On Wednesday 11 June 2003 03:55, Ben Rosenberg wrote:
* Anders Johansson (andjoh@rydsbo.net) [030610 18:35]: ->On Wed, 2003-06-11 at 02:46, James Mohr wrote: ->> In the real world, decisions like which OS to use are usually based ->> on economics. -> ->s/usually/hardly ever -> ->It's usually decided on a "what is everybody else running" or "what did ->that guy say that I played golf with last Saturday" -> ->You give upper management *way* too much credit
Yep. I've seen this first hand. I was part of a migration team several years ago that took Anheuser-Busch from a working Lotus email system that worked very well and had a group of 22 admins+techsupport+management. This occurred when "management" above the "email group" decided that the company MUST have Exchange and Outlook. The migration took 14 months because none of the email group had the slightest clue how to do any of this..let alone setup that big of an Exchange server farm and convert all those clients. Had they stuck with their current setup they could have upgraded cheaper and had it done in 30% of the time.
The thing is, we are already running Outlook and Exchange, we have already invested the money. So what I hear you and many others saying is that regardless of how much it costs the company, we should just switch to Linux. It doesn't matter that we are already working at least 10 hours a days, as well as often on weekends to meet deadlines and the fact we have laid off about 5% of our employees already, we should invest the time and money to convert the system to Linux. So we have to work even longer hours to meet our deadlines, just so we can install Linux workstations. Sorry, despite my fondness for Linux, your arguments are illogical.
It's never the geeks or their direct managers in most large to medium size companies that make the decisions and it's CERTAINLY not for economic reasons 9-10 times. It's a case " oh boy that CEO's company is using *blah* so I MUST use *blah* or we won't be competitive..."
Hmmm. Let's see if I understand your equation competitive <> economics. Hmmm. If you are not competive, you don't get the contracts and don't get the money from the customers and then you go out of business. That's not economic, right? Hmmmmm. Sorry, I guess there is a misunderstanding somewhere about what economics is. If you are talking about **home** economics and baking cakes, then I would agree with you. However, I was talking about the economics of staying in business.
These days it's becoming partly economic since quite a few companies just can't afford Microsoft wares and the headaches they bring with them. But it takes some early adopters to get the other PHB's at the country club to sit up and take notice an say " I must have that..."
Yes, and we cannot afford to migrate. Again, economics. In my last company, Microsoft had pretty good arguments why their licensing "saved" money (pre L6). Yes, if you upgraded Windows and every MS applications every single time a new version was available, it would be cheaper. cheaper = less money = economics Or am I missing something? Granted the "savings" meant spending more money on the upgrades (we had so many employees that we were continually upgrading systems). However, the decision to go with that licensing was based on a preceived belief that money would be saved. So, why is that not economics? Regards, jimmo -- --------------------------------------- "Be more concerned with your character than with your reputation. Your character is what you really are while your reputation is merely what others think you are." -- John Wooden --------------------------------------- Be sure to visit the Linux Tutorial: http://www.linux-tutorial.info --------------------------------------- NOTE: All messages sent to me in response to my posts to newsgroups, mailing lists or forums are subject to reposting.