Hi Tony , Thanks for the friendly response ;)
One comment just for the record, I may be 'up here' but the 'company of retro developers' is actually from 'down there'. Gerry -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Tony Gravagno Sent: July 7, 2006 20:02 To: u2-users@listserver.u2ug.org Subject: RE: [U2] UV - tech support Gerry wrote: > Hi Tony , > > I will probably regret this post - I never seem to get past one or 2 > before the jumping down of throats begins ;-) I pretty much regret all of mine these days, and I'm sure others do too. :^D > While I agree with what you say as far as support is concerned ( and I > still stand by my statement that there is now and never has been any > cost to report a bug to MS That is correct but rather than disagreeing with someone's experience, I know the policy that they were presented with so I stuck to that topic. Avoiding confrontation with one person makes one's statements inaccurate with another - can't win, ergo regretful postings... > , talking to a real person to find a solution can be a different story ) I must be in the minority but I have had good experience with Microsoft via e-mail and phone - I have some guys in Bangalore that keep bugging me about issues I've reported, I can't shake um! , personally I don't see access to > product documentation and knowledgebase information as even remotely > related to support. I look at it more as marketing. Why give away > the system and not give away the info ? Full agreement. When I was at Raining Data I made the same case but of course I lost the argument and to this day one still finds docs under /support/documentation/index.html. > In my case , the particular VAR I have access to ( or rather my > customers have access to ) consists of a company of 'developers' none > of which have cracked a manual since the 70's, any mention of sockets > or xml or http or services or anything post 1980 just begets blank > stares and the shaking of heads. Virtually ANY questions directed at > them have to be re-directed to IBM so what would have been a 30 second > knowledgebase inquiry is dragged out to 4 weeks. And what can we do > about it - nada. This is where the term "value-add" bears inquiry. I've had a number of discussions with others that selling software, even with a business application might be value-add, but that doesn't qualify a dealer to collect support fees. There are also many of us who do not sell applications who are perfectly qualified to support DBMS and OS platforms, but we don't qualify as having enough value-add to the DBMS providers. You have to wonder why someone in management in these DBMS companies doesn't go "hey, our policy is rather stupid, let's change it and only let qualified people represent us". The other side of the coin is that app providers and your company of retro developers up there are very leary about selling their products and services, while someone else take calls to support the end-user's platform. People get very proprietary about their customers. IMO, this situation is bad for the end-users and for the DBMS providers so I think it needs to be changed. So who decides who provides support? I personally believe third-party support providers should be certified by the DBMS vendor (IBM, RD, jBASE, LadyBridge, etc) to provide support in lieu of the DBMS vendors themselves. This sort of push-back in the channel would cause a massive political stir which everyone is afraid to endure, so it never happens. (As a complete aside I think people should be certified to use the internet, have kids, and work for the government too, but of course the same political stir prevents those initiatives from ever getting off the ground.) > I realize that that is the way it is with IBM and I lived with > quietly. I don't see the recent thread as complaining - that would > imply that there is someone in a position to make a difference within > earshot. It is just good old healthy venting and that's one of the > good things about this kind of list, you can always find a sympathic > ear even if just so that you know that you are alone in your opinions. > > Gerry I didn't see any complaining either and used the word "complaining" in a very generic sense. I just meant "think about the other side". Other synonyms maybe could/should have been better: vocalizing, venting, going on, getting bent, getting upset, etc... Regards, T http:// removethisNebula-RnD.com/blog/category/tech/mv/ ------- u2-users mailing list u2-users@listserver.u2ug.org To unsubscribe please visit http://listserver.u2ug.org/ ------- u2-users mailing list u2-users@listserver.u2ug.org To unsubscribe please visit http://listserver.u2ug.org/
