Re: market share numbers
Date: 1997/07/08
Message-ID: <33C181BD.1118_at_onecall.com.au>
This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
--------------5CA9452134AA Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Robbie wrote:
>
> > > Who in their right mind would post a message without thinking?
> > > When you are planning a long term investment the stability of the
product
> > > and the manifaturer can (must) be an aspect on wich you base your
> > > dissision.
> First of all i am talking about one off many aspects on wich you can base
> your conclusion so i'am mont impressed by you absolute assertions.
Oh really? Why do you think that market share should be so critical then? If the market leader has only a 30% market share this means that 70% of the market ISN'T using their product. If you are looking at standards, these aren't defined by the market leader but by the buying public. Right now that public is saying SQL is the standard, so those that don't comply don't get much market share. For those that do, it just makes it easier for users to switch between products. Even without much market share, companies can make a killing by addressing a market need. Even staid and conservative banking establishments aren't interested in market share when they purchase bleeding edge products like object-oriented databases. Perhaps you shold ask yourself why they would take a risk like that.
> Second, there is no reason to use the word "wanker".
If people followed your advice and used their right mind to think before posting I wouldn't have to tell them the way it is. But to further this topic here are two recent posts I came across that might be of interest to some - --------------5CA9452134AA Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; name="ms1.txt"Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Disposition: inline; filename="ms1.txt"
From: "Karl E. Taylor" <ktaylor_at_dragon.illusions.com>
Newsgroups: comp.unix.solaris,comp.lang.java.advocacy
Subject: Re: McNealy, take a tip from Ellison
Date: Thu, 03 Jul 1997 10:42:49 -0700
Organization: Desert Dragon SOHO Solutions
Leapin Larry wrote:
>
> Oracle and Sun both face intense competition from Microsoft.
>
Here we go with the apples and oranges again. Sun and Oracle = medium
to large company bases. NT/SQL Server = small and private company
base. Simple!
>
>
> the low end. Besides the obvious reason--customers prefer to buy both OS
> and db from one vendor if they can--one important reason often quoted by
> customers is the ease-of-use of SQL Server. Oracle is perceived by
> customers as being not as easy to use as SQL Server.
>
As an analyst that runs many operating systems, and databases, I have
never found this to be true. My customers want something that works and
works all the time. They don't give 2 hoots about who made it, or what
company name is on it. Only that it works and that they can afford it.
>
> Oracle has addressed the ease-of-use issue in Oracle8. According to the
> Standish Group, "the installation and upgrade tools for Oracle8 rival a
> Macintosh for ease-of-use." With Oracle8, Oracle has taken away one
> important competitive advantage of Microsoft SQL Server.
>
This one I will have to see to belive. I do work as an Oracle DBA and I
can't stand Oracle. To me it is a very poor design on a database
server. Also the Oracle cost factors are ludicrus. We have at one
company some $20,000 in Oracle stuff and we are paying some
$8,000-$10,000 per year for support, all to be told, "Yeah we know about
that problem, but we are not going to fix it. Wait for ver. 8 to come
out." That to me is not support, particullarly when I have to wait a
week to get even that answer. And who in god's name came up with the
idea that and Oracle DBA is worth between 60 & 100 k per year?
>
> Will we ever hear the Standish Group make a similar comment about
> Solaris: "The installation and administration tools of Solaris 5.0 rival a
> Macintosh for ease of use"?
>
> Not very likely. If you read the trade press you can see that users have
> been complaining about Unix administration tools for aeons. However, one
> thing no one has ever credited Sun with, is the ability to listen to
> customers.
>
Ummm, it is easy, and I could do it on my first try. Then I learned a
whole bunch of tricks and things to make it even easier. Also, "users"
complain about anything that does not work their way, to bad. Admins
have not been complaining they have been administering the systems.
BTW, the reason why a Macintosh is so simple is that it does not do very
much. It is great for Graphics and Publishing, but it sucks as a
"server", "gateway", or anything other then what it was built for, A
PERSONAL COMPUTER! I really hate it when people compare the Mac with a
true Mini-computer like the SPARC, that's like comparing a VW with a
Ferrari, they just have nothing in common.
>
> To stave off Microsoft Sun has to make Solaris rival a Macintosh for
> ease-of-use. Sun has to totally reinvent Solaris and make it totally
> non-unix-like. However this is one thing you can never expect the Unix
> die-hards at Sun to ever do.
>
Yeah right! If it is non-unix-like, the it is not Solaris. If it is
not unix then it don't work like unix. Again you compaire things that
should not be compaired. The OS holy war is a dumb war anyway. The
question should always be, "Does the computer do what you need it to
do?" If the answer is yes, then you have no problem, if it is no, then
you need to look at options and other systems. Simple, no?
>
> Although NT doesn't compete with any of Oracle's products, the spread
> of NT is a threat to Oracle because if NT becomes the dominant server
> operating system then Microsoft's SQL Server will likely become the most
>
Well since Oracle(shudder), runs on just about every OS out there,
albeit not Macintosh, I don't think Oracle has anything to really worry
about from NT. Oracle needs to worry about other RDBM's out in the
world. Most of which are a lot cheaper and better supported then
Oracle. BTW, Oracle is not as big as you might think, I spent 8 years
working on the east coast and only heard the name Oracle once, now
Progress is a different story, back east that is.
