys customers.
Fine. We're all supposed to forget about past Unisys hostilities toward free software -- and toward Unix. We get the message. We won't mention the last Unisys attempt to sell Linux servers, either. After the sidesteps about GIF patents, I didn't even bother to ask Gold about the previous Unisys attempt to crack the Linux marketplace, which involved a partnership with SCO -- just before SCO stopped selling its Linux products and shifted its legal attack on Linux into high gear.
Unisys contributions to Linux
Gold told me Unisys now has a mainframe Linux team made up of "about 50 people." They are primarily working on dynamic partitioning (allowing different processors or groups of processors to work across multiple partitions at the same time) for Linux, a feature of the 2.6 kernel (contributed by Unisys, according to Gold) that helps make use of several Unisys ES7000 proprietary hardware features. But these contributions are not necessarily valuable unless you happen to have a Unisys ES7000 handy. Gold said these kernel additions work best when used in conjunction with "proprietary extensions" from Unisys.
At least in its latest Linux incarnation, Unisys is working with Novell and Red Hat, a pair of Linux vendors that probably won't sue customers and business partners who desert them for competitors. And Gold told me that on the patent-war front, as it now relates to Linux in Unisys-land, "Our plans are to release the code, not to use any strong-arm tactics."
Perhaps Unisys is smartening up. Gold told me Unisys is "looking at various open source projects to participate in, OSDL being one of them." A "Unisys joins OSDL" announcement might help dispel doubts about Unisys's willingness to make open source contributions. And there is apparently no worry in the Unisys ranks about Microsoft getting testy about Unisys consorting with the (Linux) enemy. Gold said, when asked about this, that the Unisys move toward Linux "hasn't hindered our relationship with Microsoft at all."
There seems to be a tentative feel to all this, including the way Unisys is releasing code. Gold said the company is releasing some components "that make sense to release to the open source community." However, this does not include what Gold described as "our own value-add software."
Why Unisys is 'embracing' Linux
Gold claimed he didn't have sales figures handy for the ES7000 product line. I have heard estimates from people who follow the mainframe market ranging from "a few hundred" to "maybe 1000." This is not a sterling success for a heavily-marketed enterprise hardware product that's been out since 2000. The fact that it has been a Windows-only system until recently may be part of the reason the ES7000 has sold so poorly. As Gold said in another context, "It's hard to know how many deals we didn't get to bid on without Linux."
He also said, "What we see is a tremendous amount of activity in the public space. The public sector is a hot area where we see a lot of activity around Linux." And, he said, there are many applications vendors "that want to move into the Linux space."
He also told me we all should buy our Intel-based mainframes from Unisys instead of from Sun, IBM, or HP because only Unisys has no Unix to protect. The gist of his pitch was that when the "big three" mainframers get into your office by promising Linux on x86 as a low-cost HPC (High Performance Computing) solution, they are going to put lots of energy into "upselling" you from Linux and low-cost x86 hardware to their proprietary Unixes and expensive RISC hardware, neither of which Unisys will try to offer you -- because Unisys has neither a Unix operating sytem nor RISC hardware available.
One university sysadmin I know, when told about this aspect of the Unisys ES7000 sales pitch, pointed out that buying Linux on Unisys hardware didn't save you from the biggest problem attached to buying enterprise-level systems from any top-tier hardware company: Vendor lock-in.
"It's still a proprietary hardware platform, right?" he said in an IRC conversation, "so what's the real difference? You're paying for an OS either way. The lock-in is in the hardware."
Not only that, the best way to lower enterprise-level server TCO and get away from those pesky Unix problems isn't Linux, but Windows 2003. I know this because I have been to the Unisys www.wehavethewayout.com Web site, which apparently exists in a world where there is no such thing as Linux -- or at least one where Linux isn't mentioned in polite company. According to this site, the best way to move away from Unix is to embrace Windows 2003. In fact, one page on that site specifically says, "Unisys is focused solely on enabling you to standardize your data center on Windows® —-both end-to-end or one application at a time."
(Here's the Google cache version of that page in case Unisys decides to take it down; now that the company is selling Linux servers, the information on it is no longer true.)
Unisys needs help, not flames
In the past, Unisys has been about as friendly toward Linux and open source as its longtime business ally, Microsoft. If there was a "Linux, Incorporated," surely CEO L. Torvalds would be all over the pages of the Wall Street Journal and other financial publications touting the new Unisys willingness to work with the Linux and open source communities as a "major win" and "evidence that the Linux tide will inevitably sweep away all obstacles in its path." The phrase "world domination" might even be used.
But there is no "Linux, Incorporated," so the best we're likely to see is a press release from OSDL about Unisys joining. And we shouldn't sell that short, nor should we be as nasty toward Unisys as Unisys has been toward open source and free software developers in the past. Instead, we need to encourage Unisys to move further into the open source camp.
It's obvious that Unisys, like many old-line computer companies, is in the habit of considering software as a patentable product that should either be sold for profit or used as a (proprietary) incentive to buy that company's other (proprietary) products. But when we say "Unisys," we are not talking about a monolith, but about a group of people who may not always agree with each other. I have met Unisys employees who are hardcore Linux advocates and use Linux at home. And, no doubt, there are others who love Windows more than life itself and regard all that free software stuff as commie claptrap. The trick is to encourage those Unisys employees who are on the Linux side of the fence to keep persuading their recalcitrant fellows, not to damn all of Unisys so that upper management turns off the little trickle of Linux awareness that seems to have started within the company before it can spread and become a flood of Linux and open source support similar to the ones that are now moving through HP, IBM, and Sun.
We must be as polite as possible to all Unisys employees, no matter what they say for public consumption. For all we know, Anthony Gold is a major GNU booster when he doesn't have a PR person monitoring his conversations. And maybe he uses Linux on his own computer and ducked my "Which Linux distribution do you use personally?" question because he runs Debian and didn't want to upset Unisys Linux partners Red Hat and Novell, not because he runs Windows (or FreeBSD or Mac OS X or BeOS) and didn't want to admit that he wasn't a Linux user at all.
I asked both Gold and the PR rep to put me in contact with customers who are running Linux on Unisys ES7000 servers. The ability to run up to 32 CPUs across multiple partitions, and to mix Windows and Linux across partitions and CPUs, means that the ES7000 might be able to do things the competition's hardware can't -- and will therefore help move Linux into enterprise settings where it otherwise might never penetrate.
That is the kind of Linux story I really like to write. And I also hope to cover many important open source code releases by Unisys, because those are also good, positive stories -- especially when those code releases help all Linux users, not just Unisys customers.
Comments
on Unisys suddenly loves Linux: Should Linux users return that love?Note: Comments are owned by the poster. We are not responsible for their content.
Seems to me more and more proprietary companies now want to be pals with open source. Even companies that were hostile, or at the very least unfriendly towards open source.
It must be my imagination.
It must be my imagination.
didn't they have a unix back then? It's been a puzzlement to me that they could have a name linking them to unix, but actually be a totally closed up windows shop.
Actually the "Uni" in the name Unisys came from the older company Univac's name and had nothing to do with Unix. Univac did not supply or support a Unix operating system on its computers. Remember also that this was before the days of the desktop computer.
Except for the U.S. aren't the GIF patents still active.
Burroughs merged with Sperry to become Unisys (I don't remember how Conccurrent came to be in this mess, but I suppose Burroughs bought them).
I notice the graphic on the wehavethewayout page leaves the proverbial user hanging just outside of the Windows, unable to reach the ground. "Please Unisys, let me back in now?" is the new message is it?
I,
Remember the hassle I had to put up with when the whole GIF thing came up.
First I had to remove the GIF functionality from my previous employer's products and it's documentation.
And since it was a small firm I then had to start the inevitable "explaining" to the customers why the particular functionality had been ripped out.
So, UNISYS can kiss my big fat a$%.
Remember the hassle I had to put up with when the whole GIF thing came up.
First I had to remove the GIF functionality from my previous employer's products and it's documentation.
And since it was a small firm I then had to start the inevitable "explaining" to the customers why the particular functionality had been ripped out.
So, UNISYS can kiss my big fat a$%.
Anyone who doesn't believe in Karma only has to look at the situation in the software industry today to see how every action gets a response it deserves - maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but some day...
This one has been long overdue.
This one has been long overdue.
NO WAY ! Make a blacklist of Anti-Linux vendors
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on August 17, 2004 06:14 AM
No way Jose!
In fact a blacklist of all vendors and people who
sought to harm Linux or shilled for M$ should be
made. Whosover has any buying or recommending
authority for his organization should refrain from
dealing with the people or vendors in the
blacklist as far as possible.
