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IBM iSeries or Windows server?
Rabid Cougar asks: "I am the network administrator for a small manufacturing company. Our current ERP system has outlived its usefulness and we are in the process of selecting another package. Our present ERP system runs on an IBM AS/400, but there are those in the company who believe we should switch to something that only runs on Windows. My position is this: if we can find software that will meet our needs that runs on an IBM iSeries (new name for the AS/400) then we'd be certifiably crazy to move over to the Windows platform. A co-worker insists there are a ton of reasons to avoid the iSeries like the plague. I'm not trying to start a flamewar, but if you were to bet your career on this issue, which side would you choose and why?"
I would look for something that runs on some flavor of UNIX or Linux. If you pick a Windows based solution, you're probably locked into Windows. Is the same true for your AS/400 solution?
At least if you settle on Solaris, and Sun does you wrong, you can change to AIX, or Linux, or HP/UX, etc.
UNIX/Linux gives you the most freedom.
Back when you got your AS/400 or whomever recommended it, made a safe choice; because nobody got fired for buying IBM. Today, Microsoft is in that same position. Micrsoft's ERP products for manufacturing are second to none. The price point for the software scales to your business needs and the x86 hardware is comparitively inexpensive. So you could bet your job on it!
I recommend that you consider a Microsoft GP 9.0 solution for manufacturing. It's highly scalable, and like their other business solutions, you only purchase the modules you need and you can add modules seamlessly into the system as needs grow. If you're interested, check out the link in my signature, and contact us for more information.
If it currently works on AS/400, and you really need to upgrade the system, then I'd change one variable (the hardware), and keep running the current ERP. If they later wish to transition to a Windows-only solution, make sure that you get a generous time-table and enough technical support to ensure that it's running smoothly before the old system is turned off.
I'm sure that's being done, but sometimes executives get bit by a buzzword-compliant vendor, and lose sight of what's actually at risk; your entire business. Remember when Hershey shot itself in the foot over a several-month period when their SAP upgrade didn't work as well as it should have.
Note, I have no particular love for AS/400s, but I do believe in being cautious when potentially screwing up my entire environment and calling months of unpleasant work down on my head.
the more accurate the calculations became, the more the concepts tended to vanish into thin air. R. S. Mulliken
You choice chould be swayed by security; I don't know about the new i5/OS generation, but back when it was called OS/400 it had one of the highest ratings for both security and stability of any mid-range system in its market. Whether this is because OS/400 really was more secure or just too obscure to exploit is up to personal opinion.
Qsecofr vs. root, eh?
Hilary Rosen's speech was about her love of money and her desire to roll around naked in a pile of money.
It got so bad that the processing teams actually created little pieces of card that they used as tickets to ensure that they could access workflow (web-based run on windows).
The users within SI (my dept) have told us that if we ever force them to do the same with our applications, which include DebtManager on AS/400, then we can expect to be very bruised.
To answer your question, I would point out the mass of windows problems and ask someone to show anything that has gone wrong with (insert midrange / mainframe platform here) that has caused the same effect.
Good luck.
You'd be certifiably crazy to think that a Windows server would be as stable or as reliable as an AS/400 server. AS/400 (iSeries) systems are almost as hardcore as they come, and much less expensive than S/390 (zSeries) or Tandem->Compaq->HP NonStop Himalaya.
However, if you have no AS/400 admins in house, but you have plenty of Windows Server gurus, well, then I think you would be better off with Windows. I've seen the same situation with Linux. Company decides to switch servers to Linux but the admins only know how to speak Windows, disaster ensues.
... but it seems pretty obvious to me that there's a pretty reasonable way to solve this in a rational manner with a trade study. obviously, the more money at stake, the more time you'll have to be willing to invest in the trade study. as a rough guide:
/then/ ask again whether the iSeries or a windows based solution is better. otherwise, your choice of platform is already made for you.
1) write down the features you need in an ERP
2) find ERP packages which fit the bill
3) define appropriate metrics (cost of administration, expected amount of down time, etc.) i realize that many of these will be fairly fuzzy, but you can still get a reasonable idea. metrics should include both costs (upfront and maintence / tco type estimates, whether you already have admins to do the job or will you have to hire, etc.) and benefits / utility
4) map out on a matrix how each ERP package performs overall
5) pick the best ERP in terms of cost/benefit
6) if the winning ERP runs on multiple hardware platforms,
personally, as i spend more time in industry, i become increasingly agnostic: i don't care if it's linux, os x, solaris, windows, vxworks, etc. — if it's the right tool for the job, then that's what i'll use. which means os x at home, linux for work, and windows for administrivia, time sheets, presentations, etc. in my case.
How exactly could one bet their career on a decision like this?
At this level of spending, demand vendor demos and decide based on which package meets more of your needs.
If you just want advice from slashdotters while giving this little information, you'll get prejudiced "UNIX UNIX UNIX" all the way. I suspect this is your goal, though - the wording of your question suggests you have an answer in mind and you want validation.
Color me surprised.
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
So you are looking at all the ERP packages out there and have to decide on a new one. Should you then let the enviroment it runs on be a deciding factor?
