Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!newstop!sun!coherent!mrspoc!itkin From: itkin@mrspoc.Transact.COM (Steven M. List) Newsgroups: comp.databases Subject: Re: Is Unify perfect? Message-ID: <1990Jun27.170602.8596@mrspoc.Transact.COM> Date: 27 Jun 90 17:06:02 GMT References: <205@twg.UUCP> Reply-To: itkin@guinan.Transact.COM Organization: Transact Software, Inc., Los Altos, CA Lines: 69 bill@twg.UUCP (Bill Irwin) writes: >I've only been reading this newsgroup for a few weeks, but I can't recall >more than one article about Unify. Is this because I'm the only one >using this product, or because it works so well noone needs to post >articles about it? 8^) I'm torn on how to respond! Well, not entirely. I can make one statement with great assurance... Unify is NOT perfect! Whew. I feel MUCH better. Now for a reasonable answer to Bill's question... No, Bill, you're not the only user of Unify (or ACCELL or any other Unify corporation product). Speaking for the San Francisco Bay Area, there are dozens of users (that is, customers). In the Unify Users Group of Northern California, we have several dozen members in Northern California and a couple of dozen more from around the country and around the world (yup - we have members from several continents). So it's not, as far as I can tell, a lack of users that keeps communications down. So what is it? Well, in spite of having dozens of customers in my area, I suspect that this doesn't reflect a significant market share. Unify has made some significant sales/deals, but it may be that those customers are not particularly communicative (AFCAC 251, Boeing, Triad). The smaller sites certainly communicate amongst themselves (we have a mailing list for Unify related issues - UUG-dist@mrspoc.Transact.COM - that is used by people all over the country) and through their Users Groups (there are groups all over the USA - I don't know about other countries - sorry Bill). So why isn't there more traffic about Unify on USENET? Maybe Unify's products ARE very stable. Maybe it doesn't take a lot of discussion to figure out how to deal with problems in Unify and ACCELL. Or maybe all the customers are afraid of Nico :^>~ ! Seriously, I've also been surprised at how (relatively) little traffic there is about Unify products. I have no doubt that we'll hear a bit from Unify here. I'm willing to believe that their products are more stable than the competitions. Sadly, I'm also willing to believe that they have a smaller market share, and therefore a lower volume of users AND complaints. Anyone else have any ideas? PLUG FOR UUG/NC... The Unify Users Group of Northern California was formed to promote the exchange of ideas and information between users of Unify products. We tend to focus on ACCELL (IDS and SQL), but have spent considerable time discussing their databases (Unify 5.0 and Unify 2000) as well as looking at various other products (Oracle CASE tools, Sybase from an ACCELL per- spective). The next meeting of UUG/NC will feature PERL (Practical Extraction and Report Language) and its author, Larry Wall of JPL. Meetings are open to the public. This meeting will be held on July 12, 1990 at 7PM at the Mercury Room at the Mercury Savings and Loan, San Antonio Center, San Antonio Road and El Camino Real, Mountain View, California. If you are interested in coming, drop me a note so I have an idea of how many drop-ins we're likely to have. -- +----------------------------------------------------------------------------+ : Steven List @ Transact Software, Inc. :^>~ : : Chairman, Unify User Group of Northern California : : {apple,coherent,limbo,mips,pyramid,ubvax}!itkin@guinan.Transact.COM :