The blacklist:
1. Unisys
2. Sunbelt
3. SCO
4. Microsoft
5. Forbes magazine
6. Yankee Group and L. Didio
7. Canopy group companies
8. CNet and ZDNet
9. Enderle Group and R. Enderle
In fact a blacklist of all vendors and people who
sought to harm Linux or shilled for M$ should be
made. Whosover has any buying or recommending
authority for his organization should refrain from
dealing with the people or vendors in the
blacklist as far as possible.
The blacklist:
1. Unisys
2. Sunbelt
3. SCO
4. Microsoft
5. Forbes magazine
6. Yankee Group and L. Didio
7. Canopy group companies
8. CNet and ZDNet
9. Enderle Group and R. Enderle
Forbes does not always say what you want them to say, but I don't see them as shills. Where they've reported on Linux, they have generally been fair. Fair is not always what you want to hear, but them's the breaks. And they began reporting on Linux long before it was "cool" to do so.
Then again you probably haven't been around long enough to remember their July 1998 issue with Linus Torvalds on the cover. (That probably was the first time that he appeared on the cover of a mainstream magazine.) It was the first time that I saw a mainstream publication really "get it".
See <A HREF="http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6000" title="linuxjournal.com">http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6000</a linuxjournal.com> for a reminder of the timeline. That article hit the presses before the major database vendors (Oracle, Informix and Sybase) announced that they would port to Linux.
Then again you probably haven't been around long enough to remember their July 1998 issue with Linus Torvalds on the cover. (That probably was the first time that he appeared on the cover of a mainstream magazine.) It was the first time that I saw a mainstream publication really "get it".
See <A HREF="http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6000" title="linuxjournal.com">http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6000</a linuxjournal.com> for a reminder of the timeline. That article hit the presses before the major database vendors (Oracle, Informix and Sybase) announced that they would port to Linux.
``It was the first time that I saw a mainstream publication really "get it".''
But... since then, Forbes has been doing way too much publishing of articles by so-called journalists who do little to no research on the subject of open source and appear to be nothing more than mouth-pieces for some investment analysts who have a stake in some non-open source company. For example, check around to see what others think of Dan Lyons' articles if you want to know why Forbes is not seen as particularly Linux-friendly.
Dan Lyons attack on the FSF and GPL was scandalous!.
Microsoft couldn't have written that kind of garbage any better, thats for sure.
But that the only thing, a can't tolerate obaout them.
But then again, i hate clueless GPL bashing.
Microsoft couldn't have written that kind of garbage any better, thats for sure.
But that the only thing, a can't tolerate obaout them.
But then again, i hate clueless GPL bashing.
What was the name of their report/book stavias or something.
Re:NO WAY ! Make a blacklist of Anti-Linux vendors
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on August 17, 2004 12:09 PM
Careful. The list you give says to me you're casting the net way too broadly; the list does not have to be complete so much as it needs to be accurate. No one should go on the list except those people where we can point to their words and deeds, contrast them with the truth, and show an incontrovertible pattern of anti-Linux partisanship.
Re:NO WAY ! Make a blacklist of Anti-Linux vendors
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on August 17, 2004 12:53 PM
I agree. What is the function of a list like this?
If you want to argue to boycot such companies you have to add proof of what has been said or done hence you argue why one has to act as you propose. Or leave it up to them how to act.
In any case, more information is needed in order to be effective for whatever cause because this is useless.
If you want to argue to boycot such companies you have to add proof of what has been said or done hence you argue why one has to act as you propose. Or leave it up to them how to act.
In any case, more information is needed in order to be effective for whatever cause because this is useless.
Re:NO WAY ! Make a blacklist of Anti-Linux vendors
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on August 17, 2004 04:06 PM
I'm assuming you haven't read The Art of War. To quote (possibly not exactly, but pretty close)
"One bushel of enemy grain is worth ten of one's own. It is far better to take an enemy state intact, rather than destroying it."
And from the 48 Laws of Power:-
"Strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter."
For their sake and ours, we should do everything we can to convert people within these companies to being sympathetic towards Linux. If we have to ostracise anyone, it would most likely only be the senior command structure, and even in that case, probably only Microsoft.
Many of the rank and file members of these corporations however are not decisive thinkers themselves in other areas, but may still be extremely talented and experienced programmers. This is talent and experience which the Linux movement can utilise. I'm sure there are a large number of people from Microsoft in particular who could be of tremendous help with regards to UI development and other such areas. In the case of Windows in particular, the underlying mechanics might be the proverbial steaming pile, but purely in terms of UI, from focus groups and market research, MS *do* have experience in knowing what the lowest common denominator anyway do and do not want.
Also in terms of ZDNet/CNet in particular, this company has a herd mentality. They will back whatever/whoever they think their audience wants to read about, and who/whatever they think will generate dependable revenue for them. If they can be convinced that Linux and companies that deal in Linux will do that, they'll switch to reporting primarily about Linux and any Microsoft bias that might exist will evaporate.
Companies exist to make money. The only reason why they've adopted the old way of thinking for as long as they have is because they want to make money, and they want to do so as dependably and predictably as possible. All we need to do is convince them that Linux is *not* a threat to their livelihoods (and it really doesn't need to be) and they will start working for us rather than against us. As I said earlier, some of the people in the companies you've listed would have incredibly valuable expertise. We need to get them on side.
"One bushel of enemy grain is worth ten of one's own. It is far better to take an enemy state intact, rather than destroying it."
And from the 48 Laws of Power:-
"Strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter."
For their sake and ours, we should do everything we can to convert people within these companies to being sympathetic towards Linux. If we have to ostracise anyone, it would most likely only be the senior command structure, and even in that case, probably only Microsoft.
Many of the rank and file members of these corporations however are not decisive thinkers themselves in other areas, but may still be extremely talented and experienced programmers. This is talent and experience which the Linux movement can utilise. I'm sure there are a large number of people from Microsoft in particular who could be of tremendous help with regards to UI development and other such areas. In the case of Windows in particular, the underlying mechanics might be the proverbial steaming pile, but purely in terms of UI, from focus groups and market research, MS *do* have experience in knowing what the lowest common denominator anyway do and do not want.
Also in terms of ZDNet/CNet in particular, this company has a herd mentality. They will back whatever/whoever they think their audience wants to read about, and who/whatever they think will generate dependable revenue for them. If they can be convinced that Linux and companies that deal in Linux will do that, they'll switch to reporting primarily about Linux and any Microsoft bias that might exist will evaporate.
Companies exist to make money. The only reason why they've adopted the old way of thinking for as long as they have is because they want to make money, and they want to do so as dependably and predictably as possible. All we need to do is convince them that Linux is *not* a threat to their livelihoods (and it really doesn't need to be) and they will start working for us rather than against us. As I said earlier, some of the people in the companies you've listed would have incredibly valuable expertise. We need to get them on side.
G4TechTV used to be owned by ZiffDavis and at the time was call ZDTV, which became TechTV which merged to G4TechTV. Since ZDNet is on the list so must be ZDTV and thus G4TechTV.
Like Blair and the British are for the Americans
If there is a person who behavour have been very bad and insulting and he have made many people's lifes difficult, we could forgive him after some time - after all, he is human, with his weakness.
But as we tend to think (and I have to mostly agree with this image, however, things are not so simple anyway) that coorporations are not ethicaly liable and doesn't hold any kind of guilt, it is hard to question should Unisys be forgiven. Open source is that wonder that everyone could use it (if comply with licenses GPL/BSD/whatever) - even Microsoft, SCO or Sun.
So, it all boils down to - should emotions be mixed in all this? Customers usually punish companies with avoiding their products and services. Customers which are not affected by emotional bindings or are simply pragmatical will avoid to bring up emotions when case will be about simply doing business.
In overall, it is nothing new. And written about this problem or not, it won't change. IBM has acted badly in past but at least they somehow changed their point of view.
Will Unisys change? Will see. If they will change their coorporative style, then maybe.
But as we tend to think (and I have to mostly agree with this image, however, things are not so simple anyway) that coorporations are not ethicaly liable and doesn't hold any kind of guilt, it is hard to question should Unisys be forgiven. Open source is that wonder that everyone could use it (if comply with licenses GPL/BSD/whatever) - even Microsoft, SCO or Sun.
So, it all boils down to - should emotions be mixed in all this? Customers usually punish companies with avoiding their products and services. Customers which are not affected by emotional bindings or are simply pragmatical will avoid to bring up emotions when case will be about simply doing business.
In overall, it is nothing new. And written about this problem or not, it won't change. IBM has acted badly in past but at least they somehow changed their point of view.
Will Unisys change? Will see. If they will change their coorporative style, then maybe.
And, perhaps, AFTER UniSys has PROVEN a genuine change of heart, rather than just some kind of PR ploy, or something worse, I might start to begin to consider trusting them.
Amoral corporations are a good reason to avoid dealing with corporations. Moral ones make excellent assistants. But are rare. (They have to have moral behavior in their prospectus, or it can get them sued.)