I think both yes and no. Obviously you should select the package that is best for your needs considering all the factors like costs, reliabilty, likelihood of the software company to continue to exist, security, usability and god knows what more. There are enough books out there to tell you what to check.
The OS shouldn't have to matter. In an ideal world it doesn't but this world isn't ideal. Choosing one OS or the other has significant effects.
Flamewar material would be to point out that the current wmf mess would suggest that windows is still as insecure as ever. Then again you can ask wether this security hole is a risk for a backoffice system.
Then there is a question of lock-in, going for windows only solutions tends to force you to continue with windows only solutions for ever. You will loose your competent admins either because you fire them to replace them with far cheaper window admins or they will quit on their own. You will be another MS shop. Is this bad? Well not really. ERP software is usually a long term solution anyway and who can say if your company is even going to be around a decade from now? Plus a backoffice lock-in can at least be easier broken then a frontoffice lock-in.
Anyway AS/400 could be considered just as much of a lock-in choice.
Do the people who want to switch to the Windows only solution do this because that ERP package is the best or because it runs on windows?
I would personally seriously question any real software that does not run on multiple platforms. We are not talking games here wich are bound to the OS by choice of libraries.
I would also take a good long hard look at real uptime of such a solution under real workloads. INCLUDE the upcoming wmf patch and such delights as code red wich are bound to happen in the life time of your new erp solution.
AS/400 == nightmare but at least it is a nightmare you control and not every scriptkiddie on the internet.
If the choice for the new ERP system is going to be based on OS choice alone however I would recommend you get your CV ready.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
If you can find the software you want I'd suggest you stay with the iSeries. Going to Windows makes you subject to all the problems of a commodity piece of hardware and Microsoft's strange ideas of what makes a good server. The iSeries on the other hand has it's roots in a mainframe world where the hardware and OS all come from the same vendor. The result is a far far more stable system.
There are stories about AS/400s running in offices where an IBM service rep shows up and nobody in the office knows where the machine is - the last person who touched the hardware retired years ago... or even that the machine had been plastered into a closet when the office had been remodeled. These things are designed to run for years continuously without being babied or rebooted. It will make your life much easier.
Now, I'm not saying the iSeries is bad. Given infinite money, it probably makes a lot of sense for a lot of problem sets. I just can't imagine recommending one for any of the applications I've ever been involved with.
It kills me to say this, but without knowing more of the specifics I'd probably recommend the Windows boxen - or, more likely, a cluster of them. There's more than one way to get the kind of reliability you can squeeze from an AS/400, and most of them are a lot cheaper.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Do you have AS400 experts in house?
Is their an ERP program that fits your needs?
If so I say AS400/iSeries has some real pluses. I have never heard of an exploit, virus, or malware that targets the AS400. They are proven.
If you have more windows experience and you can only find software that runs under windows then go for Windows.
A unix/linux solution may not be a good choice for you. I would suggest that you start getting some in house experience with Linux.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Micrsoft's ERP products for manufacturing are second to none
Huh??? Microsoft is a wannabe in the serious ERP market - but regardless of software vendor, if you're considering the platform question, it becomes a matter of scale. If you need rock-solid reliability, high-volume throughput and widespread realtime access to the data and application, then the iSeries is the obvious choice.
Just as an example, I'm currently the IT project lead on an ERP installation. The ERP itself can run on a number of different platforms, of which we're going with the iSeries. Their collaborative gateway package runs on Windows, but our order volumes made their techies soil their shorts, so we're going with an alternative (iSeries-based) solution for that part.
If the situation here is for a low order-volume, low user base or other smaller scenario (say, for a niche manufacturer of high-dollar, low volume product), then maybe Windows becomes an affordable option. But if they've already got iSeries inhouse (both the hardware and the support staff), then they probably need that level of stability.
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
See my above comment. Win 2k3/Exchange 2k3, 6 months, 99.95% uptime, 1 total file infected by a virus, 0 security breaches. Plus I can pull up a configuration tool and, you know, it isn't...text. I can see what I'm doing and do it quickly and efficiently.
ACs are modded -6. I don't read you, I don't mod you, I don't see you. Don't like it? Don't be a coward.
The biggest problem with sticking with a 400 is the fact that the number of people who are trained to work on the things who are still in the market is shrinking at a noteable rate as there is little in the way of new people coming into it. Remember it wasn't more then a few months ago when there was a /. story about how IBM was looking to convince universities to start having programs about as/400s again.
This of course means that keeping support staff can become more expensive as the number of capable people declines, driving the cost of the system up over the years.
Keep in mind I'm probably a bit biased as I'm stuck working on a 400 as both a pseudo-sysadmin and developer at a tiny company who's codebase is hideous (lots of in house apps) which makes the 400 sometimes frustrating to work with.
here's how it works - you don't deploy new software solutions on iSeries, you go to a more mainstream platform (preferably linux/unix). But if you are entirely happy with your CURRENT software and don't want the massive pain of switching, you stick with iSeries for those applications. Got it?
I'd stick with AS/400 if I were you, especially if you have competent admins to administer it. AS/400's reliability and security is second only to large scale mainframes, and last much better than x86 when it comes to long term investment. Sure it costs a lot up front, but when you consider that system could last 7-15 years easily, it sure beats a 3-5 year price cycle of a x86 farm. Also, if the task is mission critical keep in mind that AS/400 up-time will absolutely destroy Windows, Linux and even industrial Unix systems up-time and those x86 machines will only start to approach AS/400 reliability when you start to farm the x86 machines.