>
Larry
> Ellison apparently understands that waiting for Unix companies to wake
> up to the threat from Windows NT is futile: Oracle's NCI subsidiary is
> releasing next month, a new operating system called the NC OS.
> NC OS is Unix based but it is easy to use. Oracle will sell NC OS as the
> backend for their Network Computers.
>
Old news. Oracle has been, like several other companies, working on
NC's for some time. IBM has a very nice NC system, that can tie into
just about any OS you want, except the Mac of course. With an IBM
monitor is retails for about $1000. It has been out for almost 2 years
now. Also a point has been missed here, What is an NC really? It is a
system that connects to a server or Internet provider and allows the
user to run software stored on other systems. King Larry's dream is to
not have to buy software and load it, just go use it. That is what an
NC does so yes the OS in it is going to be very simple, all it has to do
is remember what phone number, login and password to use when ever it is
turned on and it works.
>
> Meanwhile, Sun is enjoying some growth in revenue thanks to the growth
> of the Internet and the PR generated by Java. Sun is resting on its
> laurels.
>
Yeah right again! Mind telling me about the SPARC E10000? How about
the new Internet servers, firewalls, and Java Machines from Sun? I
don't see anyone at Sun sitting around resting. And just for fun, go
rent "The Toy Story", Sun was just having fun that time.
>
> Analysts predict that NT will catch up with Unix in scalability and
> reliability
> in as little as 2 years. If Sun doesn't take a tip from Oracle and compete
> against NT at the low end today, there won't be much Sun left 2 years
> from now.
>
Well that is an interesting theory. Since NT runs mostly on smaller
machines and platforms, not counting the Alpha, it will never reach the
scalability of a SPARC, RS/6000, HP9000, or IBM S390. All of those
systems run sum type of UNIX, to bad Micro$oft, you have a long way to
go befor entering the big boys market. Maybe Mr. Bill should stick with
what works best for Microsoft stuff, the PC world. That is where he
made is fortune and that is what they do best. Leave the mini's and the
mains to the companies that know them the best. Sun, IBM, HP, have been
doing it for a long time, and they do it very well indeed.
>
> Leapin Larry
>
I have stated many times befor that there is no right or wrong operating
system. They all have their uses and they all have good and bad
points. If the compter is doing what you need it to do, then you have
the right OS, if it is not, then you better start looking for another
OS. Maybe a UNIX, maybe NT, maybe OS/2, maybe Mac. What ever you
deside to use it has to do what you need it to do, not have the most
market share or best or the best hype on the tube. You have work to do,
not time to waste trying to make something work that won't. If Sun, or
IBM, or HP, or Microsoft, or Oracle go belly up, so what! We still have
jobs to do, and we will do them with what ever works that we can afford
to buy.
-- ________________________________________________________________________ Karl E. Taylor CEO & UNIX Systems Analyst Desert Dragon SOHO Solutions ktaylor_at_dragon.illusions.com http://www.illusions.com/ddsoho ________________________________________________________________________ Dr. Lao "You know what wisdom is?" Little boy "No." Dr. Lao "Wise answer." --------------5CA9452134AA Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; name="ms2.txt" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="ms2.txt" From: darin_at_usa.net.delete_me (Darin Johnson) Newsgroups: comp.unix.solaris,comp.lang.java.advocacy Subject: Re: McNealy, take a tip from Ellison Date: 3 Jul 1997 17:55:42 GMT Organization: CONNECTnet Internet Network Services (619-638-2020) In article <5pgldc$6bk_at_nntp02.primenet.com>, Guy Finney wrote:Received on Tue Jul 08 1997 - 00:00:00 CEST
>Remember the ABI? The idea of shrink-wrapped software that would run on any
>Unix platform? For one brief moment the Unix community noticed the M$
>behemoth and knew what it had to do.
It noticed the PC marketplace, not necessarily M$ (back then, M$ was still a relatively small player, it had a lock on DOS, but almost no applications and certainly no Windows). What they noticed was that stores were popping up that sold software while not being affiliated with an OS or hardware vendor; this was a new and novel concept. They saw a growing market for shrink wrapped software, and they wanted in on the game. The PC was in the game (it seemed) because it had a common applications binary interface; it didn't matter what DOS vendor you used, the applications still worked (and there were more than one DOS out there). So the UNIX vendors imagined there could be a spot in the market for them, if only they had an ABI for each cpu type (ie, a 680x0 ABI, a MIPS ABI, etc). In hindsight, it's mostly irrelevant now. Except for x86, there's pretty much one commercial vendor per architecture. And UNIX apps still aren't the sorts of things one buys at CompUSA individually, they're typically enterprise or department purchases. And not just because of price, a unix user is typically more savvy, and has different software needs, and isn't going to be heading to the mall to find a solution (just like a studio photographer doesn't buy cameras at Sears). -- Darin Johnson darin_at_usa.net.delete_me --------------5CA9452134AA--