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Technology Stocks : Novell (NOVL) dirt cheap, good buy? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mike Kelly who wrote (20465)	2/28/1998 12:42:00 AM
From: Elmo Gregory	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42771

Hi Mike - I think your observations are very correct.

To: Mike Kelly who wrote (20465)	3/16/1998 11:46:00 AM
From: Mike Kelly	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 42771

Gartner Report Windows NT v.5.0 vs. Year 2000: Stop Where You Are February 24, 1998 Distributed Computing Platform (DCP) Research Note Strategic Planning E. Thompson Windows NT v.5.0 vs. Year 2000: Stop Where You Are Given the contingencies required for 2000, we advise users to avoid adoption of Windows NT version 5.0 until mid-2000. Core Topic Hardware & Operating Systems: Windows NT-Based Executive and deployment Issues Key Issue How will users acquire, manage and dispose of Windows NT-related assets and know they have the best deal? Strategic Planning Assumptions Windows NT version 5.0 will become generally available in 2Q99 (0.7 probability).Windows NT version 5.0 Service Pack Release 1 will be delivered in 4Q99 (0.7 probability). Windows NT version 5.0 Service Pack Release 2 will be delivered in 1H2000 (0.7probability). Windows NT version 5.0 and the year 2000 crisis will provide a conflict of interests in 1999. As beta testing progresses, the expectations for NT v.5.0 are being raised by both Microsoft and the press. Many IT organizations are defining desktop and server infrastructure projects for 1998/1999 with NT v.5.0 as an integral component. We advise caution in implementing NT Server v.5.0 due to the number of new functions and the lack of available skills for NT Server v.5.0, but mainly because of the conflict of staff resources with those needed to prepare for 2000. Many organizations have defined year 2000 policies that mandate no new applications and infrastructure deployments in the six months before and after midnight on December 31, 1999. The objective is clearly to stabilize the operational environment to better handle expected but unidentified additional year 2000 complications. Although the objective will not always be workable, as essential modifications to the infrastructure are required, the basic tenet of the policy is in direct conflict with the deployment of a new desktop, NOS and application server OS. NT Server v.5.0 is set to deliver more than 30 million lines of code, up from 8 million in the core of v.4.0 and 5 million in v.3.5.1 (see Note 1). Although Microsoft's testing procedures are maturing and beta testing is more extensive - 6,000 organizations were involved in Beta 1 and at least 200,000 users will be involved in Beta 2 - we do not expect the NT v.5.0 launch release to be trouble free. Therefore, even Type A users should experiment with NT v.5.0 but wait until the first service pack has been proved to be stable before widespread deployment. We anticipate that NT v.5.0 Service Pack Release 1 will be delivered in 4Q99 (0.7 probability). Given the year 2000 policy objectives stated above and the implementation time scales of six to nine months required for large organizations to upgrade OSs, this provides a clear conflict of resource interests for the IT organization. Note 1 Lines of Code in Versions of NT Server (Estimates) Core NT v.3.51 (no IIS): 5 million NT v.3.51 + IIS: 8 million Core NT v.4.0: 8 million NT v.4.0 w/bundled IIS: 12 million NT v.4.0 EE (IIS, MQS, TS): 16 million NT v.5 Beta 1: 27 million NT v.5 Beta 2: 30 million Final NT v.5 Gold: 31 million For more-conservative user organizations, we advise waiting until Service Pack Release 2 is proved stable. NT Server v.5.0 Service Pack Release 2 will be delivered in 1H2000 (0.7 probability). In organizations with significant year 2000 exposure or with conservative infrastructure goals, the position is even clearer: wait until after 2000 and until any remaining year 2000 problems (if any) have been identified. This decision provides three additional benefits: the IT organization gains an extended evaluation period for NT v.5.0; the option of skipping NT Server v.5.0 and waiting for the release of v.5.x, which should be more tenable; and internal support skills for the new OS can be developed. In deciding when to adopt NT v.5.0, potential users of NT Server will have the harder decision to make, as greater additional functionality will be included - with greater potential for problems. Moreover, NT Server requires more planning and would have a greater impact on a migration project. The conflict between NT Server v.5.0 and year 2000 planning may simplify short-term adoption decisions in 1998 by hastening the acceptance of NT Server v.4.0, as opposed to waiting for a robust release of v.5.0. However, if organizations take this choice, they will have to live with NT Server v.4.0 for longer than originally expected. This means that plans for the use of new features in v.5.0 will have to be postponed. Currently, some of the more important server features include: the Active Directory Service, multiprotocol routing, support for 32 Gbytes of RAM, improved security with Kerberos authentication, support for hierarchical storage management, better hardware support (e.g., for I2O), plug and play and power management, distributed time synchronization, greater SMP scaling, improved CPU and memory resource allocation, the Microsoft Management Console and Zero Administration for Windows. It will be important for IT organizations to determine which of these features will be essential and which are just "nice to have" in order to assess the appropriate time scale for deploying NT Server v.5.0. Acronym Key EE Enterprise Edition I2O Intelligent Input/Output IIS Internet Information Server MQS Message Queue Server NOS Network operating system OS Operating system RAM Random-access memory SMP Symmetric multiprocessing TS Transaction Server Bottom Line: NT Server v.5.0 rollouts will clash with year 2000 planning. We recommend delaying widespread adoption of NT Server v.5.0. Conservative organizations should avoid NT Server v.5.0 until after the release of Service Pack Release 2 and plan on using NT Server v.4.x through year-end 2000. Type A organizations can risk rollouts during the "blackout period" from mid-1999 to mid-2000 but should do so with the appreciation that the rollout may result in conflicts for both internal and external resources and could risk the level of compliance of previously tested systems. DCP: SPA-03-4044