I don't mean to be Ms. Doom & Gloom, but I have to disagree with Chuck. U2 has been headed towards a rest home for years. I've worked for several end-users as well as a few U2 VAR's over the years, and it's pretty apparent to me that it's on its way out. I'd really like to look at this Rocket thing as a positive development, and say, "YEAH....this is a GOOD THING", but I think it's time to strip off the rose-colored glasses. The "ostrich with its head in the sand" thing doesn't work for me any more. I wish that wasn't the case, but it is. The three companies that I have worked for since 2004 have either done away with U2 already, or are currently in the process of doing so.
* A HUGE multi-national wholesale distributor in the mid-Atlantic region with THOUSANDS of users all over the US - Unidata - they are moving to SAP. * A small division of ACS in Richmond, VA which doesn't bear mentioning (handful of users) - U2 was phased out and its functionality was replaced with SQL/SSIS. * A VAR with about a hundred government clients in TX & GA - porting users to new .NET application over the next two years and phasing UV out entirely. These are three examples of a trend which is continuing all over the country. Changing jobs in the U2 world is like jumping from one lily pad to another - no one (that I've seen) is planning to continue a long term relationship with U2 any more. Myself? I've gone back to school and I'm studying .NET development. Over the next year or two, I'm going to bid UniBasic development a fond adieu in favor of an application development If Rocket wants people to pay maintenance, they will still have to port to new O/S releases where needed, still have to offer upgrades with new features, and still have to employ U2 support people. I hate to point out the obvious but they don't have to do anything with your maintenance fees other than provide support. Upgrades are not a given. Rocket does a lot of IBM mainframe work. So does IBM. So, Rocket offering UnIverse and UnIData to existing (read IBM mainframe & mid-size) customers is not a big stretch. IBM could've done this for years and didn't. Rocket has a lot of people with ":Engineer" in their titles. So does IBM. Why is there an assumption that Rocket is going to do anything more than IBM did with U2 (nothing)? Karen Bessel Software Developer Tyler Technologies, Inc. 6500 International Parkway, Suite 2000 Plano, TX 75093 Phone: 972.713.3770 ext:6227 Fax: 972.713.3780 Email: karen.bes...@tylertech.com Web: http://www.tylertech.com Tyler is proud to be the Platinum Sponsor of The Court Technology Conference 2009 Sept. 22-24, 2009 | Denver, CO _______________________________________________ U2-Users mailing list U2-Users@listserver.u2ug.org http://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users
