Common thread winding through this post... At the TigerLogic Conference a few months ago, Susie Siegesmund was a key speaker. Many of us joked/suspected/(hoped?) that TL had a Rocket in their pocket. But Susie's excellent presentation really underscored both a desire and a need for collaboration amongst the MV DBMS providers. Susie and Rick Koe (TL CEO and primary stockholder) stood together to talk about such collaboration. I was reminded of the Spectrum Manufacturers' Association of the 80's. We need something like SMA again, but while Susie and Rick openly recognize the problems I'm not convinced they're willing to dedicate resources to fixing the problems. We need an independent agency to coordinate such efforts, driving the DBMS vendors to take action toward their own best interests.
As Brian suggests below that U2UG will be taking on various projects, I'm thinking such UG time might be better spent on helping to coordinate the efforts of others - UG's for other DBMS platforms and perhaps a new "SMA-ish" oversight group. This, as a separate effort from U2-specific endeavors. Similarly, rather than the DBMS vendors themselves coordinating resources for platform marketing, books, etc, I think their best approach would be to foster the creation of a new SMA-ish group, which would in turn drive the DBMS vendors to do more. > From: Brian Leach > ... the new user group board are going to be > discussing our projects for the coming year and introductory > materials/sample applications and such like are very much in > the frame. It's a shame that U2UG is the only real global MV group around. Efforts as described by Brian should be shared by those who support other MV platforms - share the burden, share the benefits. I don't think U2UG should be driving toward introductory/sample materials that are entirely U2-centric and not more generic and inclusive of the other Pick/Prime platforms. Sure, this is all about U2 here but a user group that focuses only on U2 (for something like this) would be as guilty of self-serving efforts as the DBMS vendors. Yes, of course we need better intro material for U2 but if the rest of the MV market is still suffering from a dearth of information then U2 vendors will continue to face uphill sales battles. So collaboration in the name of mutual expansion (more like self-preservation) is important. With no other central entity or authority I think this is a project that should be undertaken by Spectrum, a neutral, for-profit business, with the same motivations as the rest of us, with co-op funding from DBMS providers and application vendors alike. > So nomenclature is something we will need to address if we're > not going to confuse people from the very start. I agree that nomenclature is important but I would put less emphasis on it. If anything, let's go back to roots rather than proprietary branding: the platform is derived from Pick and Prime, let's use the terms from those platforms as the common base, acknowledging that all MV platforms have their own names for the same concept, but not trying to coerce users or vendors to conform to some new standard. The commonly accepted name of the platform is now MultiValue. Let's not, yet again, try to come up with something new. It works, go with it. Pick your battles carefully because there will be many of them, and some not worth fighting. > From that point of view, it's a pity that mvBase and > mvEnterprise exist otherwise we could carry the 'mv' > naming further as the standard, but they will be too > heavily associated with those products. mvEnterprise is almost a dead product. mvBase is surprisingly not dead but the base is too small to worry about conflicts in nomenclature. > The Pick name has fallen out of favour, and in any > case largely describes the operating system which is > viewed very much as a historic platform. Again, in creating something new there would be a stigma of an unknown. Under a MultiValue banner, the names Pick and Prime are fine as historical references. We can't run away from history and attempting to do so will only elicit suspicion. Proudly acknowledging 40 years of history in a world plagued by techno-ADD and paradigm fads might actually be a good approach. Tony Gravagno, mvWindbag remove.pleaseNebula-RnD.com/blog Visit PickWiki.com! Contribute! http://Twitter.com/TonyGravagno _______________________________________________ U2-Users mailing list U2-Users@listserver.u2ug.org http://listserver.u2ug.org/mailman/listinfo/u2-users