My general rule of thumb is to keep a tally sheet. When a corporation does something that ticks me off, I fine them a certain percentage. When they do something that pleases me, I grant them a certain percentage. When it comes time to purchase a new product, that percentage is applied to the performance adjusted price to determine whose product I'll buy.
(E.g., I just bought a new printer. It was an HP, partially because of price performance. But Lexmark was out of consideration because of it's patented lock on ink cartridges. Epson had several dings against it because the last Epson printer I bought had severe paper feed problems. HPs recent pro-linux statements acted as a counterbalence against some prior act, I don't remember what, that had caused me to put a negative ding against their corporate name. Perhaps I should have given Cannon a better shot, but last time I checked they didn't have a compatible printer driver...and that gave them several erasable dings against them that kept them out of consideration. Strictly speaking I should have re-checked...but LinuxPrinting still doesn't list them as compatible.
The result of this process is that I purchase products that support both my needs and my other views.)
UniSys has several dings against it, and has shown no interest in removing them. Right no my attitude is "take them for what you can, but don't pay them for the priviledge". They can change this score, if they choose. It's in their court now, but saying that they like linux doesn't do much of anything...they've got to DO something.
Amoral corporations are a good reason to avoid dealing with corporations. Moral ones make excellent assistants. But are rare. (They have to have moral behavior in their prospectus, or it can get them sued.)
My general rule of thumb is to keep a tally sheet. When a corporation does something that ticks me off, I fine them a certain percentage. When they do something that pleases me, I grant them a certain percentage. When it comes time to purchase a new product, that percentage is applied to the performance adjusted price to determine whose product I'll buy.
(E.g., I just bought a new printer. It was an HP, partially because of price performance. But Lexmark was out of consideration because of it's patented lock on ink cartridges. Epson had several dings against it because the last Epson printer I bought had severe paper feed problems. HPs recent pro-linux statements acted as a counterbalence against some prior act, I don't remember what, that had caused me to put a negative ding against their corporate name. Perhaps I should have given Cannon a better shot, but last time I checked they didn't have a compatible printer driver...and that gave them several erasable dings against them that kept them out of consideration. Strictly speaking I should have re-checked...but LinuxPrinting still doesn't list them as compatible.
The result of this process is that I purchase products that support both my needs and my other views.)
UniSys has several dings against it, and has shown no interest in removing them. Right no my attitude is "take them for what you can, but don't pay them for the priviledge". They can change this score, if they choose. It's in their court now, but saying that they like linux doesn't do much of anything...they've got to DO something.
My general rule of thumb is to keep a tally sheet. When a corporation does something that ticks me off, I fine them a certain percentage. When they do something that pleases me, I grant them a certain percentage. When it comes time to purchase a new product, that percentage is applied to the performance adjusted price to determine whose product I'll buy.
Interesting. Where do you keep this sheet? In my head would be quite hmm, too much information. So how do you do that?
Interesting. Where do you keep this sheet? In my head would be quite hmm, too much information. So how do you do that?
Required trust should be proportional to the required outlay. Trust not only involves the political actions of the company but the level of tech support you will get from them. It becomes difficult to trust a company with your business if they can't even sort out their own.
The cost of a 32-cpu machine involves quite a bit of trust.
This is likely independent of which OS is running on it. Unisys may find that people don't care. Unisys may simply find that they simply have never built up a necessary level of trust with consumers.
They seem to be approaching their 'sales' problem from the wrong angle.
You don't buy a 32-cpu machine to be a cheapskate.
The cost of a 32-cpu machine involves quite a bit of trust.
This is likely independent of which OS is running on it. Unisys may find that people don't care. Unisys may simply find that they simply have never built up a necessary level of trust with consumers.
They seem to be approaching their 'sales' problem from the wrong angle.
You don't buy a 32-cpu machine to be a cheapskate.
"*Recommends windoze for your mobile computing exp
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on August 17, 2004 06:57 AM
erience"
We need to pounce on IBM, Dell, Sony, Fujitsu, and the others, too. At least those who are using Linux dangles to push hardware sales.
It is obscene and heretical for them to, on their laptop products, display such logos without accompanying it with another sticker stating,
"Visit www.linuxhardware.com when you are ready to extend the life of this machine after windoze sucks up your CPU, RAM, and video processing power..."
Of course, that's over the top, and could harm their hardware sales from an upgrade POV, but OTOH, it could endear the purchasers/consumers by showing them they can pass on those older, capable, venerable machines to other employees when the time comes to burn down budget cash on upgrades.
A nice alternative would be if the community could hurry up and centralized, compelling Linux distributed admin going. Then we should have stickers that can be affixed to the machines. The manufacturers or OEMs and other O**s could take images and put them on the disk, dual-boot ready.
I just last week and the week before had hell trying to install w2k and 2XP on Dell Precision 360 and 350 boxes. The install of XP and 2K gave me the typical spiel about how microsfot (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) products would enhance productivity, show speed gains, and so forth. After the reboot, the LAN, video and USB/PCI bus info was yellowed out. Even sound wasn't working. One machine had an unmarked (no labels, no etches of identifying kind) video card, but it was a relatively new ATI card with a fan. I visited ATI's site, only to face over a dozen choices, with the prospect that installing one-too-many of them would crash the machine or corrupt it eventually.
So, what did I do? I popped in my Mandrake 10.0 CDs, selected about 2.9 GB worth of stuff, and in under 35 minutes, including formatting in previous tests), the Precision had thousands of dollars (if you value that) of usable software and a box of working hardware. I was surfing on first book, changing resolution at first boot.
On that first boot, Mandrake detected the card properly and identified it properly. I used that information to download the right driver for w2k, shut down, rebooted, loaded the correct ATI drivers, and and Twoo-kay was shifted from the default green to the 1024x768-indicating blue desktop.
What does this tell me? It tells me that Linux and Open Source are about getting users to work (at least with what is added beyond the OS). It also tells me that microshaft and hardware manufacturers are still in cahoots, maintaining the hidden recovery partition that works if you know how to access and use it, or if you have the right recovery routine in place. But, if the partitions are blown out, forget it. You'll need to call tech support, or have the right drivers ON HAND. They were NOT on the recovery disk, and the named vid card was shipped to us by Dell sometime last year.
Now, if Unisys has any hidden shennanigans, or "let's forget the past" stuff, they'll have similar contempt roiling about them from users who know their past and measure it against their present...
David Syes
---
"Make Linux a valued part of your everyday's start. It has high protein, a balance of carbs, fiber and security for you organization's processes, and it exceeds the RDA for security protection..."
We need to pounce on IBM, Dell, Sony, Fujitsu, and the others, too. At least those who are using Linux dangles to push hardware sales.
It is obscene and heretical for them to, on their laptop products, display such logos without accompanying it with another sticker stating,
"Visit www.linuxhardware.com when you are ready to extend the life of this machine after windoze sucks up your CPU, RAM, and video processing power..."
Of course, that's over the top, and could harm their hardware sales from an upgrade POV, but OTOH, it could endear the purchasers/consumers by showing them they can pass on those older, capable, venerable machines to other employees when the time comes to burn down budget cash on upgrades.
A nice alternative would be if the community could hurry up and centralized, compelling Linux distributed admin going. Then we should have stickers that can be affixed to the machines. The manufacturers or OEMs and other O**s could take images and put them on the disk, dual-boot ready.
I just last week and the week before had hell trying to install w2k and 2XP on Dell Precision 360 and 350 boxes. The install of XP and 2K gave me the typical spiel about how microsfot (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) products would enhance productivity, show speed gains, and so forth. After the reboot, the LAN, video and USB/PCI bus info was yellowed out. Even sound wasn't working. One machine had an unmarked (no labels, no etches of identifying kind) video card, but it was a relatively new ATI card with a fan. I visited ATI's site, only to face over a dozen choices, with the prospect that installing one-too-many of them would crash the machine or corrupt it eventually.
So, what did I do? I popped in my Mandrake 10.0 CDs, selected about 2.9 GB worth of stuff, and in under 35 minutes, including formatting in previous tests), the Precision had thousands of dollars (if you value that) of usable software and a box of working hardware. I was surfing on first book, changing resolution at first boot.
On that first boot, Mandrake detected the card properly and identified it properly. I used that information to download the right driver for w2k, shut down, rebooted, loaded the correct ATI drivers, and and Twoo-kay was shifted from the default green to the 1024x768-indicating blue desktop.
What does this tell me? It tells me that Linux and Open Source are about getting users to work (at least with what is added beyond the OS). It also tells me that microshaft and hardware manufacturers are still in cahoots, maintaining the hidden recovery partition that works if you know how to access and use it, or if you have the right recovery routine in place. But, if the partitions are blown out, forget it. You'll need to call tech support, or have the right drivers ON HAND. They were NOT on the recovery disk, and the named vid card was shipped to us by Dell sometime last year.
