Can you really trust the man behind the green curtain?

Ok, that was a reference to the Wizard of Oz. Rumor has it that Stuart has a pair of Judy Garland's ruby red shoes hidden in the back of his closet. (And no, I won't go there because I have this policy of "don't ask, don't tell" and I don't know if they are Stuart's or Robin's... Or why he has them in the first place... :-P (ITS A JOKE PEOPLE!) Yet I digress. The point of this post is that while we (the faithful) are getting all sort of good news about new features in IDS, I'm afraid that the bigger picture is a bit more bleak. Large customers are being told to ignore IDS because the features in IDS will be (eventually) in DB2 and vice a versa. DB2 is still IBM's engine of choice and their sales teams lead with DB2 unless its an existing customer. 3 years after telling Jerry K, and Alyse P that there is a lack of parity in the sales force and how simple it is to fix at no real cost, nothing has been done. Hell. How many times do I have to say it? The sales team will lead with solutions that they know that they can support locally. If the IT Specialists don't know IDS, then the sales team will not sell it. And now with the issue of TS and RTL et al... Things that give IDS an edge are not being well maintained, nor are they being exploited when IBM attempts to position their latest offerings... SolidDB and Cognos. An 'in memory' database that doesn't support TS? For the financial community? LOL... Hey IBM, here's a free clue. 1) Chicago's Financial district is still a white space and because they are now more tied to NY, your reputation in Chicago is going to hurt you in NY. 2) Financial Analytics using Cognos? They're way late to the game. 15 years too late. While OTC is being a tad intentionally obtuse when it comes to talking about RTL and TS, the fact is that IBM isn't making the investment in maintaining them. So while they'll fix a bug or limitation that affects their core product, they are less likely fixing something that could help give IDS an edge. In addition to all of this... What we don't see from Jerry K, Arvin the Marvin, and others like Alyse or the WW sales/marketing manager for IDS (I forget who's sitting in that chair now, they swap people in an out very quickly...), is any effort to effectively position or advertise partner solutions using IDS. Don't get me wrong. IDS has the potential to be a game changer, however... if IBM isn't going to put skin in the game, there are alternatives that cost less and have greater potential within their niche markets. The sad reality is that I imagine that Sam P and Steve Mills are cutting all costs and trying to boost margins so that the company looks profitable on thinning margins. IBM markets the IBM brand and unfortunately in the long run, their short term profit goals are going to do about as much damage as Phil White did when he cooked Informix's books. But hey! What do I know? Its not like I don't talk to people inside IBM and at Informix customers.... -G PS. Jerry K... Where's the love? You've got a Dog and Pony show coming to Chicago some time soon. Why don't you hop a 40 min flight from KC and stop in to say hi? I'll even take a break from one of my clients to grab a coffee with you. Perhaps then you can be a bit more honest...

On Jul 12, 11:16 am, Ian Michael Gumby <im_gu...@hotmail.com> wrote: > Ok, that was a reference to the Wizard of Oz. Rumor has it that Stuart > has a pair of Judy Garland's ruby red shoes hidden in the back of his > closet. (And no, I won't go there because I have this policy of "don't > ask, don't tell" and I don't know if they are Stuart's or Robin's... > Or why he has them in the first place... :-P (ITS A JOKE PEOPLE!) Wow, within 5 mins of posting, I got a call from Stuart. Red shoes, red socks, its pretty much the same thing. I really don't care *what* people do in the privacy of their own home.... :-P Yet I digress. I think its important that the Informix community understands that while IBM will continue to support the product as long as companies use the product, that doesn't mean that IBM will treat it at the same level as DB2 or actually proactively sell the product. The promise of support without a real pro-active sales effort is the kiss of death. Companies will no longer use IDS as their main platform and relegate it to a legacy platform with net new development on a different platform. While IBM thinks that they can sell DB2 in to this space, they are mistaken. Based on the SAP forced migrations, overwhelming evidence showed that Oracle became the vendor of choice after being forced off Informix. This bad for both IBM and SAP since Oracle sells competing products and because both IBM and SAP forced the migration, they both lost a bit of the consumer's faith. While maybe a certain retailer in AR can push IBM around, no other company really has the presence globally to do so. So industry sectors like manufacturing, engineering, financial, etc ... do not have the clout to force IBM to consider making changes or product enhancements by themselves. It would have to take the entire Informix community en mass to make such stand before IBM might consider acting instead of paying lip service. You can be happy with the enhancements, however its akin to polishing the brass and cleaning the decks on the Titanic while its sinking.