Re: sql plus error - usage message

Daniel Morgan wrote:

> Hans Forbrich wrote:

>
> <soapbox mode=on>
>
> But why would anyone want to utilize the full extent & capability of
> their
> license? It's so much more fun and cost defective for an organization
> to a)
> not becoime acquiainted with the tool they have purchased, b) not
> provide
> adequate training and c) reinvent the wheel and perform onging related
> maintenance. After all, if one actually used the Oracle product to
> it's
> full scope organizations would not have [as much] reason to whine
> about the
> cost of the licenses.
>
> </soapbox>
>
> If all you have is a hammer ....
>
>
> Unfortunately much of the blame for this falls on the people in
> Oracle's marketing that find all the time in the world
> to rename products ... SQL*Forms to Forms to Developer to
> Developer/2000 to Developer Suite to Internet
> Developer Suite ... but can't find the time to market Oracle as more
> than a one product company selling columns
> and rows on steroids.

Symptom! Competition finds a weakness & exploits that (marketing-wise), Oracle's marketing renames to give the appearance of something new. Seen that from inside and out.

>
> I asked a class this week to name an Oracle product ... they named the
> database. I asked them to name another ...
> two people had heard of Oracle Financials. You don't want to guess how
> many had ever heard of Spatial, Text,
> XML, and all the other things their company spent money on. They are
> totally clueless. And Oracle Ed. still doesn't
> know enough about the product to educate students 1/10th as well as we
> do at the university.

Yup. My biggest challenge with customers & students - 'do you have any clue what you really bought?' and 'why >are you about to</>did you just< spend $x million on product X when it's in the database?' Part of the blame is Oracle marketing/sales, but a significant part is customer management's attitude about "we've made up our mind and won't listen to alternatives at this stage - it could prove we made a mistake earlier and we can't afford to admit to mistakes".

While I agree that the university curriculum is very good, I think your Oracle Ed. comment is slightly unfair - many great instructors, but the market (and marketing) decides the content. Mind you, I'm biased. (Try reworking your content into 3-5 day self-contained chunks - I'm amazed by what the OU curriculum does accomplish!) It's a different brand of student and a different purpose.

/Hans Received on Wed Oct 01 2003 - 23:39:55 CDT