Now if the ERP software your currently using is out of business, or is absoletly prohibitly expensive vs other ERP solutions, then look at all of your ERP options and pick the best one that will work for you and your business regardless of price, platform, or OS. Too many PHB's get sucked into the magical speak that comes out of the guy with the plaid suit and big shiny teeth to see if the software their actually buying will work for them. Make sure that whatever you're going to spend $100,000+ on is really going to do the job that your AS/400 is doing. Period. Call other companies using those solutions, get demos, get all the plaid suit big shiny teeth people in a room and play Corporate ThunderDome. Either way, Hardware wise IBM is the way to go when it comes to hardware and support.
In Soviet Russia, Trojan exploits YOU!
There are a great number of ERP systems that only support Windows nowadays, some of then having even been initially developed for unix. This is especially true if you consider yourself to be a _small_ manufacturing company. If you can find an ERP that both meets your needs and runs on your favorite platform, that's great, but I wouldn't make the platform the top requirement.
I'm a little cautious when it comes to betting my career on anything proprietary, but unfortunately there are only a handful of good open source ERPs nowadays, they're not really strong in the manufacturing area. ERP a real gamble. We had been searching for the "right" ERP for quite a while. Two years, dozens of employees interviews, hundreds of product evaluations, dozens of live demonstrations, a few bad selections, hundreds of thousands of dollars, and half a dozen firings later, we finally found a system that matched our specs and went "live" this week. We have mostly Linux servers, and bought a new Windows server to run the ERP and nothing else (wouldn't want to overload the thing). I hope we have a happy new year this time around.
Sarcasm aside, MS has gotten better and I like the interface, but the back end needs some work. As far as stability, I've had 2 Linux servers run from power outage to power outage, one had an uptime of over 580 days, the other ran for over 630 days. These numbers are not all that uncommon, though it's not in the best intrest to go this long without a kernel update. I'm not as anti-MS as I sounded in my first post, but I think MS has earned their black eye.
First of all, that guy who's recommending switching to Windows? Ignore his advice about everything (IT or otherwise), he's clearly uninformed, or a moron, or both.
The AS/400 (iSeries/i5) is going to do a lot more for you in the long run, with less (no) downtime and far fewer headaches involving security, and things like virii and spyware are a complete non-issue. The new boxes are even better, with the ability to run virtual machines in just about any environment you decide to experiment with, while still running those legacy apps like a champ. If there's any down side at all, it may be harder to find expertise, depending on your area of the world, since it's a low volume machine. But when you do find someone, they'll probably know a lot more than just the AS/400 and bring a lot of other real world experience with them.
You should beware that on slashdot opinions are HEAVILY skewed against Microsoft and FOR Linux. Dont bet your job on slashdot opinions... a large portion of these people DONT have jobs.
:).
Nobody has ever been fired for buying Big Iron. But thats probably not true
Youve placed options between iseries and wintel. What about others? Will you consider other architectures?
You should also discuss this with your HR department. Keeping around an iseries person is more expensive than an MCSE. These are 'hidden' costs on the iseries. And everyone already has desktops running windows on them already anyway... with an iseries server youre managing 2 different operating systems. With Wintel youre tied with Microsoft, but have options with hardware (I'd buy xseries). With iseries you run out of options, but IBM isnt going anyway. You just have to be OK with them as your vendor.
My opinion is that you should look more into the merits of the ERP system itself and the company behind it rather than what OS to run on your server. Its a little like asking which OS should I use for my firewall...
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
Yes indeed... most of the cross platform apps I've used have plenty of uptake, and I will present you with two that you've surely heard of before... Apache webserver and Open Office... both of which work admirably (except apache+modssl on windows) However, given that apache runs on everything from AIX to BSD to all the Linux based OS's out there, complaining that it doesn't run on an OS made for gaming and porn watching is like saying that your high powered Detroit diesel motor is a piece of shit because it only runs in your Peterbilt or Freightliner truck instead of running in your mom's toyota... granted most moms shop in toyotas and other small cars of that class, but if you're going to pull 50000 lbs of freight with a toyota, then you'd best go neuter yourself with a wooden ladle (less painful).
:)
I migrated my folks, friends and anyone that asked me to linux or bsd, depending on their needs... (a scant few clueless sods were put on Macs instead) but generally I've never heard them complain of instability, or machine growing slower as it aged.. Also, they were no longer allowed to connect to that "wonderful" piece of utter trash, Microsoft Exchange 2003... oddly enough, the mailservers I admined for them (free of charge, because I find it fun) did not have to constantly be repatched due to being hacked by automated wardialling scripts, constantly turning windows machines into spam zombies (its gorgeous when a windows 2003 exchange box becomes a spam relay, and gets your email domain blocked on one of the ORBLs out there... deservingly so
Anyways, I worked for a microsoft shop, and almost went nuts trying to reconcile what I knew to be true from my own work with Unix/Linux/BSD based systems and that of my closest friends and family (all of whom are or were programmers for fun or profit at some point in their lives), add to that being a linuxite since my days in computer science (where I preferred having a system I could CONTROL at levels lower than just the GUI and a dumbed down CLI that windows offered).
