No DBAs needed on AS400

[Brad Weiner]

My view of the AS/400 will always be framed by one project I heard about. The Pepsi Bottling Group in the mid 80s, was looking for a solution that would tie all of their branch offices around the country to the Bottling Group headquarters in Purchase NY. IBM of course sold them an AS/400 solution telling them, as they grew and needed more CPU all they had to do was go was buy another AS/400 and plug it in next to the others. Also they wouldn't need any pricey systems programmers.   Pepsi set up a few sites and discovered that the maximum (at the time) number of AS/400s that could sit side by side and function as one CPU was three. After that the overhead needed to keep them communicating and in sync was more than the added CPU. Although they didn't need any system programmers after the initial install, they discovered that they needed 50% more communications programmers (and more expensive than system programmers). And finally they found out that if they wanted to customize a system due to unique regional conditions, it was far more difficult than any other system they had ever used. They ended up dumping the whole AS/400 system and replacing it with HP minicomputers, which was successful enough for HP to feature that Pepsi system in marketing literature (no, they didn't mention the AS/400).   I agree with most, it's time to look for a new job. This new boss will be nothing but headaches for you and by the time they realize what a mistake they made, you'll be long gone (and they'll find a way to blame you).   Brad Weiner   From: "Jay Hostetter" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2002 08:50:58 -0400  Subject: No DBAs needed on AS400 We are going through a merger, and management is looking to eliminate = positions.  Here is a brief summary of my discussion with the new director = of IT: Director: "Back when I we were using an AS400, we didn't need a DBA." Me: "Then you probably were just using files." Director: "No, it was a database." Me: "Could you issue SQL commands?" Director: "Yes.  But we didn't need a DBA.  I guess it was just one of = those mysteries of life." My thoughts are that he is using the term "database" in the generic sense = of the word (our "files" are our database), or he was using some proprietar= y database that doesn't even begin to compare to Oracle. For those of you who know AS400s, I would appreciate some insight that = would demonstrate why he needs to keep me as a DBA. Thanks, Jay