Re: An IBM user group's final message: pwrdwnsys *immed

Rich,

Thanks for the voice of moderation ... I haven't posted anything to
the list for years (and don't view messages regularly anymore) because
of the rants that were once rampant <I didn't try to say that>

That user group wasn't really a "victim of the Internet" ... it was a
"canary in the mine" for the System i community. Most local user
groups seem to be having similar problems ... the question is ... how
do we re-energize the base?

About 11 years ago, my firm sponsored the "Partners in Education" with
our local community college ... with the intent of growing the "under
30" System i population. It was certainly an uphill fight ... with
the biggest frustration being one of lack of understanding of the
product by the faculty / public.

I was serious about the community needing to be open to new
alternatives ... where appropriate. ScoreBook.com is an attempt to
expose the System i in a new light ... please check it out & encourage
your local sports leagues to use it.

Each of us needs to find ways to remain current & bring "new blood" to
the community in order to ensure the health of each of our IT
companies. For my firm, I hope that PHP becomes a metaphor for that
re-birth.

I'm waiting to see if David posts my updated (eliminate mention of
subs & non-System i integration) ad to the midrange jobs list.

John

On Fri, Oct 24, 2008 at 11:04 AM, Rich Loeber <rich@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I hate to point out the obvious, but the article clearly points to the
fact that the information that they used to share with one another is now
easily available over the Internet. Hence, the demise of their group. It
has nothing to do with IBM's support or lack of support for the box.

.... just trying to head off a new thread of rants here.

Rich Loeber
Kisco Information Systems
http://www.kisco.com

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

John Myers wrote:

As someone who first put my hands on a System 38 in 1980, I feel their
pain ... but see this as the long-term cost of IBM's marketing
missteps for this outstanding product line ... namely, the:

- lack of product differentiation for the "i" line (or the System/38
for that matter)
- constant name changes (and the shrieking of "System i advocates" if
I don't use the name of the week) ... like the "IBM genius" who
decided to rename the operating system for the current processor ...
knowing that the next generation was right around the corner

At the same time, we must move onward ...

I've tried to post a job for a System i PHP programmer on the midrange
jobs list yesterday & have gotten a bounce message that implied that
this "wasn't a System i job". My RPG programming staff is happy &
busy, but with IBM's support for PHP on the System i, I need
additional staff with different perspectives (yes, we do believe in
promotion from within ... to anticipate the inevitable retort ...).

PHP is a great alternative for most System i shops. While it is
robust enough to develop enterprise level applications (we are
building one now), it also is great for the typical System i shop that
needs 5 to 10 web pages that expose data from the System i to selected
users on a website (we have done this with about seven System i shops
to date and have a quickly growing backlog). It doesn't have the
up-front license cost / learning curve / heavy hardware requirements
that the other primary web development methods for the System i have.

The Internet is all about servers ... the best server should win ...
both my staff and I believe that the System i is the best server ...
as do our customers.

I've never supported the "learn Java or else get ready to flip
burgers" school of thought. At the same time, we must be open to new
technologies, and embrace them when appropriate, or else we will one
day need to "pwrdwnsys *immed" too.

John Myers
President and CEO
Strategic Business Systems, Inc.
17 S. Franklin Turnpike, Ramsey, NJ 07446 USA
jmyers (at) sbsusa.com
www.sbsusa.com

Free Sports League Management - Powered by System i
http://www.ScoreBook.com

Get and route intelligence from your IBM AS/400 web site - WebSurvey/400
http://www.WebSurvey400.com

On Fri, Oct 24, 2008 at 8:15 AM, Chuck Lewis
<chuck.lewis@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


With Restart *NO ?

"A Cleveland-based user group says it's been pushed offline by the
Internet"

http://tinyurl.com/67v7fb

Chuck



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