RE: Is IBM on the right track with IBM Community Tools?

Steve,

I think IBM has more work to do for this to really work.  Honestly, the fact
that most businesses are behind firewalls which restrict port availability
makes this pointless for the majority of users.  That they just spent the
time to download such a huge thing (that doesn't work for them) just adds to
the overall effect.....  Thumbs down.....

I though Joe Pluta's article was right on target.....

Eric DeLong
Sally Beauty Company
MIS-Project Manager (BSG)
940-898-7863 or ext. 1863



-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Landess [mailto:steve_landess@xxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, March 11, 2003 11:34 AM
To: Midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Is IBM on the right track with IBM Community Tools?


{cross-posted to IBM Community Tools newsgroup}

All -

I subscribed to IBM Community Tools (ICT) when I heard about it last month.


My question is:
If you could get to ICT while at work, would you use it?    I would also use
an ICT PollCast for this, but since I'm at _work_, I can't use ICT right
now.

I don't plan to leave Midrange-L, but I like to utilize as many tools as I
can to make my job easier.  

ICT looks like a promising tool, but because of issues regarding ports that
ICT needs to use I can only use it from HOME, I CANNOT use ICT from work.
I'll never get the ports needed by ICT opened up on our network because of
security exposures that opening these ports could reveal.  ICT support Socks
4/5, which we do not have available.  If ICT supported HTTP proxy, which we
DO have available, then I could probably use ICT at work.  

Along with several others, I posted messages on the ICT newsgroup
(community.ngi.ibm.com) about this issue, but apparently it is of low
importance to the WebAhead team and it is apparently on the back burner.

Here is an article that confirms this problem:

http://www.the400group.com/aiw/free/03-1003.html


I would just like to know how many of you are currently using ICT, and how
many of you WOULD use it if you could while at work (where you most need
it!).  You would think, given the recent press about Malcom Haines coming
back to the iSeries, that new ways of connecting iSeries users as a
community would be a priority for the whole iSeries team...

Quote from yesterday's iSeries Nework News Wire Daily:

<quote>
The best marketing campaigns, Haines said, have nothing whatsoever to do
with the technology being sold, "but everything to do with connecting with
human beings." For example, in 1995 for the launch of Windows 95, Microsoft,
among other stunts, took a group of Polish journalists out on a submarine to
show them what it would be like to live life without windows.
</quote>

See full article at:
http://www.iseriesnetwork.com/news/nwn/story.cfm?ID=16189&channel=home

Just my opinion,

Steve Landess
Austin, Texas
(512) 423-0935
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