Spam RE: .Net was V8 Installations

[system]

> First, I completely agree that one of the motivations
> behind all of the frameworks is to carve out a business
> advantage. But if it were that alone, that would not be enough.
> (Mac OS X anyone?) There needs to be a good reason for a
> company to use the framework in the first place. It must provide some>
> benefit: faster code, portability, stability, ease of

modification/deployment, etc.

This is conflating strategic and tactical goals. In the end, users don't
care how long the code took to write or what benefit the developer garners
from the platform. All they want is that it is resource light, stable,
inexpensive to maintain, easy to use and well...cheap. The platform
provider's business model is market penetration, the developer lowest
cost/time to market and the end user is shortest/highest ROI. They're not
mutually exclusive, but hardly cooperative.

> If, and I stress if, the promise that clients automagically
> get updated when they login then it will help out all of
> the administrators who won't have to go from workstation to
> workstation at every upgrade/update.

You will have magically re-invented the browser interface.

> I wasn't here for it but I'm sure that when Vantage went
> client-server things got slower too. In fact, that's probably
> why some of you still run Terminal Services.

Yeah, command line Vantage was a rocket....seriously, it was always C/S,
Progress 4GL, etc...

> Right now, my users are excited about not having character-based
> screens, not having to wait until a report is finished before
> accessing another screen, being able to have more than one command
> on a screen at one time, and having a computer platform that will
> still be supported next year...

Ok, so it is occasionally beneficial to put the more esoteric discussions in
some practical context.

> And I'm sure the same complaint was lodged when the code was
> moved to Progress or even newer versions of Progress. The older,
> less flexible, soon to be outdated code is always faster.
> But let's be real, there were limitations to the primarily
> single-user VFP too. "Everybody get out while I re-index..."

Um, actually, the older code (and different product same vendor) was MORE
flexible, faster and the SQL Server backend obviated the well known single
user VFP issues.

> As for kidding oneself, how are the Visual FoxPro or Progess ecosystems?

VFP is continuing to fight an Access bird flu pandemic and, if revenue and
profitability mean anything Progress is beginning to look like MS's Dutch
Elm Disease. Sure, its not Kudzu but its hopping developer lakes like an
Asian Lung Fish. If you want to talk markets on the other hand...

> (Multi-agent systems and constraint-based coding is a
> programming methodology popular with the AI crowd and
> not really a framework for screen IO, data or network services, etc.)

Yep, that's the point. When the framework becomes a commodity, the next
generation will take those services for granted and the level of programming
abstraction will extend beyond screen, data, network, etc...

> You're starting to scare me Barry. That's sounding a little too
> Unabomber to this Midwestern guy... ;-)

Darn, I guess I'll have to make my references a little more obscure next
time...must be the curse of having two first names?

Michael

Michael Barry
Aspacia Systems Inc
866.566.9600
312.803.0730 fax
http://www.aspacia.com/

[system]

For Electroimpact, no, for we still have critical issues, among which are:

V8 Conversion corrupts 7 of our jobs with duplicate BomSequence numbers.

Right-clicking on PO Number in Dashboard and selecting "Open PO Entry
with po-#" doesn't work when PO Entry Form Cache is on.

A/P Payment Tracker brings up wrong vendor.

Contact Phone Numbers don't appear on PO Entry Summary form or printed
PO.

Throughout the year, we've noticed many performance problems, most of which
are fixed, that lead me to believe the programmers simply didn't use the
most efficient indexes. This is to be expected on a complete rewrite. But
the product went GA way too early and we've been paying for it ever since.
Our Accounting and Production departments haven't even used it much yet.
Most of our problems were discovered by researching the customization we
want to do. We've created over 130 incidents and still have 4 critical
(can't do it), 12 high priority (painful) and 19 low priority (workaround or
not important.)