Stil, it is all much like the Chinese outsourcing of US jobs... shittier products at cheap prices... but is it WORTH replacing every year or more often? A few ppl luck out without having products burn out, break, fray, or fall apart... but quite often, I would rather get a free product and know it will continue to improve and that when a "patch is issued' it FIXES the issue (personally prefer freebsd for max uptime servers, but linux hasn't failed me either).
Speaking of security, you're a microsoft fanboy, care to explain why "shatter" attacks STILL work on windows 2003 even after the service pack?? I'm curious to hear your explanation, since MS supposedly fixed it repeatedly over the past 6 years (and yet, Win2k, 2003, XP are all still vulnerable to the same old shatter attacks)... How about the Windows 95 ICMP nuke patch? Anyone remember what they really did? YES, they port blocked 139. You could actually test this, by downloading a copy of winnuke and setting it loose after binding it to a local area network host (non routeable IP on same subnet), they didn't block 139 against localhost attacks until later... with another "patch" heh... Irony at its best... they claim that OSS is a "cheap solution" but the chrome painted tin car is the one labelled Microsoft, with their new and improved INDIAN IT support group... please learn Hindi or Punjabi or you won't get much help.
~D
PPS = These folks already have the AIX infrastructure in place, both in terms of manpower and software... if they are AIX friendly they can adapt to any other UNIX fairly fast. I've worked with AIX systems as well, one was a financial database sitting side by side with two windows servers used for groupware (2003 + exchange, failover cluster of 2, professionaly administered) Oddly, whenever that AIX box went down, their database would cleanly reload without losing any data.... heh... when the windows servers crashed, and often they did... especially when the pros dec
" What luck for rulers that men do not think" - Adolf Hitler
iSeries is one of the best systems made. It has the top security build from gound up and no viruses and such. You can run multiple Operating systems on in such as OS/400, Windows, Unix in their own logical partitions. It is very reliable piece of hardware and I would pick it every time over intel based windows servers. If you can afford the initial hardware cost, go with iSeries without any thought.
The platform is just something you use to run the software. Select the software first + the technical partner that will implement it for you. By far most of the cost of the whole thing will be in those two things. Hardware + os is peanuts compared to that. Then go with the platform recommended by your technical partner. If it happens to run on both windows and ibm, your ibm skills may be reusable (that's the real issue, isn't it?). That should be decided based on cost of ownership.
Jilles
See my above post as well. 99.5% is unacceptably bad performance in a production environment for a small business, much less a mid-size or larger consern. I'm not saying that wintel can't be the answer (with clustering, etc), but 99.5% uptime is evidence of an inferior solution.
What the hell are you doing choosing ERP software for your company?
I'm in a similar position, my current employer is evaluating ERP packages and then I'll get told which one we're going to. We currently run BPCS on AS/400 (iSeries). We're probably going to SAP on AIX using DB/2.
As a dev I don't get to make business decisions. I get to do the tech stuff my employer deems suitable.
As for this Windows/Unix/iSeries question, it should not be yours to make. Your job is to make what they buy work reliably. If can't or don't want to do the job then find another one pronto.
Too bad you don't know what you're doing. Or talking about.
It sounds like someone is trying to build an empire in your organisation based on an ERP implementation.
Being seen as being attached to the current hardware will mean being seen as being attached to the current software as well - and if that needs replacing, that's not a good place to be. Strategic decisions should be made on costs and benefits - but all too often it's a fashion decision taken to help someone's career along.
It is possible to run Windows systems reliably and securely, but don't underestimate what it costs in terms of hardware and handholding.
If the proposed ERP is well-known then there'll be plenty of info around - try and find people who've had good and bad implementation experiences. Any horror stories there may help any case that you might want to (by accident of course) want to make for the hardware.
As an aside to this good advice, hardware means almost nothing. Software is what matters. Don't start off limiting your software choices based on hardware. But, by all means, do as the parent suggests and don't get locked into a Windows solution either.
If you have more than 100 employees and at least two competent IT personnel, you're in the perfect position to take advantage of the flexibility of Unix or Linux. Spend the time evaluating all of your options.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
Has anyone in your company done even a qualitative risk assessment of the options? For starters, what is the cost to mitigate the risk posed by a failure of the proposed architecture and loss of mission-critical systems due to worm or virus by one of the many known vectors of infection?
Not to mention the cultural differences, but I'm sure others can comment on that.
Ask me about my vow of silence!
Well, I'm in agreement that there's a problem with the /. moderation system. How exactly does someone mod a post as "overrated" when its only received a -1 Flamebait mod? Unless you think even a flamebait mod down is overrated for a clear and concise reply to a previous post.
;) Better suppress my opinion post haste!
Oh wait, no I get it. I said something in support of Microsoft
I work at a large corporation that used to have AS/400's. They are thought of very fondly now. We have 10 NT boxes and a few AIX boxes. We do .NET development, and use TIDAL for cron type stuff over unix and nt.
NT just proves to be more touching and more changing of hardware. SQL Server just can't handle databases like oracle or mysql on unix/linux.
