RE: RPG is Dead? Say it aint so!

Hi List, thanks for a very interesting and readable thread and I reminded
about a couple of things:

1. You can take an "old dog" to a dog show even with scares but not if it is
neutered.
2. Back in the "old days" just before SilverLake was released the head of
the s/38 sales (the Main Frame people were selling them in those days) thank
the members of the Atlanta User Group for the most sales that IBM had had.

I don't think things have changed much and we the trench solders are the
real motivators for System i sales.
Yes, we need IBM to support us with discounts to educational customers and
small government customers (cities and states but we have to believe in the
value of the platform and go forth with our story.

I have no worries about RPG and COBOL being around for many years to come.
The confusion of all the "new toys" is important to keep the younger minds
busy and burning but when it comes down to gut data processing the reliable
languages will be with for some time to come.

Many years ago Philco Corp had a machine designed by the Institute of
Advanced Studies (IAS) and it was a real burner. However one engineering
group had thought that 1" tape drives would be more efficient. IBM had
already established the 1/2" drives as a "standard" and for that reason the
machine did not sell. Of coarse Ford bought Philco about that time and the
big business "suits" destroyed the company.

Does history teach us anything?

Jack Derham
Direct Systems, Inc.

-----Original Message-----
From: rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of DennisRootes@xxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Thursday, June 21, 2007 5:23 PM
To: rpg400-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: RPG is Dead? Say it aint so!

A comparison: Lets say that every 18 months for 40+ years the cost of
producing socks falls by 50%. At some point everyone just has too many
socks, regardless of what the fashion mavens say & do. At that point
socks sales dollar volumes would have to fall. Great management could
not overcome that simple economic reality.

Well that certainly makes a lot of sense, but I'm not sure how it applies
here. IBM's prices, (from what I've seen), are pretty steep and I don't
believe that they've captured so much of the market that everyone has too
many AS/400's. In fact, if that was the case wouldn't there be so many
AS/400's out there that I would be jumping for joy?

In my opinion, it seems to be less a factor of less sales dollars for the
same number of units as it is simply less units being sold. But I could
be wrong. =)