But we're confident Epicor will fix all these issues... some day.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Todd Anderson" <todd.anderson@...>
To: "'Vantage @ YahooGroups. Com'" <vantage@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, November 15, 2005 8:43 AM
Subject: [Vantage] V8 Installations


> It's been awhile since anyone asked so ...
>
> Anybody out there who is up and running on V8 who considers it ready for
> prime time?
>
> If so, how large is your database? Number of users?
>
> Is this version ready for serious work?
>
> Todd
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>
>
> Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must
have already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
> (1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
> (2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
> (3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>
>

[system]

I'd have to say Vantage 8 is still NOT ready for prime-time. We are
supposed to be up and running by the end of the year, but the outlook
gets gloomier every day. There are many unresolved issues, and there
a lack of people at Epicor to address them or willing to address
them. Support has been lackluster, and difficult questions do not
get satisfactory answers. Their custom development group works from
home, and based on their responsiveness and the quality of work, it
seems like it -- oh but the pricing doesn't.

We constantly come across bugs. Support always seems to be a release
ahead, and then asks if you tried it out on that version. Of course
not, it's not out! It's frustrating because you don't know if it was
fixed in the new version, or if they just didn't understand what you
were reporting. It is difficult enough to describe some of these
bugs, without having support on a different version. They could at
least keep the current version around for testing. It ends up being
double work for their customers.

Epicor's answer to everything tends to be, use your consultant. We
are fortunate that we have a good one, but they don't know
everything. For example, most are not programmers. Along these
lines, I was on a call the other day where the head of development
was describing a fairly involved coding change, and when he was asked
if he could make a copy available, he said to contact your
consultant. There was a lot of grumbling on the call after that,
because we all knew that the implementation consultants aren't
programmers. I have yet to run into a Vantage implementation
consultant who was a skilled coder. He also suggested the consultant
could bring someone out to write the code for us. Well if that is
the case, then why even bother wasting our time showing us how to do
it in the first place?

They are also very stingy on documentation. They appear to be afraid
it will be given away to other users, while at the same time,
punishing its paying users. It seems the more complex the module or
issue, the less documentation there is.

I almost feel like they intentionally hide things or don't adequately
answer questions so you spend more money with them. Even with the
training classes (which are a whole other story) they don't give you
enough knowledge to be able to walk away and do your job.

To make a long story short, I don't feel Epicor really cares if their
customers have a successful implementation. I think they want to
collect your money, and then once you start getting into the
implementation, collect even more by making limited information
available to allow you to do things by yourself.

I would wait at least another 6-12 months for this release to
stabilize. We have been suffering with it for at least six months,
and when we go live, we will probably be suffering even more since
our business will be solely relying on Vantage every day.

Lastly, from what I have heard, most of the implementations do not go
live on time. We have already re-scheduled once, and may very well
need to again. Beware!

[system]

In general implementation consultants are not programmers / developers
- its a completely different skillset. In fact it's better if they are
not programers. Implementation cosultants are there to solve business
issues.

