Can JBoss/IONA Displace BEA/IBM in the Enterprise?

Anonymous queries: "It was recently announced that JBoss and IONA have entered into a partnership where IONA (who had their own J2EE certified application server) will now provide enterprise support for JBoss. Will relationships like this one allow open source projects to compete with and displace closed source commercial products. Are large enterprises likely to stop paying huge licensing fee's to BEA & IBM, and start deploying on JBoss with an enterprise support contracts from IONA."

Comments

Isn't it the tool set as a whole?

[msuzio]

I avoid EJB development like the plague it is, but from what I understand in discussions with fellow developers, it is really the integrated tool set that they like. The fact that Websphere works well with Visual Age, and the sets of management tools for it, seem to be the selling point.

I think for places with more of a limited budget, JBoss is already well suited to be the choice. Why pay uber-bucks when JBoss does the job well enough and you can spend that cash on a beefier infrastructure (so that even if someone argued that JBoss isn't as fast or whatever, who cares... I'm got a 16 CPU Dell Server running Linux that I host it on). For places who tends to spend more money (and time) on development anyway (major auto maker, name begins with 'F' and rhymes with 'ord'), IBM probably will still own the EJB biz. Not sure if IONA can change that, they're a good company but still much lower-profile than BEA or IBM. Most people know of IONA only if they had been exposed to CORBA previously, and that's still a pretty low number of developers.

Just my general thoughts observing from the outside. I hope JBoss does take off, at least then I'd know there's an EJB suite I wouldn't mind working with...

Re:Isn't it the tool set as a whole?

[Anonymous Coward]

Mod this guy up. He is absolutely correct. Two things that too many slashdotters miss in situations like this is that:

1) The best technology rarely wins in the business world

and its corrolary

2) The lowest cost option is not always the lowest cost option

First, its hardly arguable that JBoss is better than Websphere App Server. Even? Arguable, I don't think JBoss comes close, but this is opinion now. Even if it was, business decisions rarely come down to good technology. They hinge on "solutions" making "good business sense". You know what makes good business sense? Integration. IBM's WAS is just the beginning, there is a whole family of Websphere software that integrates into WAS/on top of WAS (not to mention Tivoli Security/Management software that integrates seamlessly). JBoss can't even hold a candle to this portfolio.

Moreover, cost means a lot of things to a lot of people. Dollars are the least of it, to a major corporation cost is resources, time, efficiency/productivity, and least of all dollars.

What happens when a software developer (such as JBoss) has a 3rd party supporting the package. Yes, you guessed it, good ole' pointing fingers. Customer: "IONA! MY JBOSS IS BROKEN FIX IT!", I can hear it now: IONA: "Well, that's a JBOSS software issue, open up a defect and get a fix.". Businesses (esp big enterprises) will not stand for this. What do you get when you buy IBM software with IBM support? You get full accountability. It's all IBM, you know why I know this? I've worked with and/or for IBM my whole life. This is one reason IBM consistently wins.

Let's not even get into the cost analysis when you analyze software integration (e.g. how well IBM Business Intelligence/DB2 software integrates into WAS). Oh yes, WAS integrates well with Portal, Commerce, and other EAI tools. JBoss has no such functions. It's not even a competition, on any level, see, now it comes full circle.

Re:Isn't it the tool set as a whole?

[blippo]

This is so funny:

"You get full accountability. It's all IBM."

Have you ever read an IBM support contract or a software licence agreement?

Re:Big Blue

[Anonymous Coward]

While IBM talks up "services" quite heavily, don't get them wrong -- Linux is a key part of their plans to sell expensive proprietary software.

They give away a standard and open OS, but that allows them to sell WebSphere and DB2 into shops that would never previously considered a "proprietary" IBM hardware/OS combo. If/When JBoss and Postgres start talking business away, IBM probably won't be so keep on Linux anymore.

Re:Erosion, not conquering

[j3110]

People don't use application servers, they use end products. An application server is very much similar to a kernel in that they run an application. Also, they have to provide standards like JMS, EJB containers, etc. where kernels don't really implement an interface, you just have libraries that implement an interface for cross-platform at source level. With Java, I would have binary compatiblity between JBoss and Geronimo.

What if FreeBSD's kernel was better than the Linux kernel? You would see a lot of people move toward FreeBSD (and we've seen this happen in some sectors of the market before when FreeBSD got a leg up on Linux).

My premise, that I should have stated, was that Geronimo being an ASF project instead of a project hosted by a for profit company headed by a man that has been known to alienate developers (http://www.coredevelopers.net/ incident where some of the core JBoss developers split off) has a chance of gaining more developer attention. Large companies don't donate code to JBoss, but they do to the ASF. SUN will certify Geronimo for free.

All I'm trying to say is that projects started at Apache generally have a greater following, and often better products. It's do partially to the license (corperate involvement) and partially to the Apache trademark, following, and the general trust for ASF's quality of code.