If you admin wants only NT and that is all they know then can them. Hire a guy that knows systems back a little further than 3 years, 'cause really that is when NT has gotten good enough to be used as a server. MS is getting better, but still doesn't come close to a UNIX box from 1993.
Plus I can pull up a configuration tool and, you know, it isn't...text. I can see what I'm doing and do it quickly and efficiently.
How the hell was the information conveyed? Pictographs? What are these characters you are reading? Title bars and vendor branded borders are not a very good reason to abandon highly configurable command line based text tools. Many of which even work on the Windows platform.
... find the ERP system that does everything you need (well, as close to everything that any ERP system can do, all businesses are somewhat different such that the ERP system needs some tweaking). Don't make software decisions of that nature based on what systems it runs on.
... make sure you have plenty of redundancy and virus protection.
... as you almost never need to change an application due to a hardware or operating system upgrade.
Once you find the system that's right, then determine what platforms it runs on.
If it's windows, take prudent precautions
Personally, I'm a big proponent of iSeries. Nothing can beat the system for stability and security.
Keep in mind, of course, that the iSeries isn't a legacy system that can only run RPG, COBOL, and the like. Current versions of the iSeries can run modern Java apps, Linux apps, AIX apps, PHP in Apache2, etc.
Of course, the even with the native applications (RPG & COBOL), you have solid investment protection
Check out http://www.midrange.com/ for more information and iSeries oriented mailing lists.
Akamai TOOK OVER the windows update hosting for a hefty sum from MS because MS couldn't handle the massive server loads. Akamai does handle, supposedly, about 25% of the web's traffic... for businesses... I'll have to dig up the article someday.
:) Counterstrike much like apache has NOT evolved codewise... it is patched, solid, stable, and people love the damn thing.
Either way, IIS5 and 6 couldn't handle it, and I'm a bit keen on stable codebase (anyone remember playing counterstrike? its a game, but a flawless example that a GOOD codebase remains a popular one even when new games with better eye candy come out, I can still fire up a counterstrike game even now, and find more servers than I'll ever be able to get booted off of for winning too much
~D (only change to CT is the inclusion of Steam Auth to prevent hacked copies of CT/Halflife from being on the network)
" What luck for rulers that men do not think" - Adolf Hitler
I've worked with AS/400s quite a bit in the past, and in my experience the damn things
are wicked stable and reliable. You almost can't destroy the things... One place I used to work
had an S/38 (the precursor to the AS/400) that was friggin' ancient and still hummed along like
a champ day in and day out... until we upgraded it to a more modern AS/400. If you could
find the old one in the junkyard still, I bet you could plug it in and IPL it today.
Anyway, with the newer iSeries, it's not like you're locked into some obscure technology
platform if IBM ever decides to kill off OS/400. The newer ones will run Linux
which gives you a nice migration / upgrade path. In fact, you might be well served
to start out running Linux on something, whether or not it's an iSeries... then if your
needs change you can scale up, down or horizontally with much greater ease than if you
had to switch operating systems to switch to a different hardware platform.
With Linux you might have to recompile everything, but it's still just Linux.
Just imagine, you start with Linux on xSeries (x86 boxes), and from there you
can scale horizontally by clustering, and/or scale up to an iSeries or pSeries
or OpenPower box, and ultimately you can scale all the way to a zSeries (mainframe). All without
changing your operating system. That's a pretty strong story, and I'm pretty sure it's
one main reason IBM is pushing Linux so hard.
// TODO: Insert Cool Sig
We just finished migrating one of our divisions from a windows ERP package to one that runs on the iSeries. We are currently in the initial phase of migrating a second. That will leave only 1 division that uses a windows solution and it will most likely be migrated also. All of this is mainly due to the iSeries superior security and ease of use.
iSeries will run Windows. You can keep the reliable hardware and use multiple operating systems, including windows, on it. If Windows doesn't meet your expectations, you can change the OS but keep the hardware. http://www-03.ibm.com/servers/eserver/iseries/soft ware/os/
Good god, note to self: a comment that says Windows is good on /. will get modded overrated for no other reason than the mod disagrees with its content (against the moderator guidelines).
Good job, mods! Show me that you're a man!
ACs are modded -6. I don't read you, I don't mod you, I don't see you. Don't like it? Don't be a coward.
Ah, the business world. A place where "reputation" is always at the fore front. By presenting an oppossing view, you are putting yourself in a terrible position. Especially if you are the chief dissenting voice. Management will make up its mind regardless of what you tell them. Heck, they have probably already decided to move to Windows, but don't want everyone to think they are rushing into it. So they let dissenters make their case.
How this affects you, is that after the decision is made, and if it isn't in your favor, then you are the "outcast." You are the "outdated thinker" who lacks the "foresight" to help the company. The rest of the group moves on to implementing the new system and you are kicked to the back of the line. Best thing to do is get pros and cons for both systems and present them evenly. When asked your opinion directly, state your preference with a few key points and then clam up. Under no circumstance would I personally advocate one system over another. You are risking being the "oddball." No sense in being a crusader and putting your job on the line.
