Off Topic: Novell vs. Microsoft

#11

In article <1113075855.861626.38380 (AT) o13g2000cwo (DOT) googlegroups.com>,
ddspell-m3 <ddspell (AT) yahoo (DOT) com> writes

Quote:

Scenario: Medium sized manufacturing company with 150 knowledge
workers in 7 divisions in 4 states. Dominate Network Operating System
(NOS) is an old version of Netware with GroupWise for email used at one
company. All the others are using POP3 services provided by the host
of their web site. Network Administrator (NA) is deeply rooted in
Novell products. User community doesn't have a strong preference,
although the executives appear to prefer Outlook. The next release of
GroupWise this summer will provide 100% functionality with Outlook.
Production database is D3 running on RedHat Linux.

Responding well late I know ...

Analysis
Politically, moving away from Novell Directory Services, Netware and
GroupWise to Active Directory, Windows 2003 Server and Exchange would
be easy. Going the other way, may be political suicide.

By "going the other way" do you mean converting all your windows clients
to Novell? I doubt it.

Technically, you're much better off just upgrading your existing setup.
And if your NDS setup is anything complex at all, you're likely to find
AD a pain in the neck - as usual AD is a "me too" product which,
although it's improved since it first came out, is still nowhere near a
match for its competition, other than it's pushed by MS and is hard to
ignore.

Oh - and the latest version of Novell runs on a linux core. I'd be
inclined to get a brand-new, dual-0pteron or equivalent, server with
"Novell on Linux" installed. Okay, that linux will be SLES, not RHEL,
but who cares. You can always "upgrade" the server to Win2K3 later if
you want to :-)

Quote:

The decision made will affect the company for probably the next 10
years. The company does not make huge investments in IT often. Little
or no budget for hardware, software and training.

Little or no budget ... GREAT. Once you've costed the MS solution it'll
cost a bomb. The Novell solution is almost bound to be cheaper. Oh - and
a lot of companies are on the verge of ditching MS. I know we go on
about it, but it looks if linux really is going to take off on the
desktop soon. MS will be toast if that happens.

Quote:

The goal of the company is to be turned into an attractive target of
acquisition.

Always a bad move ... but if that's what management are aiming for, more
fool them.

Quote:

Cost of moving to Microsoft would probably be about 20% higher than
expanding use of Netware/GroupWise.

Are you sure? That's probably an underestimate.

Questions
Given all this, shouldn't the company move everything over to
Windows/Exchange, including moving D3 to Windows? Wouldn't going 100%
Microsoft be the best way to go despite issues of security holes in the
Windows platform, OR would building the NOS on NDS/Netware/GroupWise be
a better way to go? Why?

If you want to be acquired, surely running your computer department on
the cheap is a plus? MV is normally reckoned to cost about 1/2 that of
SQL, and I would guess similar for linux vs MS. All the MS TCO studies
have been debunked as having been rigged, and once you understand MS's
rigging tactics you get very suspicious of their results ...

Quote:

The NA is very knowledgeable and deeply passionate about his work, but
is reluctant to embrace the all Microsoft direction. In all
likelyhood, he would quit. This would be unfortunate since he has been
a great asset to the company.

Sounds like you'd need two or three replacements if he quit. And finding
replacements is expensive to start with - cheaper to hang on to him ...

Quote:

Would staffing need to increase to handline a Microsoft solution?

See above ...

Quote:

Would server hardware costs increase since beefier hardware would be
needed to handle Windows?

Well, you're not planning to be around in two or three years time, but

expect to have to replace your existing systems now, and then when
you're *forced* to upgrade to Longhorn (or its successor) in the
not-too-distant future, expect to replace your hardware again.

As an all-Windows shop, we have now decided to buy all our kit with a
three-year warranty, and throw it out when the warranty expires - it's
the cheapest solution ...

Quote:

Does D3 run better on Linux than Windows?

I'll leave others to address the rest :-)

Quote:

Is anyone running D3 on Suse Linux?

What are your thoughts?

Cheers,

Wol
--
Anthony W. Youngman - wol at thewolery dot demon dot co dot uk
Witches are curious by definition and inquisitive by nature. She moved in. "Let
me through. I'm a nosey person.", she said, employing both elbows.
Maskerade : (c) 1995 Terry Pratchett

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Off Topic: Novell vs. Microsoft

comp.databases.pick comp.databases.pick

Re: Off Topic: Novell vs. Microsoft - 05-07-2005 , 08:14 AM