Leo, Your one-liner's are most entertaining, but I appreciate the information and perspective. Obviously the high cost of PC maintenance in an organization is a function of the ratio of PC's to IT personnel. You can see the techs running around from PC to PC solving little problems, questions, installing new software, upgrades etc. In the world of Dos and Windows 3.1, system stability and even user induced problems, upgrades, etc., would indeed be fairly costly even though the $2,000 per unit cost does seem high.
However, (now this is a stretch) if Windows 98 and NT provides more stability, and if Microsoft totally opens the "window" on Windows for developers, maybe system hangups can be almost eliminated. Further, why can't Windows defrag automatically like Netware? Why can't a quick disk check utility like scandisk be performed automatically at each startup without user intervention, thus keeping the hard drive in tune as you go? Any small steps that minimize the need for large corps of "techies" on the payroll to solve these types of simple things would cut maintenance costs.
Also, why can't push technology be used to distribute upgrades for windows based applications simultaneously in the background, e.g., Corel's agreement with Marimba. If upgrades were treated like "patches" so that only the "upgraded" files were transmitted, it need not take a great deal of bandwidth and time to perform that task.
I agree with your "status symbol" statement. Are there are any large scale "morale" costs associated with integrating different classes of hardware?
I believe Java has its place, but is not necessarily the immediate future of computing. I'm back to the independence and power issues that were discussed way back on the $100 in 98 thread when the NC concept picked up steam.
Unless it already too late (confusion here), Corel need not be disconcerted, or derailed by the IBM move, and could yet forge ahead with its plans. The "Remagen" approach seems more logical to me as a Java connection so long as speed is not impeded or compromised. To me, speed, will determine whether or not Remagen becomes vaporized, or a highly viable part of current Suite technology.
FOCUS ON WHICH SUITE?
Scott |