You may laugh, but in a few months, when the new system is up and running, despite what ever problems occur along the way, management will think that you don't have the right judgement to be employed anymore. Best thing is to follow the group. If the Windows transition fails, it will be on the shoulders of the main proponents of the move. The ones you would have face head to head in a debate. They will be in hot water, and the rest of the group will go about deciding what to do, including you.
You don't have to be the advocate of the new system, but I certainly wouldn't be the thorn in the company's side. That is always a losing gamble. Let the system fail and you will quickly be realized as the wise one who said it wouldn't work. You will also be seen as the team player, who worked on a project you didn't agree with. That is always bonus points, working for the good of the company regardless of personal beliefs.
My employer is moving from one ERP system to another one on iSeries. If your Co. has expertise with iSeries' systems then stay with it. There are very few systems with the security and reliablity of an iSeries. OS/400 (and i5/OS) is object oriented by design and that contributes enormously to it's security. One idea is to keep the iSeries and use it as a DB2 server. That way you aren't locked into it if your company decides to move to another platform and are taking advantage of the iSeries' strengths. By the way, you can run X applications from i5/OS and OS/400 natively as well as running Linux, AIX, etc. in logical partitions.
One thing to keep in mind, a lot of naysayers for the system point to legacy green screen applications. When you have a platform that hasn't required extensive code modifications to keep old software running, it is common to find packages that are over ten years old. (And bear in mind that most System/38 packages can be loaded onto an iSeries and be up and running without a problem.)
It also isn't a problem to find client/server implementations of ERP packages, and I know of more than one that can be used with a web browser. I often have to point out to our users that the hardware is fine, the software (BPCS 4.05) is from the early 1990s. Ask them how they would like to get a new PC loaded with Windows 3.x, and they start to understand that the handicap is almost always outdated software. It's great, in that the company was able to truly get the benefits of an ERP package without playing the continual Microsoft type upgrade games. It's bad, in that everybody equates the old stuff with what it can do now.
I do want to know, are iSeries and Windows your only options?
Unfortunately, yes. About a year before I landed this job, our company started working with a consulting group whose purpose was to help us implement "lean" manufacturing. As a part of the process, it is quite clear our old "green screen" ERP software just won't cut it. Anyway, these guys only know Windows and that's all they recommend.
When I got into the picture just before we sent RFI's out, I got to ask our consultants a few questions. One of them was whether we were considering anything other than Windows-centric solutions. When I asked why not anything AS/400 based, they responded that the only ERP software for the AS/400 was tier-1 solutions like JD Edwards. My boss and I called BS, and found an ERP package for the iSeries that looks to be every bit as good or better than any of Microsoft's offerings (and cheaper too!). So it got included in our RFI's.
I guess what I would like to know then, is there any good reason not to go with an AS/400 based ERP system? I mean, according to everything I've seen in terms of stability and security, i5/OS makes even Linux look insecure and unstable. As this ERP system would consolidate several apps hosted on 3 different servers, downtime would mean a company-wide shutdown. I know you can cluster Windows, but what happens when you get a virus or worm in the network before the AV company updates the definitions? Can you clean it without any server downtime? If so, maybe Windows wouldn't be too bad. But then there's still the issue of 0wnership...
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All things being (nearly) equal, platform is a huge consideration. If your entire operation depends on the availability of your ERP software, you cannot afford downtime for any reason. That's the thing. We are putting all our eggs into one basket. With aproximately 200 employees and $500,000 to spend on ERP software, why should we go with a platform that has a horrendous track record on security? Sure, if you were a mechanic, you could save $$$ by buying the cheapest tools sold by WalMart. Or you could pay more for Snap-On. Saving money up front often bites you hard in the butt down the road. I'm still looking for a convincing argument that it's better to run our entire operation on a platform with an enormous risk for downtime versus one that has virtually none.
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My co-worker told me everyone she's talked to about the AS/400 (iSeries) has told her there's no way they'd ever go with one. I can't find any good reason not to (maybe it's because I have 21 years of using MS-based systems under my belt). It's more mature, stable, and secure than Windows by an enormous margin. For instance, rounded down there's 0% risk of a viral infection. Since the new ERP system will mean all our eggs will be in one basket (we're consolidating different functions being hosted on 3 different server platforms), I want to know why going with Windows will be worth the risk when we have $500,000 to invest in the system. Since you're obviously an iSeries person, are there any negatives about them at all?
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After taking a week-long course in pen-testing and seeing just how easy it is to compromise Windows boxes, and considering the ramifications of having our server broken into or getting infected, I am more security conscious than I ever have been in my life. Since the decision has been made to put all our eggs into one basket and we have sufficient money in the budget to buy pretty much whatever we want, why pick Windows over i5/OS? If /. readers can't come up with a convincing reason, it makes me strongly suspect that there really isn't one.
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I just did a 6-page report for our ERP team on the topic of stability and security of the AS/400 vs. Windows Server 2003. With nearly 200 vulnerabilities , many of which were extremely critical and/or allowed remote 0wn3rsh1p for Windows (yes, I'm counting IE 6.x vulnerabilities because it's a shell to the OS) versus 2 almost non-issues with ZERO remote 0wn3rsh1p for OS/4.x, there's no comparison. Plus, there has never been an AS/400 virus or other malware AFIK. How much money do people spend every year on antivirus and antispyware for Windows? How many programs like Metasploit that allow any script kiddie full access to your Windows server are there for the AS/400? When was the last zero-day exloit for the AS/400? Again, tell me why I should recommend we run our entire operation on Windows over an iSeries when we can afford the iSeries? What would justify such an enormous gamble?