Now, if Unisys has any hidden shennanigans, or "let's forget the past" stuff, they'll have similar contempt roiling about them from users who know their past and measure it against their present...
David Syes
---
"Make Linux a valued part of your everyday's start. It has high protein, a balance of carbs, fiber and security for you organization's processes, and it exceeds the RDA for security protection..."
I worked for Unisys for years, as an employee and as a conractor on Unisys projects. I'm also a Linux type and let me tell you, I place little faith in *any* moves Unisys makes. Since their heyday in the 1970's, they have missed the boat at every opportunity and this is just another step down the hole, too little, too late.
They'll still be around in one form or another, but as far as being a force or anything to really consider, nope, never happen. They have their large accounts, mainly public and if they actually grab any market share putting Linux on a ES700 or Clearpath I'll probably get a job with them<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:-) But I'm not going to book a flight...
They'll still be around in one form or another, but as far as being a force or anything to really consider, nope, never happen. They have their large accounts, mainly public and if they actually grab any market share putting Linux on a ES700 or Clearpath I'll probably get a job with them<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:-) But I'm not going to book a flight...
My employer recently decided to switch the outsourced help desk support from one vendor (who was doing an alright job, IMHO, but shall, nevertheless, remain nameless) to Unisys. Their helpdesk software is the worst crock of crap I've had the misfortune to use. It launches slowly (takes nearly a minute) and to close an incident requires enough mouse clicks issued in the the correct sequence that you think you just solved one of the more difficult puzzles in Myst. As far as I can tell, Unisys hasn't progressed much since their systems were running, what was it, Exec8?
I don't see Unisys as much of a friend to computing, let alone Linux.
Unisys has always seemed to be sort of schizoid, rather than sort of ceaselessly obnoxious like Microsoft or smug like IBM. I mean they do all this bad stuff, but it doesn't ever seem to *help* them much
Uhm, Exec 1100, you mean?
Actually, their best product was a thing called the System 80 - for its time, it was a solid product, brought out to beat the IBM 4300 series. Never heard of either one? Not surprising, since they both sank without a trace in the mid-1980's
Uhm, Exec 1100, you mean?
Actually, their best product was a thing called the System 80 - for its time, it was a solid product, brought out to beat the IBM 4300 series. Never heard of either one? Not surprising, since they both sank without a trace in the mid-1980's
"*Recommends windoze for your mobile computing exp
Posted by: David Syes on August 17, 2004 08:01 AM
erience"
==========
I inadvertently submitted as anonymouse reader...
Also, I want to make a correction, changing pounce to "cajole"
Also, I want them to get the leading laptops makers to impart the knowledge that Linux-based laptops a excellent desktop replacements for the companies whose employees change desks every few months, but roving/roaming profiles or NFS is not in place or not working or if guests need a box. Just lock the laptop to the docking station or desk, and only move when the employee moves or the guest departs, upon which time the laptop is locked down...
==========
We need to pounce on IBM, Dell, Sony, Fujitsu, and the others, too. At least those who are using Linux dangles to push hardware sales.
It is obscene and heretical for them to, on their laptop products, display such logos without accompanying it with another sticker stating,
"Visit www.linuxhardware.com when you are ready to extend the life of this machine after windoze sucks up your CPU, RAM, and video processing power..."
Of course, that's over the top, and could harm their hardware sales from an upgrade POV, but OTOH, it could endear the purchasers/consumers by showing them they can pass on those older, capable, venerable machines to other employees when the time comes to burn down budget cash on upgrades.
A nice alternative would be if the community could hurry up and centralized, compelling Linux distributed admin going. Then we should have stickers that can be affixed to the machines. The manufacturers or OEMs and other O**s could take images and put them on the disk, dual-boot ready.
I just last week and the week before had hell trying to install w2k and 2XP on Dell Precision 360 and 350 boxes. The install of XP and 2K gave me the typical spiel about how microsfot (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) products would enhance productivity, show speed gains, and so forth. After the reboot, the LAN, video and USB/PCI bus info was yellowed out. Even sound wasn't working. One machine had an unmarked (no labels, no etches of identifying kind) video card, but it was a relatively new ATI card with a fan. I visited ATI's site, only to face over a dozen choices, with the prospect that installing one-too-many of them would crash the machine or corrupt it eventually.
So, what did I do? I popped in my Mandrake 10.0 CDs, selected about 2.9 GB worth of stuff, and in under 35 minutes, including formatting in previous tests), the Precision had thousands of dollars (if you value that) of usable software and a box of working hardware. I was surfing on first book, changing resolution at first boot.
On that first boot, Mandrake detected the card properly and identified it properly. I used that information to download the right driver for w2k, shut down, rebooted, loaded the correct ATI drivers, and and Twoo-kay was shifted from the default green to the 1024x768-indicating blue desktop.
What does this tell me? It tells me that Linux and Open Source are about getting users to work (at least with what is added beyond the OS). It also tells me that microshaft and hardware manufacturers are still in cahoots, maintaining the hidden recovery partition that works if you know how to access and use it, or if you have the right recovery routine in place. But, if the partitions are blown out, forget it. You'll need to call tech support, or have the right drivers ON HAND. They were NOT on the recovery disk, and the named vid card was shipped to us by Dell sometime last year.
Now, if Unisys has any hidden shennanigans, or "let's forget the past" stuff, they'll have similar contempt roiling about them from users who know their past and measure it against their present...
David Syes
---
"Make Linux a valued part of your everyday's start. It has high protein, a balance of carbs, fiber and security for you organization's processes, and it exceeds the RDA for security protection..."
==========
I inadvertently submitted as anonymouse reader...
Also, I want to make a correction, changing pounce to "cajole"
Also, I want them to get the leading laptops makers to impart the knowledge that Linux-based laptops a excellent desktop replacements for the companies whose employees change desks every few months, but roving/roaming profiles or NFS is not in place or not working or if guests need a box. Just lock the laptop to the docking station or desk, and only move when the employee moves or the guest departs, upon which time the laptop is locked down...
==========
We need to pounce on IBM, Dell, Sony, Fujitsu, and the others, too. At least those who are using Linux dangles to push hardware sales.
It is obscene and heretical for them to, on their laptop products, display such logos without accompanying it with another sticker stating,
"Visit www.linuxhardware.com when you are ready to extend the life of this machine after windoze sucks up your CPU, RAM, and video processing power..."
Of course, that's over the top, and could harm their hardware sales from an upgrade POV, but OTOH, it could endear the purchasers/consumers by showing them they can pass on those older, capable, venerable machines to other employees when the time comes to burn down budget cash on upgrades.
A nice alternative would be if the community could hurry up and centralized, compelling Linux distributed admin going. Then we should have stickers that can be affixed to the machines. The manufacturers or OEMs and other O**s could take images and put them on the disk, dual-boot ready.
I just last week and the week before had hell trying to install w2k and 2XP on Dell Precision 360 and 350 boxes. The install of XP and 2K gave me the typical spiel about how microsfot (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) products would enhance productivity, show speed gains, and so forth. After the reboot, the LAN, video and USB/PCI bus info was yellowed out. Even sound wasn't working. One machine had an unmarked (no labels, no etches of identifying kind) video card, but it was a relatively new ATI card with a fan. I visited ATI's site, only to face over a dozen choices, with the prospect that installing one-too-many of them would crash the machine or corrupt it eventually.
So, what did I do? I popped in my Mandrake 10.0 CDs, selected about 2.9 GB worth of stuff, and in under 35 minutes, including formatting in previous tests), the Precision had thousands of dollars (if you value that) of usable software and a box of working hardware. I was surfing on first book, changing resolution at first boot.
On that first boot, Mandrake detected the card properly and identified it properly. I used that information to download the right driver for w2k, shut down, rebooted, loaded the correct ATI drivers, and and Twoo-kay was shifted from the default green to the 1024x768-indicating blue desktop.
What does this tell me? It tells me that Linux and Open Source are about getting users to work (at least with what is added beyond the OS). It also tells me that microshaft and hardware manufacturers are still in cahoots, maintaining the hidden recovery partition that works if you know how to access and use it, or if you have the right recovery routine in place. But, if the partitions are blown out, forget it. You'll need to call tech support, or have the right drivers ON HAND. They were NOT on the recovery disk, and the named vid card was shipped to us by Dell sometime last year.
Now, if Unisys has any hidden shennanigans, or "let's forget the past" stuff, they'll have similar contempt roiling about them from users who know their past and measure it against their present...
David Syes
---
"Make Linux a valued part of your everyday's start. It has high protein, a balance of carbs, fiber and security for you organization's processes, and it exceeds the RDA for security protection..."
