Thanks Paul, I'm dumping it into SI page here, as I want to get my money's worth, and help out the disk storage companies <gggg>
QuadK
From ComputerWorld link
Interest renewed in Novell apps
Laura DiDio
It started out as pure marketing kitsch. Write the best application for NetWare and Novell Directory Services (NDS) and win a
Harley-Davidson motorcycle.
Seven months and 250-plus entries later, Novell, Inc. has awarded a prize in the "Get Off Your Apps" contest to NetVision, Inc. in
Orem, Utah, for its Synchronicity. The product synchronizes user information in NetWare with directories in Notes and Windows NT
machines.
During the past few years, Microsoft Corp.'s Windows NT has stolen the loyalties of many independent software developers to the
point that users looking for a key application sometimes can't find a version that runs on NetWare, said George Hoffman,
technology services manager at Penobscot Bay Medical Center in Rockland, Maine.
The hospital picked a specialized medical application from Hewlett-Packard Co., but it runs only on NT. "We have no choice. If
Novell wants to compete against NT, they must do a better job of getting [independent software vendors] to write for NetWare,"
Hoffman said.
But observers said the number of contest entries is indicative of a growing body of products that use NetWare services such as
NDS rather than just run on the server.
"I predicted this would happen a year ago. Now people realize that NetWare is a solid, secure operating system that's here for the
long haul," said Leonard Steinbach, director of information technology at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York.
The Guggenheim uses several NDS-based applications to cut administration time by almost a third and to enhance
communications with the museum's new location in Bilbao, Spain.
Scott Webster, MIS manager at Canadian Occidental Petroleum Ltd. in Calgary, Alberta, uses a combination of Net Vision's
Synchronicity and Novell's NDS for NT to integrate all its Windows NT Server domains and Notes account information.
UNIFIED MANAGEMENT
"Synchronicity lets us unify management of our Windows NT application servers under the NDS umbrella. This is an incredibly
valuable application resource because we have 3,000 users in 40 different sites worldwide, and only three or four sites have
resident network administrators," he said.
Webster said he has been able to find third-party NetWare applications fairly easily. The exception, he said, has been Internet tools
for the NetWare environment. "Now we're starting to see that change," he said.
Still, there's no doubt that for the time being, the momentum in terms of development efforts belongs to Windows NT. And all the
users interviewed by Computerworld acknowledged the plethora of applications available for their NT application servers.
Mike Kearney, vice president of IT engineering at Phoenix Home Life Insurance Co. in East Hartford, Conn., said Novell's year-long
effort to improve relations with independent developers is paying off for users, as the number of applications that use NDS
increases.
Other factors also are prompting independent software vendors and others to say, "Let's take another look at NetWare" as a
development platform, Kearney said. Those factors include Novell's release of the developer tool kit -- which consolidates multiple
development tools into one -- at its Brainshare conference in March, as well as the release of Novell tools such as ZENWorks, an
NDS-enabled desktop management suite.
"So far, NetWare 5 Beta 3 and the ZENWorks beta look great," Kearney said.
Rich Ingram, network administrator at Turck, Inc. in Minneapolis, a supplier for the automotive and manufacturing industries, said he
wants applications that use NDS because they save time.
"We're driven by technology that can solve our problems right now. And NDS, NetWare 5 and the applications do that. The
combination cuts at least 15 hours out of my workweek," Ingram said. |