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However, if you have no AS/400 admins in house, but you have plenty of Windows Server gurus, well, then I think you would be better off with Windows.
Here's the deal. My boss knows RPG and the AS/400. I'm the Windows guru. He'll be retiring in a few years. (BTW, we're it as far as the IT team is concerned). I can learn the AS/400 stuff. My company will send me to school if need be. So why then should we drive the company in a Yugo just because it's easy to find people with a drivers license (MCSE). As every single aspect of our business (except e-mail) will depend upon the availability of the ERP system, I cannot see this as justification to not buy the tank when we can afford it. It seems to me that lack of AS/400 skills hardly matters when 1)Then can be learned and 2) They'll almost never be needed.
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Your troll modding is non-deserved IMHO. Those are fair questions. Let me answer them
How exactly could one bet their career on a decision like this?
Well, this is a company I want to work for for the rest of my career. So as far as I am concerned, it is my career. A poor ERP decision can wreak havoc on a company. We simply cannot afford to make a mistake here. I can see various scenarios in which I would have to find another company to work for and I don't want to do that.
I suspect this is your goal, though - the wording of your question suggests you have an answer in mind and you want validation.
That's true. I've done a ton of research, but I don't have the experience with the iSeries or AS/400 that I know other /.ers have. Everything I've seen says the iSeries kicks the snot out of a Windows server. But since a co-worker told me everyone she's talked to says they'd never touch an AS/400, I need to find out if there's a compelling reason to stay away. I'm still looking for one. BTW, since the question was "iSeries vs. Windows", those who answer "UNIX!!!" need a course in reading comprehension. Either that or they just like to pimp their favorite OS whenever given the chance. It's a great platform (better than Windows IMHO), so it's hard to blame them too much.
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I happen to work for a manufacturing ERP software company and one of my jobs is to help customers pick the OS & hardware. We run Oracle, which gives me the ability to say pick whatever OS you want as long as Oracle supports it. I agree with the repeated posts that you want to pick the software package first, but after that, if you still have an OS decision to make, I suggest you choose the one that you are most capable of managing. If you like Linux, go that way.
In my experience, Oracle in particular performs very well and reliably on Windows. My company has several hundred customers running Oracle on Windows, and I can say with confidence that Windows these days is a very stable OS when run on decent hardware. If you go cheap with the hardware (like building your own), you're a lot more likely to have problems. On the flip side, you don't have to spend $100K+ on hardware to get reliability and performance. I think it's totally impractical for a small company to be buying equipment like that, and if you buy a package that requires an iSeries, your software costs are probably going to start in the hundreds of thousands, then hit you harder with consulting costs.
If you are doing your own development it's a whole different decision process based on who's doing it, but these days, that is an enormous waste of time and energy given the ERP packages out there. From what I've seen, it's just not cost effective.
If you are in fact shopping for a replacement for your manufacturing ERP system, you might want to take a look at my company's offering, as it is fully integrated into a single database, and targeted at small to medium manufacturers.
Matt Kilbride
Professional Services, IQMS
www.iqms.com
What is the advantage of a Windows cluster over a single (or in our case, probably 2) AS/400? Besides (maybe) lower initial hardware cost, how is a Windows cluster more secure than an AS/400?
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Everyone knows that when you get out of college, you have to get trained for your job anyway. So why not hire someone smart and train him/her on the AS/400 as needed? I thought the main purpose of a college degree anymore was to show that 1)You're not stupid 2)You can learn 3)You're willing to put up with a lot of BS to get your BS and can therefore put up with it at work when necessary. Besides, a professor friend tells me that 70% of all college grads are working in a field unrelated to their major. In fact, a good friend who has a degree in Political Science is a DBA for Citigroup. Since he's a smart guy, I'm sure it was no problem to train him.
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I never said I was the one making the decision. As a company, we (that means I too am assisting in the evaluation process) are considering five ERP packages, four of which run on Windows (because our consultants only know Windows) and the other runs on i5/OS (because my boss and I knew their reasons for not considering an AS/400 to be flat-out BS). I think my background is such that if I come out strongly on one side of a technological issue, my co-workers feel confident that I'm not blowing smoke. I've worked hard to gain their trust and respect, and am certainly sticking my neck out by taking the position I am.
BTW, you have absolutely no idea what my job is like or even should be like. When you work for a small company, you help out in whatever capacity is needed. In fact, today I came in to work 2 hours early in order to help with an inventory count. Do I care that it's not in my job description? NO. The fact of the matter is, the very nature of my job requires me to be somewhat of an expert in many areas.
Were I in your position, what you say would be 100% applicable. It just so happens that the one I am in is quite different.
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How is that working for you? What prompted the migration away from Windows? What ERP package did you decide to go with? Any regrets?
