[WEB400] Re: Modify the IE Browser

["Buck" <buck.calabro@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> The NetScape comparison is flawed for a lot of reasons:

But it's easy to comprehend, and management tend to latch onto things like
this.  Alas!

> I can sympathise with the attitude "if it ain't broke, don't fix
> it". But at some point, any company may still come up against a
> competitor employing a different methodology, developing a product
> from scratch, that may well blow away yours. At some point, your
> code base may well be too brittle to easily respond to changing
> market conditions, where the easier response it to start from
> scratch. I suspect there's already an awful lot of RPG code in that
> particular boat, and the need to add a "webified" interface
> certainly isn't helping any.

All true.  But I've spent my life branded as a 'blue sky techie who has no
head for the business end of things.'  I feel this is patently false but
when such a moniker is applied, it isn't easy to shake.  The upshot is that
when I (literally the most experienced person in the company) bring up the
idea of re-writing a _portion_ of our code base, (brittle is a fair
description of the oldest code) the thought is poo-poohed away by the
'business heads.'  A common rejoinder is that our competitors haven't had to
go that route, so why should we (and fall behind?)  The worst part is that
several ex-competitors are now gone because they did just that: re-wrote,
lost market share during the re-write period, and now they're 'unknown' with
a new product (read: untested.)  Nobody wants to take a flyer on this
entirely new software until they've seen it installed somewhere else.
Nasty.

> My point is that a paradigm change may well be necessary for many
> shops. "Webifying" a tradional green-screen app (using whatever
> tool) may well give it a few more years of life. But in my (perhaps
> jaded and cynical) opinion, it's only delaying the inevitable.

Yes, but we really do need the time (instant GUI) in order to simply market
what we have in order to survive.  Without marketing now, we will not get
paid tomorrow, and new development will... well, cease.  It's like being
balanced on a knife edge.  How much do you put back in the business as R&D,
and how much to maintain what's already there?  That's really what we're
talking about.

Good thread.
  --buck