IMHO the docs from the better-known app server vendors are just more pretty.
In most cases they aren't actually better. The best docs I've ever seen for
applications of this kind are those for open-source CORBA ORBs - ORBacus
springs to mind. Maybe Orion can emulate those.
Lack of support? I see better answers generated on this list than I would
expect to get from obscenely-priced 24/7 technical support from a big
operation.
General sentiments (from a number of folks on this list) about IT managers
covering their ass, well, I can't but agree. :-) I'm fortunate - I work on a
small team (about 10 developers) in a small company. We went with Orion
because it was free for development, and within 2 months were absolutely
hooked. Nothing has changed our minds since. But we get the same pressure to
expose well-known names to investors, so we've grudgingly acquiesced with
experiments in swapping out Orion's webserver for IIS (even Apache won't do
'cause it's free), and have evaluated a whack of app servers for final
production. So far none of them cut the mustard, so we haven't switched, and
in the near term Orion can expect to get a $1500 cheque. :-) But down the
road we may do iPortal, since my gut feeling is that that is probably best
of a mediocre lot, and we can't avoid purchasing a "big-brand" server
forever.
We also found long ago that switching J2EE apps from server to server is
non-trivial, regardless of the J2EE dream. We've never had the considerable
time it takes to work out how to actually use one of these supposedly
easy-to-use "name" app servers.
One thing we'll probably end up doing is getting a pricey app server so we
can tell outside folks we have it, and then continue using Orion so that we
can assure ourselves that things will work. Seems stupid, but that's the way
things are.
One valid concern our business folks have is, "what is Orion's future?" _I_
don't know where they stand from a business viewpoint (revenue, profits,
business plan) and so it's really tough to know whether they'll be around in
a year. What's to stop them being bought out? For this reason we'll end up
using Orion in production to some degree, but we'll also have a shiny
stand-by app server migration plan, JIC.
Just some thoughts.
Arved Sandstrom
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Juan Lorandi
(Chile)
Sent: Friday, October 20, 2000 5:36 PM
To: Orion-Interest
Subject: RE: Orion in production
[ SNIP ]
And also, lack of support & documentation is becoming now, as most
developers are finishing
their work and reach deployment time(from what I pick up of many mails in
this list), a critical point about orion.
Many of us are reaching the point where we have to prove no only that
orion's the best, but that it also is a good business
choice. This is unfairly hard due to little colaboration from Evermind's
team regarding, as said, support & documentation,
tough it clearly seems to be changing.
Perhaps its time for a change(and I hope it's a change that will keep my
sorry a~s working with Orion ;-)
JP
