Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!bionet!ucselx!crash!scotto
From: scotto@crash.cts.com (Scott O'Connell)
Newsgroups: comp.databases
Subject: Re: subquery EXISTS()...or does it?
Message-ID: <3349@crash.cts.com>
Date: 29 Jun 90 23:53:31 GMT
References: <1990Jun22.194026.4097@midway.uchicago.edu> <9883@sybase.sybase.com>
Distribution: usa
Organization: Crash TimeSharing, El Cajon, CA
Lines: 50

In article <9883@sybase.sybase.com> jeffl@sybase.Sybase.COM (Jeff Lichtman) writes:
>
>I'm curious.  Why do people ask the net at large for technical support,
>instead of getting help from the people who sold them the product?

I ask the net at large because I've been burned/mislead by manufacturers
so many times.  I hate to name names, but Informix technical support has
(in the past) been so bad that I stopped calling them months ago.

I always got the same answer from them "It works on the "stores" (their
sample database) database so it must be your problem".  After complaining
to management they put me in touch with a responsible tech named "Gretchen".
If she didn't know the answer SHE FOUND SOMEONE THAT DID!  Not only did
she know of all the bugs I'd been having problems with (and had described
to others at Informix) she told me they were documented for the support
techs.  Why they didn't take the time to look in that database for my
problem I don't know.  Anyway, when I called once and asked for Gretchen
I found that she'd been transferred to another department.  I gave the 
tech that answered the phone a chance to prove to me that my original
six months of unresolved problems was a fluke, but that didn't prove to
be the case.

As a solo system administrator/programmer for a company with 7 SCO Xenix
based PC's I just don't have the time to go through the whole game of
finding a good support rep again.  It's common for us in the real world
to find a bug AND A WORKAROUND before ever getting a callback from the
support group of a particular piece of software.  

Once on this net I asked an Informix question and was given three different
methods of solving my problem.  I'd been through the support route with
the answer "it can't be done". 

> If you're paying for support, why not use it?

Well for me I'm paying support to get upgrades.  I've already been shown
that the support isn't worth much but I stay on the mailing list and get
discounts on upgrades.

NOTE: In all fairness to Informix, these comments are based on my previous
contacts with them.  I haven't called for support since January 1990 due
to the problems I had with their support department.

>Jeff Lichtman at Sybase
>Manager, Data Server Engineering
>{mtxinu,pacbell}!sybase!jeffl  -or- jeffl@sybase.com

-- 
Scott O'Connell - N6ZEK      UUCP: {nosc, hplabs!hp-sdd}!crash!ipars!scotto
                             ARPA: crash!ipars!scotto@nosc.mil
                             INET: scotto@ipars.cts.com