First I'll say that if we put on blinders (and remove most of our long term memory) then Unisys is finally on the right track with running Linux on the ES7000.
\
That said, Sun and HP do not make mainframes or anything remotely equivalent to them. The author has some excellent points and understanding of the history with Unisys (I was running an 4way 386 based system in the early 90s) but could gain from some experience in the high end space. The IBM p690 is the closest thing to a UNIX mainframe with the possible exception of some things Fujitsu is working on (or of course when we ran AIX on the 390).
Having 32way partitions is entry point these days. Sun is still back in the dark ages using board level (4 CPU) allocations which we were doing in 2000 on the E10000. IBM will be supporting 64way LPARs with a minimum partition size of 1/10 of a CPU. Oh, and while the "partitioning" is basically a hardwire, SGI is supporting 128way Linux on the Altix (and can do more by special request, read support $$$).
Final thought: if I wanted to run Windows and Linux on the same hardware I would run VMWare ESX on 8way systems....like we do now. This is the cheap $50k commodity hardware space.
\
That said, Sun and HP do not make mainframes or anything remotely equivalent to them. The author has some excellent points and understanding of the history with Unisys (I was running an 4way 386 based system in the early 90s) but could gain from some experience in the high end space. The IBM p690 is the closest thing to a UNIX mainframe with the possible exception of some things Fujitsu is working on (or of course when we ran AIX on the 390).
Having 32way partitions is entry point these days. Sun is still back in the dark ages using board level (4 CPU) allocations which we were doing in 2000 on the E10000. IBM will be supporting 64way LPARs with a minimum partition size of 1/10 of a CPU. Oh, and while the "partitioning" is basically a hardwire, SGI is supporting 128way Linux on the Altix (and can do more by special request, read support $$$).
Final thought: if I wanted to run Windows and Linux on the same hardware I would run VMWare ESX on 8way systems....like we do now. This is the cheap $50k commodity hardware space.
solaris 10 will provide 8196 zones per solaris (each runs as a separate instance of the os) on x86 and sparc.
my experience of the ES7000 is that it has static partitioning - you have to shut down the operating systems in harware partitions that are to be changed, make the change and reboot. not a whole lot of fun.
the harware implementation is cheesy - its got 8 PC chassis arranged around the base of each unit. The only parts that are shared is memory and CPU. you must physically move PCI hardware around between these chassis.
ES7000 is let down by its implementation. it is too much of a comprimise for my liking.
my experience of the ES7000 is that it has static partitioning - you have to shut down the operating systems in harware partitions that are to be changed, make the change and reboot. not a whole lot of fun.
the harware implementation is cheesy - its got 8 PC chassis arranged around the base of each unit. The only parts that are shared is memory and CPU. you must physically move PCI hardware around between these chassis.
ES7000 is let down by its implementation. it is too much of a comprimise for my liking.
There is not much anyone can do. UNISYS can download
Linux, even source, just like anybody else. They
can build their products on the top of it, within GPL limits, and nothing could stop them.
So, why even bother ?
DG
Linux, even source, just like anybody else. They
can build their products on the top of it, within GPL limits, and nothing could stop them.
So, why even bother ?
DG
1. They did not and will not apologize for the GIF patent mess because they want to leave the path open for asserting some other patent in the future, should they have the opportunity.
2. They did not want to be a good "Open Source citizen" until AFTER the GIF patents had expired. No more value in being the mean one so now they'll be nice and see if that makes any money?
Conclusion: They are a big corporation out to make money. Not that being that is inherently bad but that they obviously will just do what they think will bring them money. Depend on them at your financial peril because they will change direction when the winds change.
2. They did not want to be a good "Open Source citizen" until AFTER the GIF patents had expired. No more value in being the mean one so now they'll be nice and see if that makes any money?
Conclusion: They are a big corporation out to make money. Not that being that is inherently bad but that they obviously will just do what they think will bring them money. Depend on them at your financial peril because they will change direction when the winds change.
I liked the article, well balanced and makes some important points on where Linux is heading and how Unisys could help with this.
As a self admitted Linux nut of many years standing, I see their announcement as a positive movement for the entire Linux community.
As a self admitted Linux nut of many years standing, I see their announcement as a positive movement for the entire Linux community.
But these contributions are not necessarily valuable unless you happen to have a Unisys ES7000 handy.
A bit like most of IBM's "contributions", then?
A bit like most of IBM's "contributions", then?
A "Unisys joins OSDL" announcement might help dispel doubts about Unisys's willingness to make open source contributions
As if Sun's contributions and membership of OSDSL have helped their reputation.
The "MS/SCO Lackeys" reputation, just because they've relieved MS of $2bn of
their cashpile (to keep Java pure - and kept it pure in so doing), whilst buying StarDivision to improve
StarOffice5.1, opensource it, give the world OO.o 1.1/StarOffice 7, is
nothing against the "Sun must be evil because they sell "proprietary"
hardware" slashdot mantra.
For all we know, Anthony Gold is a major GNU booster when he doesn't have a PR person monitoring his conversations.
So what? PR are always involved. If the Management and Engineers are behind
Linux (and/or F/OSS - not the same thing), but PR are pushing a different
campaign, it is all futile.
It's amazing how things get spun... Sun put more source code into
Linux distro's via OpenOffice.org alone, than any other contributor, but
IBM are seen by the slashdot crowd as the "Linux hero" (more F/OSS
GNU/Linux confusion), for doing exactly what Rob mentions as a caveat -
contributing kernel code to support their proprietary hardware (ObReply:
Intel is also proprietary).
Now Unisys want to join in with Linux - I agree with Rob - let's give
them the assistance we can. If they choose to "IBM it" and add code to make
Linux run better on Unisys kit, that's great... if they choose to "Sun it"
and contribute to a variety of community software (maybe where Sun aren't
doing it - KDE, Wine spring to mind), that'd be great for everyone.
Let's keep an open mind for Unisys - let's also have an open mind about Sun, IBM, and HP.
At the risk of sounding like one of Groklaw's predicted astroturfers, just have a look at what you use, how much is from IBM, HP, Unisys, and how much is from the Community. I missed Sun from the list, because of their involvement in Gnome.
If you're a mainframe user, IBM rank high; desktop - Sun rank high.
Whoever you are, the Community ranks highest.
Proprietary companies are most welcome to add support for their hardware, and to improve the UI.
Let's welcome them all in - the GPL ensures that they can't claim it all as their own - but let's be honest about who's contributed what.
At the same time, we need to ensure that nobody's pusing things too far (some would argue that RedHat are becoming closer to MS than they are to GNU/FSF - how do I get a RedHat distro more stable than FC2?)
But that's another article...
Are you a troll? If not, you really need to start paying more attentions...
Firstly, you claim IBM is comparable to UNISYS in that their contributions are only useful when running IBM's hardware, but this is patently false. Sure, some of them are only useful for high-end stuff, but a lot of it directly benefits normal users too. To pick the simplest example, perhaps you don't know how to change your filesystem, but if you decide to learn then you'll notice a good performance gain moving to JFS.
As for claiming SUN is a good member of the community, you're right that OO.org is a huge contribution. However, Sun makes a lot of very negative press releases too and at least for me they kill much of the good karma that OO generates.
Put simply, there are a lot of compeditors in the marketplace now and many of them are very good companies. I see no reason to treat UNISYS as anything other than a dinosaur, the sentiment "Too little, too late" springs to mind. Of course, I'll keep my ears open, and if they are largely well behaved for a few years then I might send some business their way but I have no intention of supporting them until that point -- why support a company that makes the odd pro-linux comment when there are others purely pro-linux, it is easier just to wait for them to go bankrupt and a better company fill their place.
Finally, RedHat do a great many things I dislike, crippling KDE when it is consistantly voted better than Gnome being their worst offence. I consider their distribution is worse than both SuSE and Mandrake, and almost everybody who has used all three agrees. But they are no Microsoft; they do not create lock-in so all you have to do if you're annoyed is leave.
As for this release from unisys, methinks they doth talk with a forked tounge.
Firstly, you claim IBM is comparable to UNISYS in that their contributions are only useful when running IBM's hardware, but this is patently false. Sure, some of them are only useful for high-end stuff, but a lot of it directly benefits normal users too. To pick the simplest example, perhaps you don't know how to change your filesystem, but if you decide to learn then you'll notice a good performance gain moving to JFS.
As for claiming SUN is a good member of the community, you're right that OO.org is a huge contribution. However, Sun makes a lot of very negative press releases too and at least for me they kill much of the good karma that OO generates.
Put simply, there are a lot of compeditors in the marketplace now and many of them are very good companies. I see no reason to treat UNISYS as anything other than a dinosaur, the sentiment "Too little, too late" springs to mind. Of course, I'll keep my ears open, and if they are largely well behaved for a few years then I might send some business their way but I have no intention of supporting them until that point -- why support a company that makes the odd pro-linux comment when there are others purely pro-linux, it is easier just to wait for them to go bankrupt and a better company fill their place.
