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Re: [LUG] Linux Training



On Monday 20 September 2004 10:31, Patrick Kimber wrote:
I think the main reason for the change to Open Source software is that it
gives us more control.  At the moment we are forced to upgrade our
customers to a new version of the database every couple of years.  If we do
not we end up with an unsupported version of the database.  Switching to
Linux and an open source database will allow us to upgrade when we want to
- probably combining this with a major upgrade to our software.
We should see increased reliability because we will supply the Linux
servers (as a black box).  We will no longer have software installed by
other suppliers - should avoid software conflicts.
The whole solution should be easier to maintain.  Configuration in Linux is
normally based on simple text files which should be easily updated.
I am worried that we will lose some customers because we will not be
supporting the Microsoft "server suite" i.e. SQL Server, Exchange,
Sharepoint etc.  Some of our competitors will build solutions based these
products.

sounds like you've got some selling / education to do....

the "but it won't run MSSQL!" argument is a valid one, we get it too, and "but 
what about all my asp/vbs?" 

sometimes it seems that the answer is the client has become so embedded in 
their proprietary solution that it has become symbiotic, and killing the 
entity and creating a new one is the quickest / fastest / cheapest / best way 
out of it... in business terms of course this means walk away from that job / 
client, because you'll never win.

new jobs are easy of course

so you're left with where you appear to be, in the middle ground...
looking at your website, which BTW is seriously broken under linux/mozilla 
firebird/uxga, I would guess that while your coders have built up libraries 
of reusable snippets each client effectively gets treated as a bespoke job, 
which perhaps periodically get major rewrites of the majority of the code 
(I'm trying to guess your coder / hours / client here in an effort to say 
things that might bear some relevance rather than being totally inapplicable) 
so perhaps an approach might be to select a pet client and do not change 
anything, but instead also install a mirror of the database data, but on a 
linux/postgreqsl box running alongside the winders one, and thus generate 
REAL data about the comparative strengths and weaknesses, costs, server admin 
hours, etc etc etc, and for gods sake don't forget the one step removed stuff 
like antivirus software, not just cost and cpu overhead, but this last week 
alone there have been 3 instances of mcafee updates completely breaking 3rd 
party userland apps such as yours, one of which I believe involved permanent 
data loss when the a/v software deleted files.....

I must ask, why postgresql and not mysql?

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