Gavin

--- In vantage@yahoogroups.com, "jameswi2000" <jameswi2000@y...> wrote:
>
> I'd have to say Vantage 8 is still NOT ready for prime-time. We are
> supposed to be up and running by the end of the year, but the outlook
> gets gloomier every day. There are many unresolved issues, and there
> a lack of people at Epicor to address them or willing to address
> them. Support has been lackluster, and difficult questions do not
> get satisfactory answers. Their custom development group works from
> home, and based on their responsiveness and the quality of work, it
> seems like it -- oh but the pricing doesn't.
>
> We constantly come across bugs. Support always seems to be a release
> ahead, and then asks if you tried it out on that version. Of course
> not, it's not out! It's frustrating because you don't know if it was
> fixed in the new version, or if they just didn't understand what you
> were reporting. It is difficult enough to describe some of these
> bugs, without having support on a different version. They could at
> least keep the current version around for testing. It ends up being
> double work for their customers.
>
> Epicor's answer to everything tends to be, use your consultant. We
> are fortunate that we have a good one, but they don't know
> everything. For example, most are not programmers. Along these
> lines, I was on a call the other day where the head of development
> was describing a fairly involved coding change, and when he was asked
> if he could make a copy available, he said to contact your
> consultant. There was a lot of grumbling on the call after that,
> because we all knew that the implementation consultants aren't
> programmers. I have yet to run into a Vantage implementation
> consultant who was a skilled coder. He also suggested the consultant
> could bring someone out to write the code for us. Well if that is
> the case, then why even bother wasting our time showing us how to do
> it in the first place?
>
> They are also very stingy on documentation. They appear to be afraid
> it will be given away to other users, while at the same time,
> punishing its paying users. It seems the more complex the module or
> issue, the less documentation there is.
>
> I almost feel like they intentionally hide things or don't adequately
> answer questions so you spend more money with them. Even with the
> training classes (which are a whole other story) they don't give you
> enough knowledge to be able to walk away and do your job.
>
> To make a long story short, I don't feel Epicor really cares if their
> customers have a successful implementation. I think they want to
> collect your money, and then once you start getting into the
> implementation, collect even more by making limited information
> available to allow you to do things by yourself.
>
> I would wait at least another 6-12 months for this release to
> stabilize. We have been suffering with it for at least six months,
> and when we go live, we will probably be suffering even more since
> our business will be solely relying on Vantage every day.
>
> Lastly, from what I have heard, most of the implementations do not go
> live on time. We have already re-scheduled once, and may very well
> need to again. Beware!
>

[system]

Are you upgrading from a prior version of vantage or a different system?

Frank Zeigafuse
Innovative Office Products
General Manager
Direct Phone: 610-559-6369
Email: fzeigafuse@...

Visit www.one.org to see how the world can be changed one person at a time.



-----Original Message-----
From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of
jameswi2000
Sent: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 10:01 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Vantage] Re: V8 Installations


I'd have to say Vantage 8 is still NOT ready for prime-time. We are
supposed to be up and running by the end of the year, but the outlook
gets gloomier every day. There are many unresolved issues, and there
a lack of people at Epicor to address them or willing to address
them. Support has been lackluster, and difficult questions do not
get satisfactory answers. Their custom development group works from
home, and based on their responsiveness and the quality of work, it
seems like it -- oh but the pricing doesn't.

We constantly come across bugs. Support always seems to be a release
ahead, and then asks if you tried it out on that version. Of course
not, it's not out! It's frustrating because you don't know if it was
fixed in the new version, or if they just didn't understand what you
were reporting. It is difficult enough to describe some of these
bugs, without having support on a different version. They could at
least keep the current version around for testing. It ends up being
double work for their customers.

Epicor's answer to everything tends to be, use your consultant. We
are fortunate that we have a good one, but they don't know
everything. For example, most are not programmers. Along these
lines, I was on a call the other day where the head of development
was describing a fairly involved coding change, and when he was asked
if he could make a copy available, he said to contact your
consultant. There was a lot of grumbling on the call after that,
because we all knew that the implementation consultants aren't
programmers. I have yet to run into a Vantage implementation
consultant who was a skilled coder. He also suggested the consultant
could bring someone out to write the code for us. Well if that is
the case, then why even bother wasting our time showing us how to do
it in the first place?

They are also very stingy on documentation. They appear to be afraid
it will be given away to other users, while at the same time,
punishing its paying users. It seems the more complex the module or
issue, the less documentation there is.

I almost feel like they intentionally hide things or don't adequately
answer questions so you spend more money with them. Even with the
training classes (which are a whole other story) they don't give you
enough knowledge to be able to walk away and do your job.

To make a long story short, I don't feel Epicor really cares if their
customers have a successful implementation. I think they want to
collect your money, and then once you start getting into the
implementation, collect even more by making limited information
available to allow you to do things by yourself.

I would wait at least another 6-12 months for this release to
stabilize. We have been suffering with it for at least six months,
and when we go live, we will probably be suffering even more since
our business will be solely relying on Vantage every day.

