Rick Fochtman wrote:
--------------------------<snip>-------------------------
Like a few others here on the list I'm pretty sure IBM must have an
emulation (simulation, whatever) product. Possibly just about to
escape from the labs into public view.
There is no way they can leave their own staff swinging in the breeze,
regardless of their attitude to the rest of the world. Don't tell me
the company that has all those smarts can't get it done if/when they
want.
One of the advantages of being "lost" in the wilds of Australia - I'm
not privy to secrets, nor subject to NDAs, and it don't matter one
iota if I'm wrong.
I can theorise all I like ... :0)
-------------------------<unsnip>--------------------------
Theories or not, I think that ALL the posts I've seen here today and
yesterday on this issue have some elements of validity and/or truth.
In a business shop, you don't drop a process without a replacement
process or a backward path; your customers may not be ready for
upgrades or revisions; any one of a number of reasons.
Dropping the FLEX-ES program may be only the harbinger of something
better in the offing, but it leaves a number of ISV's twisting slowly
in the wind during the interrim period. IMHO, this is NOT a smart
move. And the loss of AMDAHL and HITACHI as effective competitors in
the mainframe market here in the U S of A could very well leave IBM
open to government action for monopolistic practices whether FLEX-ES
is continued, replaced or whatever. The whole area is a tangled web
and the little guys, the small ISV's, are the ones that will suffer
the most.
Time will tell, but I wish it would hurry up. ;-)
If I was in the ISV game, it might be time for me to consider
founding/joining a "group" of ISV's to get together to obtain a current
z series box with appropriate disk and tape to support their customers
requirements. There are probably just enough ISVs in Australia to do
this together. Certainly we would prefer to have our own machine. But
will we be able to afford to do so in the future?
Might be time for OEM software vendors to get together, assuming that
the emulation way is either dead or dying.
Paul Gillis
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