RE: Support for Informix 7.24
Okay, if you're not going to get any support from Informix for the 7.24 licenses, then why not use your current maintenance to upgrade to 7.31 (you'll have to pay a small amount to cover shipping and media costs, but not the thousands required for new licenses, once you have a valid maintenance contract in force, i.e. OpenLine or Assurance). Then you could install 7.31 on a test server and see if your applications really would work or not (I'm guessing that it will; the only thing I'm unsure about is if there are any serious differences in the handling of SPL code and if your application uses SPL at all; our D4GL 3.00 and 4GL 7.20 application went from IDS 7.23 to IDS 7.31 without requiring a re-compile, but we don't use SPL). In the meantime, there is nothing to prevent you from continuing to use 7.24; you just won't be able to approach Informix for costless support. So in the end you get to jumpstart your migration and get support from Informix for problems (I'm hoping you have the code for your application; it is pretty damning for your application vendor to restrict you to obsolete software just because they don't have the vision or wherewithal to update themselves). In two years, we might be up to IDS.2002! Also, check your Informix rep (or change your Informix rep) for some help on getting the upgrade done at a reduced cost if you paid maintenance for all these years, never upgraded and allowed the maintenance contract to lapse for the current year. It doesn't seem morally right for Informix to require you to purchase your upgrade by treating it as new licenses outright or by making you pay 150% of exisiting 7.24 maintenance costs and then adding the minimum shipping and media fees on top. If you're large enough, Informix will still want your business (I hope). Best regards, Edmund Nigel Gall Senior Information Systems Specialist Process Plant Services Limited Atlantic Avenue, Point Lisas Industrial Estate Point Lisas, Couva, Trinidad & Tobago, W.I. Tel: (868) 636 2906 x 274 Fax: (868) 679 3770 -----Original Message----- From: jblatz2@my-deja.com [mailto:jblatz2@my-deja.com] Sent: Tuesday, September 26, 2000 6:16 PM To: informix-list@iiug.org Subject: Re: Support for Informix 7.24 Not true for our platform. For us 7.24 became a Category 4 (Obsolete) the end of last June. If we want to continue support we have to pay 50% more for maintenance, which my company will not approve. In addition - we are planning to begin migrating in about a year. At that time we would go to Informix 2000 or later. This is NOT a free upgrade so the maintenance we have been paying almost $100,000 a year for has been basically for nothing. In answer to the previous post: No, we cannot upgrade at all because the application software that we use was ported specifically for us and for ver 7.24. They will not port to a newer version and will not support us if we do upgrade and encounter problems. We need to migrate to a new platform and rewrite our applications with another tool. That will take us a minimum of one to two years. In article <39D116C9.487EFDB8@bloomberg.net>, kagel@bloomberg.net wrote: > Informix still support 7.24, they are just not making any more upgrades to > it. It does not go to 'pay only' support for bug fixes for another year > except on some platforms (like mine 8-(). > > Art S. Kagel > > jblatz2@my-deja.com wrote: > > > > We have Online Dynamic Server 7.24. We are not in a position to upgrade > > all of our applications for at least another year or two. > > > > I just found out that Informix no longer supports ver 7.24. I found it > > out by accident, Informix never notified us even though we have been > > paying them a fortune in yearly maintenance. > > > > Does anyone know of a third party company that provides hotline support? > > We have been pretty lucky and have not needed support for some time, but > > even one database corruption problem could bring us to our knees pretty > > quickly. > > > > Thanks > > > > Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ > > Before you buy. > Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Before you buy.