[RndTbl] Microsoft WINS.... at MPI

[Chung, Damian]

Well I've talked to some of you at MUUG Meetings about this issue, but I'm
afraid it's a losing battle unless I can manage to show the public how there
is NO BENEFIT TO CONVERTING TO WINDOWS!

Manitoba Public Insurance is planning to convert our extremely reliable
AIX/UNIX environment into a "One vendor, Microsoft Solution".  In all of
2001, we only had 9 min of Prime-Time Down Time.

Why?  The business case is for a thin client, web based application. 

Why not JAVA?  I just sat through a presentation from Gartner Group, where
they explained how good JAVA is and how it can run in different
environments... but MPI should migrate to a .NET strategy.  Hmmmm, just
proves you can pay Gartner to skew data, and say anything you want.  When
questioned on why Gartner believed that mindshare was higher for .NET rather
than JAVA, when .NET doesn't even exist, they couldn't answer us.  

The Cost?  Estimated $50 million over 8 years.  Plus added day to day
electricity/infrastructure costs of supporting 70 Intel boxes compared to 2
IBM p680 RS/6000.

This is being pushed by some of the MPI Executive, and almost everyone in IT
is against it.  But what more can we say?  We all still need jobs.  EDS is
also pushing for microsoft... but I don't understand how you can hand EDS a
mulimillion dollar contract without an RFP.

So if you want to help fight this battle against "communism", email your
MLA, the Public Utilities Board, the President of MPI.  If Microsoft does
win,  where do you think that $50 million is coming from?

For now, I'm scheduled to start my MCSE training in a couple months.  Anyone
need an AIX Administrator?  

Thanks for reading through my entire rant.

Damian
resume available