Re: Help to Promote Linux! - Economics....

Greg wrote in message <34B9BF4F.54C7@cyberramp.net>... >Just fer sport (and I really don't have a preferred side here...), how >do you all see the economics of Informix on Linux working? All of the >Linuxes I'm aware of (and I'm nobody's expert here either...) are >inherently uniprocessor machines, mostly PC's. So basically, we're >talking the lowest end, most price sensitive segment of the market. > Interesting points Greg. :-) The committee has been given some numbers as to what it will cost Informix to do the port, unfortunately I can't tell you what they are. But I can tell you it's very affordable in the grand scheme of things. At this point the cost to Informix is not just the money to do the port, but the loss of face when they find out somebody else has it first. Right now they have priorities that are apparently more important, because they don't have any strategies that are really based on understanding the marketplace. Once the top management gets the right leadership to make the decision to get the port done, then things will begin to happen for the better. Keep in mind there is an emerging market with Linux hardware such as VA-Research and some Alpha platforms too. 64-bit Linux is right around the corner, for Alpha and x86. >How does Informix in it's questionable financial state, do Linux ports >and support them even minimally, when it's having problems with the big >dollar industrial strength market?? Support is always a point of concern, however, we have to ask how does Netscape support *it's* Linux version? Many of the people who would obtain the Linux copy will be smart enough to use it with minimal support, those that need support can pay for it. This is just another platform to support, and is extremely similar to the SCO market. >So even though the modest number >of us who know and like Informix for bigger jobs might like to have >something similar to put in the East Boofoo field office to work with, >Informix would have to sell a jillion of them at $100-$300 a copy to >make it work economically, and that's just hard to see (unless microsoft >buys 'em out - ooooooo there's that nasty rumor again...). Personally, >I don't think theres a big enough market for a really heavyweight >database running on toy hardware. > >That's just my opinion, of course, I could be wrong. It's great to think of Informix as a heavy-weight data base product, worthy to compete against the likes of an Oracle. But the bigger problem is mind share. Unless Informix starts to build a wider base of users, there will be NO talent to support the "heavy-weight" sites. Finding people to support the big box is as important as making the decision to buy it for the big box. Linux is a great way to get the mind share and visibility necessary for people to make a commitment to the product for their careers. Here's how it might work: A person finds out that Informix is a product to be supported and used in business, and wants to learn more about the product. So, they go to the book store, find all 5 of the Informix books, and then look around for the web sites and trade magazines where Informix is mentioned. They find a job for Informix work, and decide they need to get up to speed on the product, possibly on their own time. Or they use it at work a little but want to try other things, or learn about the engine. Either way, there's no real way to learn about the product, except on a production system. Imagine trying to change the ONCONFIG and bouncing the engine at work. It's a major event, even on test systems. Linux reduces the cost of the OS to the point where Informix can be a part of the most essential and necessary parts of computing: developing and testing. It's not just about production-only-systems in the real world. Or maybe a person needs to learn about it without anyone knowing they're learning, etc. And they might want to learn things that can't be learned on NT, such as multiple instances, etc. Then there's the small business who wants simply to use Informix on x86, but not NT. There might be some cost considerations, or application considerations, or whatever. Informix started out on the smaller platforms, and had a foothold that was hard to beat. Now because of the past couple of years of lost direction, it's hard for them to see where to go. To those of us out in the field, the decision is obvious. Tim -- Tim Schaefer \\\\|// tschaefe@mindspring.com 6 6 -------------------------------oOOo---( )---o00o---------------------- http://www.inxutil.com ICQ:6358805 http://www.informix.com http://www.iiug.org news://comp.databases.informix mailto:majordomo@iiug.org no subject body: subscribe linux-informix http://securities.stanford.edu/complaints/informix/ ======================================================================