Re: OS/400 on a Sun unix -- MIDRANGE-L

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Brad Stone" <brad@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Midrange Systems Technical Discussion" <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, October 22, 2003 5:18 PM
Subject: Re: OS/400 on a Sun unix


> I can guarentee that 90% of the stability comes from the OS
> itself.  But, in order to pay outrageous prices for DASD,
> whatever makes one feel comfortable.

Yes, the OS which handles devices.  You go from needign to support 10 piecs
of oen type of hardware to 1000, you are introducing issues.

> Who would buy only an OS?  A lot of people.  Unix, Linux,
> FreeBSD, Windows, DOS...

Ok, fine, but you would have to make the OS/400 comparable in price.  Looks
like the target market is $0 - $700.  You better make some major sales to
make it worth it.  I would even wager that at that price range, you would
probably have to sell more individual licenses than peopel that currently
own an iSeries, to make a profit of the cost of having to port the OS.  Sure
they are doing it for PS2 in test, but that again is a SINGULR piece of
hardware they have to support and running on a similar chip.  That is not on
intel hardware with a near infinite amount of hardware configurations.

> The market is only "small" because it's only available on
> the AS/400 hardware.  The Unix market was small until
> Linux.  That's like saying the market for personal aircraft
> is small.  But make that option available to the average
> consumer and....

The Unix market was small till Linux?  You are goign to throw out that
TOTALLY inaccurate statement as your support?  Even for arguments sake let's
say the iSeries-as/400 market even had the same amount of instalaltions as
Unix ever had.  You are then basically saying OS/400 would have to be given
away for free to be successful, because in all honesty, fre was and is a
major reason Linux has gotten to where it is.

But the fact calling Unix small before Linux is totally off the mark, the
hypothetical isn;t even worth it.

> Well, then we're blaming the drivers, not the OS.  Not to
> mention the "problems" with Linux and Windows are HUGELY
> overrated.  I have yet to have any major problems.  Most
> are from users who delete the wrong file or do something
> they are not supposed to do.

And what do you think handles the driver subsystem? The OS.  The OS has to
be strenghtened not jsut against bad drivers, but jsut bad hardware too as
well as hardware that conflicts with other peoples hardware.  You ever build
your own PC?  There are a lto of motherboards out there that won't play nice
with some companies RAM, for starters and it can send your OS flaky.

> Windows offers a lot of updates, yes.  They have security
> holes, yes.  But, compare the number to the number of PTFs
> on the average CUM.  Give the hackers a challenge and
> they'll find security holes in any platform.  Windows is
> the most used, therefor it's easy to see why it is
> targeted.

Apples and oranges man, apples and oranges.  You even read what a lot of the
security holes are and patches you are applying?  Internet Explorer based
stuff.  OS/400 has no real user itnerface security issues to worry about
from browsing the internet.

> They all have plusses, they all have downfalls.  Nothing is
> impossible and in this world we seem to want to make
> everything cross-platform except OS/400.

I didn't say it was impossible.  I said I highly HIGHLY doubt there is any
cost return in doing such a venture. Oh and your beloved Windows is not
cross platform.

> Just my .02.. you don't have to agree.  Just a dream of
> mine I guess.

Nothing wrong with wanting it, but I can't see how IBM would ever make money
on it.