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Your advice is solid. Here's the thing: I'm not the only one sold on the merits of the iSeries. The decision truly is up in the air. One other thing--and this is a rarity. Our executives are smart guys. They have demonstrated many times that they will listen to others when they know that they themselves don't have all the answers (I think they would be upset with me if I knew something and kept my mouth shut). They actively seek customer input on our products, as well as the input from the gyus on the lines. The result is that we are an American manufacturer who is thriving in the face of fierce competition from China. In fact, we even make some of our competitors' products for them. I have no problem with getting 100% behind any policy we implement and I think they know it. My job is to make sure they can make an informed decision and then support it. So I don't foresee any problems.
But thanks for the advice, man. I'd rather someone give me a heads-up and then never have to deal with the situation than to royally mess things up because I never considered that which ended up transpiring.
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Thanks for the info. That's pretty impressive about allocating system resources in real time via a GUI. Without knowing anything else about the new iSeries, I would have had a hard time believing IBM would force some kind of command line green screen upon their users for administration. Given the whole Websphere/Cloudscape/Eclipse thing (Java, anyone?), IBM would have to be absolutely stupid to not make something like iSeries Navigator. So much for the "But Windows is better because you can administer everything in a nice GUI" argument. I'll have to give you a holler here in the next few days. Thanks again.
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I agree that the higher-end iSeries machines are expensive. There's no way we'd pay $100k for just one server. Besides, the $100k server would be severe overkill for our company. I mean, we're only talking approximately 200 employees, and most of our sales come over the phone via direct marketing. At present, an older AS/400 that originally cost $26k has been handling most of our back-end needs for many years now.
I just did some checking and you can buy an iSeries starting around $12k and they can be clustered. So 5 of these babies in their base configuration would cost about $60k. I think you may have to license middleware clustering software, so that price would go up. Also, I would guess that we would want more memory, a UPS, and redundant power supplies for those iSeries servers, so we'd be talking more than $12k apiece.
Anyway, it looks like the cost to get a fault-tolerant solution on the iSeries would be comparable to what it would cost on Windows. Am I wrong?
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We have a single AS/400 administrator at our (very large) company. He does nothing. Literally, nothing. Makes a good $200k/year too. Kiddies, this is where you want to be, not behind Linux/x86-64.
Cougar, Last year I took a position with an IBM VAR. I spent the next two months acclimating myself to our client base which spans four states, includes mom-and-pop shops and Fortune 100 shops, and multiple state and federal government clients. We are a Microsoft Gold partner, an IBM Premier Business partner, partnered with SuSE, Sun, Oracle, and a cornucopia of other industry heavyweights. Nothing surprised me in this job more than the number of AS/400 machines in regular daily use by our customers. For simplicity, I will refer to iSeries and i5 machines as AS/400s. Experience 1: I have one customer that bought a pair of smallish 400s in '97. This client drafted a goal of migrating some custom and ISV code to "something else" because the platform was non-strategic in 2000. Since then, the machines have failed but once, due to an exhaustion of disk space. This was a controlled failure in a sense because the machine was still functional. It apparently went into a "maintenance required" state and paused the applications. 20 minutes later, they were back on the air. This client has had more hardware failures on their pair of s/390s than on the as/400s. They have daily issues with the Microsoft servers that require dedicated staff to support. The AS/400s are supported by Unix people, except they don't remember much about administration because they don't ever need to touch the machines. It's like the old story about the Netware 3 box that was discovered sealed behind a wall after five years because renovators didn't realize it was in constant daily use. Experience 2: I have probably three dozen manufacturing clients who use AS/400's because they do not require dedicated IT administrators. They run nearly everything on the same box. The iSeries moniker is derived from a marketing label for "Integrated". They are designed to run a bunch of applications with very little administrative overhead. They are the everyman's mainframe for a fraction of the cost. (At the low end, anyway) They are capable of tremendous vertical scale for big shops that love the platform. The key niche is really the low end "park it in the corner" shop. Experience 3: I have two non-profit clients that approached my company regarding "upgrading" their single AS/400's to Windows machines. One did, one didn't. The one that did had to hire two administrators to maintain the additional servers required to run a very small ERP application. Not to mention the fact that the small ERP app required Active Directory, SQL Server, IIS, and a refresh of every Windows machine in the organization. The client that stuck with AS/400 purchased an option that allowed them to plug in blade-type computers running Windows to keep management happy. They sent them back. Instead, they dabbled a bit with Linux micropartitions. It was ok for them, but AS/400 did everything they needed it to do. In the interest of brevity, I'll stop evangelizing. In the interest of full disclosure, I'm a Unix guy through and through. I was a Windows guy but the ulcers were starting to become a real burden. I'm learning AS/400 in my spare time because it makes so much darn sense and its the best keep secret in the industry. If you're interested in conversing in more detail, ping me at scottlewis101-at-yahoo-dot-com. Bottom line: AS/400s are for champagne tastes on a beer budget. If you don't want to be an IT-focused company, absorb the initially higher acquisition cost of AS/400 and save huge amounts of money down the road in reduced complexity, staffing, and resource costs. Work with a business partner, not IBM directly. You'll get the attention and resources you need with less red tape. There are lots of trade-up incentives from the iSeries group to keep iSeries customers from making the mistake of jumping ship just when things are starting to get really interesting.