Finally, RedHat do a great many things I dislike, crippling KDE when it is consistantly voted better than Gnome being their worst offence. I consider their distribution is worse than both SuSE and Mandrake, and almost everybody who has used all three agrees. But they are no Microsoft; they do not create lock-in so all you have to do if you're annoyed is leave.
As for this release from unisys, methinks they doth talk with a forked tounge.
Puhleeze - what exactly do you think that Unisys wants from the OSS community?
They sell hardware. Their clients wanted Linux on that hardware. Why? Because it does similar workload to SUN hardware but costs a lot less. (Gee that's a conspiracy and a half right there - people making purchasing decisions based on value vs. religious zealotry). So Unisys adjusted their plan and now offers Linux on their hardware. I suspect to satisfy their clients but you never know with these conspiracies.
I don't think they even have any value added tools, and the ES-7000 code has been in the kernel tree for at least a year if not longer.
Sounds like pretty much the end of the story.
All this kvetching about GIF! Jeez-Luise, PNG came out of it and its better then GIF anyway, and I've been doing this internetty-thingie a LONG time and ain't never ran across someone (the proverbial little guy/lone webmaster) that was negatively impacted by the GIF fiasco. It was more of an inconvenience then anything else.
Plus, you should realize that IT lives in a broken state begging to be retooled on a monthly basis. The more big companies and their clients screw up, the more work there is for us. Yay!
So come on SCO! Piss everyone off so that we can migrate the world off of you! Come on Unisys have everyone convert from GIF - It will employ 100,000 monkeys for an additional day converting to PNG! Come on Microsoft release your next XP SP! Please - get me off the bench - I need to fix the security stuff and connectivity you broke overnight!
Thank god for malfunctioning companies.
Oh, I know - when OSS kiddies grow up and take over the world with the zealotry, all will be peachy keen and 1,000,000 monkeys will hit the streets unemployed because OSS will give us computing nirvana.
As Daffy would say - It is to laugh!
They sell hardware. Their clients wanted Linux on that hardware. Why? Because it does similar workload to SUN hardware but costs a lot less. (Gee that's a conspiracy and a half right there - people making purchasing decisions based on value vs. religious zealotry). So Unisys adjusted their plan and now offers Linux on their hardware. I suspect to satisfy their clients but you never know with these conspiracies.
I don't think they even have any value added tools, and the ES-7000 code has been in the kernel tree for at least a year if not longer.
Sounds like pretty much the end of the story.
All this kvetching about GIF! Jeez-Luise, PNG came out of it and its better then GIF anyway, and I've been doing this internetty-thingie a LONG time and ain't never ran across someone (the proverbial little guy/lone webmaster) that was negatively impacted by the GIF fiasco. It was more of an inconvenience then anything else.
Plus, you should realize that IT lives in a broken state begging to be retooled on a monthly basis. The more big companies and their clients screw up, the more work there is for us. Yay!
So come on SCO! Piss everyone off so that we can migrate the world off of you! Come on Unisys have everyone convert from GIF - It will employ 100,000 monkeys for an additional day converting to PNG! Come on Microsoft release your next XP SP! Please - get me off the bench - I need to fix the security stuff and connectivity you broke overnight!
Thank god for malfunctioning companies.
Oh, I know - when OSS kiddies grow up and take over the world with the zealotry, all will be peachy keen and 1,000,000 monkeys will hit the streets unemployed because OSS will give us computing nirvana.
As Daffy would say - It is to laugh!
Sun evil because they sell proprietary hardware? I haven't heard that near as often as I've heard "Sun is evil because their top executives are out there committing FUD campaigns against Linux and the GPL."
Re:Spin? s/comanyA/companyB/g until done not me...
Posted by: David Syes on August 18, 2004 02:33 AM
Not me... not completely...
IBM would be MY BIGGEST corporate hero if they would dual license or Open Source Lotus SmartSuite or donate "rights" to the community so LSS can be updated. If LSS becomes a native app to Linux, rather than it being left up to the emulators, Wine, etc, then more corporate adoption of SmartSuite might be comfortable. Instead of IBM's own SmartSuite-using customers dealing with another layer of complexity, licensing, or training, they'd benefit from community hackers looking at SmartSuite with wonder and excitement. There are features there that no other suite has, but IBM and Lotus are always shielded by:
"cost"
"there is proprietary material inside"
"there is no market"
"been there, rejected it"
I hope someday there is massive interest in it, because for the things I do, for Linux users there simply is no end-user, WYSIWYG relational database front end like Approach.
Lotus WordPro, if updated, might threaten OpenOffice Writer, since LWP has a superior page count tool, has a kick-but preview options set, and allows editing during preview, but also has a floating, non-modal "smart properties" palette tool to give the most WYSIWYG experience.
Currently, I can use the SmartSuite for windows version to see MySQL tables, and edit/update/modify aspects of tables. The Approach database front end could relieve many IT departments of making reports and charts for cubicle workers who ought to be doing it themselves once a company style sheet/guide is defined for meetings purposes.
But, sigh, no one seems able to get IBM and Lotus to rip out the proprietary stuff and let the community (Open Source) restore that broken functionality with non-proprietary features that IBM can then donate back to the community.
Since SmartSuite is in "maintenance mode", it's probably costing IBM a tad bit more than they'd like. I posit that by increasing SmartSuite's exposure, by offering it as an enhancement to cutting over to Linux/Open Source, IBM could gain more by doing for SmartSuite what Sun did for Star Office: Open Sourcing it and charging for the improved version and releasing for free/no support the O/S, but unstable/cutting-edge version.
Politically, internally, though, it might not go down very well, as I suspect all too many IBM'ers and Lotus employees might have personal investment in microsoft (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) to let it get past the "ad-hoc" stage of any meetings.
David Syes
"Practice Safe Surfing: Use Linux/Open Source tools (browsers, email tools, proxies, firewalls, etc... Ditch ie and outlook; depreciate or reduce dollar values on your books by deprecating what for-cost software you can..."
IBM would be MY BIGGEST corporate hero if they would dual license or Open Source Lotus SmartSuite or donate "rights" to the community so LSS can be updated. If LSS becomes a native app to Linux, rather than it being left up to the emulators, Wine, etc, then more corporate adoption of SmartSuite might be comfortable. Instead of IBM's own SmartSuite-using customers dealing with another layer of complexity, licensing, or training, they'd benefit from community hackers looking at SmartSuite with wonder and excitement. There are features there that no other suite has, but IBM and Lotus are always shielded by:
"cost"
"there is proprietary material inside"
"there is no market"
"been there, rejected it"
I hope someday there is massive interest in it, because for the things I do, for Linux users there simply is no end-user, WYSIWYG relational database front end like Approach.
Lotus WordPro, if updated, might threaten OpenOffice Writer, since LWP has a superior page count tool, has a kick-but preview options set, and allows editing during preview, but also has a floating, non-modal "smart properties" palette tool to give the most WYSIWYG experience.
Currently, I can use the SmartSuite for windows version to see MySQL tables, and edit/update/modify aspects of tables. The Approach database front end could relieve many IT departments of making reports and charts for cubicle workers who ought to be doing it themselves once a company style sheet/guide is defined for meetings purposes.
But, sigh, no one seems able to get IBM and Lotus to rip out the proprietary stuff and let the community (Open Source) restore that broken functionality with non-proprietary features that IBM can then donate back to the community.
Since SmartSuite is in "maintenance mode", it's probably costing IBM a tad bit more than they'd like. I posit that by increasing SmartSuite's exposure, by offering it as an enhancement to cutting over to Linux/Open Source, IBM could gain more by doing for SmartSuite what Sun did for Star Office: Open Sourcing it and charging for the improved version and releasing for free/no support the O/S, but unstable/cutting-edge version.
Politically, internally, though, it might not go down very well, as I suspect all too many IBM'ers and Lotus employees might have personal investment in microsoft (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) to let it get past the "ad-hoc" stage of any meetings.
David Syes
"Practice Safe Surfing: Use Linux/Open Source tools (browsers, email tools, proxies, firewalls, etc... Ditch ie and outlook; depreciate or reduce dollar values on your books by deprecating what for-cost software you can..."
I worked with Sperry/Univac folks who changed to Unisys when the Honeywell merger went through. Those guys knew their stuff. The direction the company took after that merger though was a complete mystery. Almost as if top management was headed one direction regardless of their techs.
Well anyways, what I'm saying is there's probably a lot of really good folks still in Unisys. Be cool with them and maybe Unisys will turn around. They've been lost for 20 years. Maybe they can see a light in the fog now.
