Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!gem.mps.ohio-state.edu!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!lll-winken!uunet!munnari.oz.au!comp.vuw.ac.nz!dsiramd!marcamd!tcnz2!greg From: greg@tcnz2.tcnz.co.nz (super) Newsgroups: comp.misc Subject: Re: Low Productivity of Knowledge Workers Keywords: pc dos os2 unix ps2 Message-ID: <164@tcnz2.tcnz.co.nz> Date: 26 Oct 89 08:22:49 GMT References: <9676@venera.isi.edu> <189@crucible.UUCP> <291@voa3.UUCP> <7971@microsoft.UUCP> <6441@ficc.uu.net> <9605@attctc.Dallas.TX.US> <3326@ur-cc.UUCP> <9716@attctc.Dallas.TX.US> <20471@hpftc.UUCP> Reply-To: greg@tcnz2.UUCP (super) Organization: Thomas Cook NZ Head Office, Auckland, NZ Lines: 57 In article <20471@hpftc.UUCP> mco@hpftc.UUCP (Mark C. Otto) writes: [ .. some deleted .. ], most of which I agree with > >It is true that the great majority of the semi-automated office workers in >business today find themselves working on P.C. products. These P.C.'s are >generally purchased for the workers by insecure and generally computer >illiterate managers. These managers are convinced that P.C. products are >the solution of choice for three reasons - > >1. P.C. hardware is cheap, so if their choice is wrong it probably won't > damage the company too much (and thus affect their rise to power). >2. P.C. software is plentiful and cheap, so that even if their choice is > far from optimal they can probably find a vendor that sells something > that they can press into service and then blame the poor software vendor > and/or their underlings for poor productivity (and thus not affect their > rise to power). >3. The "everyone else is doing it this way so it must be O.K." syndrome. > Until just recently "nobody ever got fired for buying XYZ" was the most > commonly held belief amongst managers. > This is a fairly major generalization. We have rather enlighted management, but we got shafted from the UK Head Office. Out with networked Unix solution, replace with ps/2's. Why - 1) Worldwide buying strategies count for something. In the UK market, lanned pc's are where it is at, and the global manager has been bit by Unix before. He is computer literate, etc, but has a global situation to address. 2) the bulk of users need spreadsheets and wp, and dos packages are more robust in the hands of the naive user, especially when in a small branch. 3) The airlines have some important global reservation systems. They run on ps2's under dos or os2. We have to run it. I wanted to try it under xenix but no-one was interested. 4) The age old IT managers argument - in 2000, who will be around ? IBM will. 5) Unix bad press. OSF really isn't helping the big MIS managers perception of Unix as a serious product. There are still too many individual unixes without ABI's or ANDF or whatever else to make Open Systems a believable concept. They seem more prepared to listen to IBM's promises of a coherent os2 future than 20 other vendors talking about how unix will get it's shit together real soon now. In some ways, I can't blame them. Some of this makes very good business sense, much as I hate the whole idea. Time to find a more appropriate job. I love Unix, os2 seems to be a toy. My question is - does dos/os2 have enough of the important and useful unix tools such as make, sccs, grep, awk, sh, etc, for people to work productively under ? In the UK, a workstation is a PC. I want a workstation, but a Sun or 3100 or AViiON seem to be alien to these peoples thinking. I was offered all the processing power I would ever need, and they were talking 386's. No smiley, even. Disclaimer - These depressing thoughts are mine alone. Think I'll go suicide now. -- Greg Calkin Thomas Cook N.Z. Limited, ...!uunet!vuwcomp!dsiramd!marcamd!tcnz2!greg PO Box 24, Auckland CPO, or greg@tcnz.co.nz New Zealand. Phone (09)-793920