RE: 5.1 upgrade -- MIDRANGE-L

Rob said:
>They've published, long in advance, when an OS is going
>to be non supported, what OS upgrades to what, and when
>you can no longer purchase a particular OS level.

That page is here: http://www-912.ibm.com/supporthome.nsf/document/17623433

As far as I remember, IBM has ALWAYS done this; going back into the S/3
days.  They send out marketing announcements regularly; one can subscribe to
them, in fact.  http://www.ibm.com/isource

Here is the letter announcing the end of marketing for V4R5.  The message
was delivered in February, effective in July 2002.
http://www.ibmlink.ibm.com/usalets&parms=H_902-015  V4R5 was announced in
June 2000. http://www.ibmlink.ibm.com/usalets&parms=H_200-168

V5R2 announced Jun 2002
V5R1 announced Apr 2001
V4R5 announced Jun 2000, discontinued Jul 2002
V4R4 announced Feb 1999, discontinued Feb 2001
V4R3 announced Sep 1998, discontinued Dec 2000
V4R2 announced Feb 1998, discontinued Feb 2000
V4R1 Announced Aug 1997, discontinued Feb 2000

Have fun searching the announcements at
http://www2.ibmlink.ibm.com/cgi-bin/master?xh=gIcxcTlLVIuRZ72USenGnN9332&req
uest=announcements&parms=D&xfr=N  I use vr4r, v4r5, etc. to find stuff like
this.

Konrad said:
>The iSeries market is declining for many reasons,
>one of which is its success. Why change what is
>working?

and

>Where is the gui, the database support, ifs file
>system performance, and the advanced development
>environment that would set it ahead of everyone
>else not just participating in the me too java
>world? We still fight issues on a daily basis
>that stop being issues on many other systems 10
>years ago!

Erm, which should it be?  "Don't change" or "change everything"?

>Clearly people would upgrade and pay substantial
>amounts for software subscription if they were
>getting value out of it.

Working for a software vendor, I can tell you that this is simply not true.
People treat software very differently from other assets of the business.
No business I know would remotely think that they have to buy a truck just
once and never replace it.  But these same businesses revolt at paying an
upgrade or support fee for software.  It matters not one whit that their
entire business runs on iSeries and on our software, and that their business
would literally stop if the iSeries went down or our software stopped
working.  We have had customers stop paying support because they simply
didn't see the value in paying to have us here to answer questions and fix
problems and enhance the software.  Our software is just as critical to
their operations as electric power.  Oddly enough, they never think of
'going off support' from the power company.

I think the different treatment software receives is because it is simply
not a large physical thing like a warehouse, truck or a forklift.  If we
delivered our software in dump trucks I think our customers would be happier
to pay for it.
  --buck