Well anyways, what I'm saying is there's probably a lot of really good folks still in Unisys. Be cool with them and maybe Unisys will turn around. They've been lost for 20 years. Maybe they can see a light in the fog now.
Univac merged with Burroughs not Honeywell.
For some reason, I think the editor forgot how the community reacts to negative opposition towards FOSS.
If you want "us" to play nicely with a company who's so far up microcrap's bum, they can see what's coming down their throat, then Unisys needs to 'addy up' and cut this horsing around and actually do something important for the community as a whole... LIKE IT'S COMPETITION IS DOING.
NOTE: It's alright, and forgivable, if a company changes it's mind and decides to embrace what it once disliked as long as the company proves to "everyone" it's sincerity by aggressively contributing to projects that doesn't necassarily help out it's 'bottomline'.
Unisys has a long ways to go before forgiveness and reconciliation falls into play.
If you want "us" to play nicely with a company who's so far up microcrap's bum, they can see what's coming down their throat, then Unisys needs to 'addy up' and cut this horsing around and actually do something important for the community as a whole... LIKE IT'S COMPETITION IS DOING.
NOTE: It's alright, and forgivable, if a company changes it's mind and decides to embrace what it once disliked as long as the company proves to "everyone" it's sincerity by aggressively contributing to projects that doesn't necassarily help out it's 'bottomline'.
Unisys has a long ways to go before forgiveness and reconciliation falls into play.
They were supporting SCO Unixware on the ES7000 platform. The install I know of when in just before the "we have the way out" campaign started. Some of the people who work on those systems where rather annoyed. But Unisys was quite good about supporting them through the hardware and software issues that they experienced.
To call people to senses not to hold particular grudes against Unisys, despite their 20year long history of beeing an oppresive pain in the arse, is brave, at least.
However, the vast majority of comments here ( and I wouldn't exlude myself ) is far on the negative side whatever concerns Unisys.
Of course we can't Blacklist them, as nice as it may seem first. But what many of us can and will do, is continueing their career on whatever they do in the IT, and never forget about Unisys. Eventualy there will be an opurtunity to harm them by chossing some alternative, or advising against them.
However, the vast majority of comments here ( and I wouldn't exlude myself ) is far on the negative side whatever concerns Unisys.
Of course we can't Blacklist them, as nice as it may seem first. But what many of us can and will do, is continueing their career on whatever they do in the IT, and never forget about Unisys. Eventualy there will be an opurtunity to harm them by chossing some alternative, or advising against them.
50 people working on kernel development to allow unpopular hardware run Linux? What's the problem? It's a silly business investment, that's all. You don't have to buy it, and Linus would never allow a design that disrupts hardware from other vendors.
UNISYS should abandon this failing product line, and put the money into something more interesting - like the Free Software Foundation.<nobr> <wbr></nobr>;-)
UNISYS should abandon this failing product line, and put the money into something more interesting - like the Free Software Foundation.<nobr> <wbr></nobr>;-)
At the end of the day, as much as we'd like to think/hope that Unisys have suddenly turned over a new leaf, despite all of the former GIF nastiness of the past, I think it is extremely unlikely.
GNU/Linux is basically where a lot of profit lies. Yes, much of the free software and open source communities don't like to think of it like that, but at the end of the day, if you sell servers, and you don't provide support/capability for the most popular server OSes (FreeBSD included) then you are going to lose money.
As a business, this is not something that can easily be passed up on. You may not like the OS, you may not see any value in it whatsoever; but if you provide it, people will buy it, and that's really all they're in it for. It's yet another corporation who have seen the steady decline of Windows and Unix as server platforms, and have started to panic, embracing our community irrespective of their personal beliefs.
And as for their beliefs? They're already writing proprietary extensions, anathema to many free software users, and have yet to discuss any free/open contributions they are making to the community. That, coupled with the GIF disgrace, I think makes it fairly obvious that they don't give a rat's ass about the community; they're in it for the $$$.
"I wouldn't trust them further than I could comfortably spit out a rat."
GNU/Linux is basically where a lot of profit lies. Yes, much of the free software and open source communities don't like to think of it like that, but at the end of the day, if you sell servers, and you don't provide support/capability for the most popular server OSes (FreeBSD included) then you are going to lose money.
As a business, this is not something that can easily be passed up on. You may not like the OS, you may not see any value in it whatsoever; but if you provide it, people will buy it, and that's really all they're in it for. It's yet another corporation who have seen the steady decline of Windows and Unix as server platforms, and have started to panic, embracing our community irrespective of their personal beliefs.
And as for their beliefs? They're already writing proprietary extensions, anathema to many free software users, and have yet to discuss any free/open contributions they are making to the community. That, coupled with the GIF disgrace, I think makes it fairly obvious that they don't give a rat's ass about the community; they're in it for the $$$.
"I wouldn't trust them further than I could comfortably spit out a rat."
Robin,
This article opens up a whole can of worms, in that, the time has arrived that the community as a whole will need to start questioning the motives of all new corporate adopters. How many of these new found friends are truly born again lovers of freedom, and how many are simply looking for a footing in a new market with the intent to expose their true selves and or agendas, once they have acquired sufficient market share to leverage.
Some months ago, you covered one of the many Linux events and you had promised, after you got some rest from that said event, to do an article on Real Players moves in this regard. That article was not forthcoming. As of late, there has been quite a bit of positive press on the Real Player offerings (Helix Player and Real Player10) for Linux. There are however, no real specifics being reported on. Absent from the discussion are anything that addresses the primary concern of Real's (Progressive Networks) traditional practices of being intrusive and underhanded in their dealings with end users of their player clients. Requiring registration and forcing their DRM framework as part of the basic player install.
Some say they are changing for the better, with a different philosophy on their position in the media market. But if this is so, where is the basic non intrusive real player for the MS Windows platform ? It's absence speaks "Volumes" as to their intent.
We as a community, will need to look beyond the various facades and veneers put in front of us to appease our concerns, from now on.
Can we expect you to follow through on that earlier promise at some point ?
This article opens up a whole can of worms, in that, the time has arrived that the community as a whole will need to start questioning the motives of all new corporate adopters. How many of these new found friends are truly born again lovers of freedom, and how many are simply looking for a footing in a new market with the intent to expose their true selves and or agendas, once they have acquired sufficient market share to leverage.
Some months ago, you covered one of the many Linux events and you had promised, after you got some rest from that said event, to do an article on Real Players moves in this regard. That article was not forthcoming. As of late, there has been quite a bit of positive press on the Real Player offerings (Helix Player and Real Player10) for Linux. There are however, no real specifics being reported on. Absent from the discussion are anything that addresses the primary concern of Real's (Progressive Networks) traditional practices of being intrusive and underhanded in their dealings with end users of their player clients. Requiring registration and forcing their DRM framework as part of the basic player install.
Some say they are changing for the better, with a different philosophy on their position in the media market. But if this is so, where is the basic non intrusive real player for the MS Windows platform ? It's absence speaks "Volumes" as to their intent.
We as a community, will need to look beyond the various facades and veneers put in front of us to appease our concerns, from now on.
Can we expect you to follow through on that earlier promise at some point ?
There will be at least one NewsForge article about Real and possibly a Slashdot interview with Real CEO Rob Glazier in the near future. The delay at this point is being caused by Real's PR department, which seems to have as much trouble as Sun's or Apple's at handling simple interview requests.
At some point I need to write a commentary piece about how corporate PR departments often do more harm than good. The current Real situation is a case in point: A Real PR person approached *me* about doing an interview with Glazier early last week. I responded favorably, and that's far as it went. They haven't gotten back to me yet.
- R
At some point I need to write a commentary piece about how corporate PR departments often do more harm than good. The current Real situation is a case in point: A Real PR person approached *me* about doing an interview with Glazier early last week. I responded favorably, and that's far as it went. They haven't gotten back to me yet.
- R
You can't trust Unisys.
You can't really trust any company.
For Unisys to really help spread those positive vibes throughout the Open Source community, it needs to give back.
Considering that Unisys has been a FUD-flinging foe of Open Source, it really needs to give back a lot.
Look at Novell, there's a company that has gained acceptance from the Open Source community. It has shown that it is embracing Open Source, and giving back to the community.
You have to build up trust in a relationship, especially when you've treated somebody like dirt for years. This is no different.
You can't really trust any company.
For Unisys to really help spread those positive vibes throughout the Open Source community, it needs to give back.
Considering that Unisys has been a FUD-flinging foe of Open Source, it really needs to give back a lot.
Look at Novell, there's a company that has gained acceptance from the Open Source community. It has shown that it is embracing Open Source, and giving back to the community.
You have to build up trust in a relationship, especially when you've treated somebody like dirt for years. This is no different.
One could argue that at a certain point, you're beyond forgivness, compassion and pity, and started to loathe and condemn something. If you're like 20 years over that point, it's pretty hard for that 'something' to actualy come crawling back and ask for a little understanding, and some $$$ too.
