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Interex Closes Its Doors

Posted by timothy on from the compaqtion dept.

matt.cheek writes "I was just informed that Interex, the HP User's Group, has shutdown. Here's the notice on the organization's web site: 'Dear members: It is with great sadness, that after 31 years, we have found it financially necessary to close the doors at Interex. Unfortunately our publications, newsletters, services and conference (HPWorld 2005) will be terminated immediately. We are grateful to the 100,000 members and volunteers of Interex for their contributions, advocacy and support. We dearly wish that we could have continued supporting your needs but it was unavoidable.'"

15 comments

  1. So... with the I'net, is it really needed...? by ivi · · Score: 4, Interesting


    Many of us rely on Open Source and/or
    Amateur Radio communities for hints,
    tips & useful workarounds, at least
    sometimes over the life of our many
    high-tech system projects.

    This might be like the phasing out of
    the horse & bugy (except for Amish &
    others in developing worlds), ie, now
    that we have cars (at least while our
    fossil fuels last...).

    Of course, there are some folks who -
    quite rightly - relish some elements of
    the past (eg, Clydesdale horses here)
    enough to keep representative alive,
    either by restoring older machine or
    breeding, riding & showing a few horses.

    Just as worthy as enjoying a sail on
    tall ships.

    But business has to consider costs &
    RoI... not the warm glow that might
    come from doing a job well for clients
    or members.

    With a bit of luck, slices of Interex's
    support libraries or whatever they have
    will fall into the hand of respective
    communities of folks who care about the
    systems needing support.

    Maybe any users group meeting will take
    place at greener, potentially lower cost
    venues out, a bit away from cities.

    It might do some good... ;-)

  2. Backstory? by JeffMagnus · · Score: 1

    Any backstory on what is going on here?

    1. Re:Backstory? by Ingolfke · · Score: 4, Informative

      Better information can be found on eWeek and Computerworld.

      In short it looks like HP is holding a competing conference. Other user groups, like Encompass, are working w/ HP on this new conference.

  3. Seems to make sense... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    2 hours after being posted on Slashdot there are only 3 posts. Me thinks this would've happened earlier if anybody had cared enough to type up the farewell notice.

  4. Get rid of Hpux by superpulpsicle · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This OS is seriously lacking attention in the company. The patch scene is an absolute mess. Every Hp industrial strength box I have seen takes 1 hour to reboot.

    It doesn't do high end nearly as well as Aix, it doesn't do low end as well as Linux. And most would agree Solaris is better in the middle.

    1. Re:Get rid of Hpux by calidoscope · · Score: 3, Informative
      It doesn't do high end nearly as well as Aix, it doesn't do low end as well as Linux. And most would agree Solaris is better in the middle.

      HP-UX started to fall behind Solaris in the mid to late 90's, HP was starting to waffle about the future of HP-UX, while Sun was firmly committed to Solaris. In the early 90's, HP-UX seemed to be a bit more solid than Solaris.

      HP also did a good job of pissing off their customers by dumping MPE.

      --
      A Shadeless room is a brighter room.
  5. Seriously Dead! by metalmaniac1759 · · Score: 1

    With less than 10 comments on this article this thing must be Dead and Decomposed by now!

    Seriouslym, anyone using HP operating systems out there?

    Nandz.

    1. Re:Seriously Dead! by castle · · Score: 1

      Only because the organization I work for has to, it must have a large enough user base that it is a necessary platform to develop for.

      IMO HP-UX Just isn't all that exciting or robust, even to those that get excited in general about Unix and Unix-Like operating systems.

      It is similar to AIX in that it has a nice console-gui, SAM, that you can use to do almost every, and perhaps every system admin task through it. This for me is a definite plus.

      I am sad for those that may have used it extensively, and enjoyed the Interex user group.

  6. What is Interex? by AnuradhaRatnaweera · · Score: 1

    Does anyone know (or knew) what Interex is? ... ;-p

    1. Re:What is Interex? by eyeye · · Score: 1

      Not really but I used to get regular spam from them that I couldnt unsubscribe from and to an address that I would never have used to sign up to a newsletter.

      --
      Bush and Blair ate my sig!
    2. Re:What is Interex? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The major thing Interex did was put on "HPworld" each year, a great conference and the only one with an HP products focus. I attended while dot com days were still raging. It was amazing.

  7. There are other strong Unix communities about by hacker · · Score: 1

    While HPUX gets a bit "long-in-the-tooth", there are still quite a few other Unix communities that have user-centric forums and websites dedicated to their support.

    One of my favorites is UserBlue , focused on IBM and AIX solutions. They're hosting mailing lists, webcasts, conferences (with speakers needed in some cases), and lots of other resources where you can tie into other developers, users and solutions involving AIX.

    UserBlue is run BY USERS, not by IBM, and that tends to help its buoyency quite a bit, without any specific agenda to the discussions.

    I'm not sure what Sun has in this space, so I can't comment there, but their developer community and internal developer blogs are busy lately.

    If you're an ex-Interex user, consider hopping on over to UserBlue and continue to share your knowledge and experience with other Unix users and developers.

  8. HP even has one by infernalC · · Score: 1

    HP had multiple redundant user groups as a result of their merger. Before all the DEC/HP/Compaq mess, DEC had DECUS, which Compaq changed to Encompass. My guess is that Encompass simply has more members than Interex and serves the same purpose anyway. Encompass has had OSF/1 (Digital UNIX, Tru64, whatever) users for years, and, come on, HP/UX is just another Sys V derivative, right? PA/RISC is dead... there just isn't any point to this any more. AFAIK, HP/UX is no longer being pushed. If you want to spend big bucks on a computer from HP, you're gonna get VMS (maybe) or Tru64 (more likely) on an Intellish system nowadays.

  9. Prepaid admission? by phlack · · Score: 1
    I'm one of those that was scheduled to attend Hp World. Naturally, I'm disappointed that I won't be able to go now.

    The posted notice suggests that Interex is financially unable to continue. (ironically, I just received a bill from them yesterday) While that might be true for the organization as a whole, why cancel the conference? I know my company has already paid for it, and I'm sure 1000's others have as well. So unless they only got a few registrants (I wondered why a lot of the courses were still available!), and assuming the vendors and such already paid for their booths, I wonder how they could not have the money for the conference?