Buck,
On 2/26/2015 12:18 PM, Buck Calabro wrote:
I'm really loving IBM i 7.2. The new SQL abilities are sweet, fully
free RPG is a joy to work with and the Power 7 hardware just screams. I
got Node.js to run, and a dinosaur like me even manages a PHP script
that surfaces some SQL stored procedures which give my boss a very crude
web portal. Crude because I worked on it, but cool because it's all IBM
i - no multiple platform debugging headaches, yay! I recognise that
opinions legitimately differ but that seems like forward motion to me.
Thank you for this. This is exactly the message that needs to get out
more and More and MOre and MORe and MORE! It's Solid. It's capable.
It's fast. And It's all in one box! Back ups? One place. Debugging? One
place. Knowledge? One set. And it SCALES to the heavens!
Sadly you and me and Pete and Jon and Jim and Gary (the OP) and most on
this list already know this. In many cases our Boss knows it too but the
CIO and CFO and CEO have been fed the "AS/400 wine (whine?)" for so long
they cannot taste the sweet vintage of IBM i on POWER!
Seriously every time I hear about this or that app being moved to any
other platform 'because it's cheaper or better or ???' I just shake my
head. Splattering the data across the datacenter on desperate systems
and servers and databases is fraught with peril. Just ask anyone who's
tried it.
Here is just one real life example of a customer who has trod that path:
IBM i shop has an small part of their application they would like to
make better. Someone on the outside 'sells' them on this new 'better'
component. Some (likely shady) math is done and they buy it. So now
instead of this piece being on i where the entire rest of their business
runs, the data:
a) Is exported from DB2 to flat files.
c) FTP'd to a (new) Windows Server.
d) Windows server has GUI interface to allow creation of 'batches' (for
lack of better term)
e) Batches are fed to second (new) windows server with (new) Oracle.
f) Second windows server FTPs data to an (new) AIX partition also with
(new) Oracle.
g) App on Oracle does it's work and FTPs back to first Windows server.
i) User sees batch completed and if acceptable it is FTPed yet again
back to IBM i and loaded into DB2 there where it once again is used in
the mainline business app.
Oh AND the vendor suggests "You should have a full time Oracle DBA on
staff for this." (Their ENTIRE I.T. staff is currently THREE!)
Total investment HAS to be $25K EASY, likely over $50K. (Without the
DBA!) And it hangs up all the time. Batches must constantly be redone
and data is lost routinely in all those ftps. Impossible to justify but
now that they've purchased it it must be used!
The Sad part is they were given a proposal to do the same enhancement
using PHP on i (by a company who ABSOLUTELY would have done it right)
but their users couldn't get it through their heads that 'green screen'
wasn't right for this even though green screen was NOT Part of it!!! The
CEO bowed to the users.
- Larry "DrFranken" Bolhuis
www.frankeni.com
www.iDevCloud.com
www.iInTheCloud.com
midrange.com