Cmpanies exist to make money. Sometimes they can do that by helping Linux (IBM), other times by hurting Linux (SCO), often by doing both at the same time (Sun). Don't mistake them for friends or enemies. They are not capable of being either.
When a company has interest that coinside with the interest of the Linux community, we should help them. When their interest go against ours, we should fight them. Sometimes we should do both at the same time.
Stop giving companies people attributes, they aren't people, and treating them as such will only hurt your interests.
When a company has interest that coinside with the interest of the Linux community, we should help them. When their interest go against ours, we should fight them. Sometimes we should do both at the same time.
Stop giving companies people attributes, they aren't people, and treating them as such will only hurt your interests.
Misstakingly believing that a company is neither foe nor friend, because it's only a few who are bad or good in there, is the same as believing that an army set to invade your country will not shoot you when you confront them because in average the people making up the body of it are pretty decent. That's just pretty naive.
I am looking forward to adopting User Linux as soon as it is ready. The merged model of proprietary plus free is looking more locked-in every day. Back to true Linux!
There already is a 'true' Linux distro: Slackware: <A HREF="http://www.slackware.org/" title="slackware.org">http://www.slackware.org/</a slackware.org>
I really enjoy reading most RobLimo articles.
Great Tenor. Frankly, I don't know how SF
gets advertisers with such honesty. RL walks
a really good line. I'm impressed.
I think the unisys thingy can be viewed much
more simply. They had some big customer of
theirs request Linux and/or drivers/support.
Whether the customer installed Linux on their
own, or Unisys installed it is unknown.
The fact that it has happened means that at some
point unisys has to address the issue. The
customer must be fairly significant. I don't
know who the customer(s) are, but isn't unisys a
big DoD/CIA/NSA vendor, where another 'not common'
architecture might be to their (obscurity)
advantage ? Thats the tone I got from the
writeup.
As far as their relationship with linux, it's
not up to the larger, more diverse, creation/
community of Gnu/Linux to embrace Unisys.
It's up to Unisys to embrace Gnu/Linux if they
see a need (opportunity).
They said they have 50 'people' working on Linux.
Read between the lines: 5 full time engineers,
5 part time engineers, involvement of 5 managers
part time (well, maybe 1 full time), 5 technical
support people part time, 1 full time marketing
person, 3 part time marketing people, 3 PT
secretaries... plus misc..... and then inflate.
Unisys is just like the old steel companies.
Or a car manufacturer. Or Sun. Or SGI. They
have some business and no place to go. If
I were looking for opportunity, I might work
for Unisys because of short-medium term
opportunity for myself, not because Unisys has
any long term future. I'd certainly like to
know more about "cross-platform partitioning".
W in B-More
Great Tenor. Frankly, I don't know how SF
gets advertisers with such honesty. RL walks
a really good line. I'm impressed.
I think the unisys thingy can be viewed much
more simply. They had some big customer of
theirs request Linux and/or drivers/support.
Whether the customer installed Linux on their
own, or Unisys installed it is unknown.
The fact that it has happened means that at some
point unisys has to address the issue. The
customer must be fairly significant. I don't
know who the customer(s) are, but isn't unisys a
big DoD/CIA/NSA vendor, where another 'not common'
architecture might be to their (obscurity)
advantage ? Thats the tone I got from the
writeup.
As far as their relationship with linux, it's
not up to the larger, more diverse, creation/
community of Gnu/Linux to embrace Unisys.
It's up to Unisys to embrace Gnu/Linux if they
see a need (opportunity).
They said they have 50 'people' working on Linux.
Read between the lines: 5 full time engineers,
5 part time engineers, involvement of 5 managers
part time (well, maybe 1 full time), 5 technical
support people part time, 1 full time marketing
person, 3 part time marketing people, 3 PT
secretaries... plus misc..... and then inflate.
Unisys is just like the old steel companies.
Or a car manufacturer. Or Sun. Or SGI. They
have some business and no place to go. If
I were looking for opportunity, I might work
for Unisys because of short-medium term
opportunity for myself, not because Unisys has
any long term future. I'd certainly like to
know more about "cross-platform partitioning".
W in B-More
This move by Unisys doesn't smell well.
Some possible scenarios:
1) Unisys gets actively involved in the Linux High Performance Computing [HPC] arena. Unisys learns plenty.
2) Unisys passes lots of its learnings to its long-time buddy called Microsoft. (As we know, Microsoft now has a high priority project underway for HPC)
3) Unisys does indeed introduce a Linux product and even sells some.
4) When Microsoft's HPC product is ready, Unisys shifts all it's focus to the Microsoft HPC platform including upgrading its Linux customer base to the shiny new Microsoft HPC solution.
Some possible scenarios:
1) Unisys gets actively involved in the Linux High Performance Computing [HPC] arena. Unisys learns plenty.
2) Unisys passes lots of its learnings to its long-time buddy called Microsoft. (As we know, Microsoft now has a high priority project underway for HPC)
3) Unisys does indeed introduce a Linux product and even sells some.
4) When Microsoft's HPC product is ready, Unisys shifts all it's focus to the Microsoft HPC platform including upgrading its Linux customer base to the shiny new Microsoft HPC solution.
You really should read
http://slashdot.org/articles/99/08/31/0143246.sht<nobr>m<wbr></nobr> l
for the history behind the GIF "saga".
Truth is often the first casualty...and everyone goes blind in the end. [sigh]
http://slashdot.org/articles/99/08/31/0143246.sht<nobr>m<wbr></nobr> l
for the history behind the GIF "saga".
Truth is often the first casualty...and everyone goes blind in the end. [sigh]
Unisys are idiots. They're only doing this because they have failed with their ES7000 box. The majority of enterprises that need the kind of hardware firepower that the ES7000 offers would never be stupid enough to want to run Windows on it. As usual, Unisys is a day late and a dollar short. They jumped on the Windows 2000 Datacenter Edition (does this even exist anymore, or is it just another dead-end OS version from MS?) bandwagon and got burned. Why would anyone want to buy an ES7000 and have to pay Unisys (for the rest of eternity, mind you...) ridiculous "right to use" license fees for their stupid extensions to make their stupid box work with Linux when you can get one of IBM's fantastic new i5 boxes and run OS/400 and Linux at the same time with no BS?
BTW, I say all this as a long time Unisys enterprise customer in the remittance processing arena.
BTW, I say all this as a long time Unisys enterprise customer in the remittance processing arena.
Agree with ya. They just want to get Linux developers to work on their box for free.
The hell with them<nobr> <wbr></nobr>... Avoid Unisys !
The hell with them<nobr> <wbr></nobr>... Avoid Unisys !
Several years ago now I worked for a small company that wanted to get it's own computer system to get away from using the parent company's mainframe.
One of the main apps was to be CAD. Unisys sold their system to us with the assurance that this app was well known and well supported.
The damn thing was so slow and temperamental it never worked worth a damn. It turned out that there was only ONE other company using the same software- and they were having problems too.
I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw one of their mainframes. The damn thing wound up being used mostly for what was called MAPPER, thier version of a user programmable database system.
I once asked an acquaintance of mine who had some experience with it, what his opinion of it was, (and he didn't work at my company). He said "MAPPER is a disease that slowly takes up every bit of avaiable space."
Avoid them like the plague. Once they get their hooks into you, you will never get shut of them.
They MIGHT have changed since they pulled those shananigans, but I wouldn't bet the future of my data center on anything they had to sell.
This sounds like pure desperation to me.
Chances are, they won't be around much longer anyway. They bet on the wrong hoss at the starting gate and now, 3/4ths of the way through the race, they are trying to change that bet.
Let 'em have all the Windows data center business they can handle.(SNICKER)
Cheers,
Frank
One of the main apps was to be CAD. Unisys sold their system to us with the assurance that this app was well known and well supported.
The damn thing was so slow and temperamental it never worked worth a damn. It turned out that there was only ONE other company using the same software- and they were having problems too.
I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw one of their mainframes. The damn thing wound up being used mostly for what was called MAPPER, thier version of a user programmable database system.
I once asked an acquaintance of mine who had some experience with it, what his opinion of it was, (and he didn't work at my company). He said "MAPPER is a disease that slowly takes up every bit of avaiable space."
Avoid them like the plague. Once they get their hooks into you, you will never get shut of them.
They MIGHT have changed since they pulled those shananigans, but I wouldn't bet the future of my data center on anything they had to sell.
This sounds like pure desperation to me.
Chances are, they won't be around much longer anyway. They bet on the wrong hoss at the starting gate and now, 3/4ths of the way through the race, they are trying to change that bet.
Let 'em have all the Windows data center business they can handle.(SNICKER)
Cheers,
Frank
Nope
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on August 17, 2004 03:33 AM#