Lastly, from what I have heard, most of the implementations do not go
live on time. We have already re-scheduled once, and may very well
need to again. Beware!










Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links
Yahoo! Groups Links

[system]

It bothers me that a Tech Support call would end with "call your
consultant". I just approved a check for a ton of money to renew our
support contract. I encourage anyone getting that type of feed back to
post it on this board so we can track the level of support that is
available.



I don't want to Epicor bash, we stopped even trying to mess with V8 and
we were alpha testers. It is just too painful. This may be short sided
but we can't afford to do their architecture and code testing. We have a
business to run. We plan to camp out on 6.1 for a while and let new
customers shake the trees for a while. Hopefully they will have the
power and resolve to move this product forward.



If support now requires the hiring of an independent I suggest we form a
more public medium to voice concern, maybe a BLOG since they are "the
new forum" for general communication. It would be picked up by Google
for sure. This whole V* thing has certainly been a disappointment on my
end, while the technology is nice and it has promise it was "released"
and shown way too soon. Just one guys opinion. Anyone looking for an
alternative yet. I would be interested in what you have found.





Keith







________________________________

From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
Of Frank Zeigafuse
Sent: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 10:16 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Re: V8 Installations



Are you upgrading from a prior version of vantage or a different system?

Frank Zeigafuse
Innovative Office Products
General Manager
Direct Phone: 610-559-6369
Email: fzeigafuse@...

Visit www.one.org to see how the world can be changed one person at a
time.



-----Original Message-----
From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
Of
jameswi2000
Sent: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 10:01 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Vantage] Re: V8 Installations


I'd have to say Vantage 8 is still NOT ready for prime-time. We are
supposed to be up and running by the end of the year, but the outlook
gets gloomier every day. There are many unresolved issues, and there
a lack of people at Epicor to address them or willing to address
them. Support has been lackluster, and difficult questions do not
get satisfactory answers. Their custom development group works from
home, and based on their responsiveness and the quality of work, it
seems like it -- oh but the pricing doesn't.

We constantly come across bugs. Support always seems to be a release
ahead, and then asks if you tried it out on that version. Of course
not, it's not out! It's frustrating because you don't know if it was
fixed in the new version, or if they just didn't understand what you
were reporting. It is difficult enough to describe some of these
bugs, without having support on a different version. They could at
least keep the current version around for testing. It ends up being
double work for their customers.

Epicor's answer to everything tends to be, use your consultant. We
are fortunate that we have a good one, but they don't know
everything. For example, most are not programmers. Along these
lines, I was on a call the other day where the head of development
was describing a fairly involved coding change, and when he was asked
if he could make a copy available, he said to contact your
consultant. There was a lot of grumbling on the call after that,
because we all knew that the implementation consultants aren't
programmers. I have yet to run into a Vantage implementation
consultant who was a skilled coder. He also suggested the consultant
could bring someone out to write the code for us. Well if that is
the case, then why even bother wasting our time showing us how to do
it in the first place?

They are also very stingy on documentation. They appear to be afraid
it will be given away to other users, while at the same time,
punishing its paying users. It seems the more complex the module or
issue, the less documentation there is.

I almost feel like they intentionally hide things or don't adequately
answer questions so you spend more money with them. Even with the
training classes (which are a whole other story) they don't give you
enough knowledge to be able to walk away and do your job.

To make a long story short, I don't feel Epicor really cares if their
customers have a successful implementation. I think they want to
collect your money, and then once you start getting into the
implementation, collect even more by making limited information
available to allow you to do things by yourself.

I would wait at least another 6-12 months for this release to
stabilize. We have been suffering with it for at least six months,
and when we go live, we will probably be suffering even more since
our business will be solely relying on Vantage every day.

Lastly, from what I have heard, most of the implementations do not go
live on time. We have already re-scheduled once, and may very well
need to again. Beware!










Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must
have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder
and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links
Yahoo! Groups Links










Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must
have already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder
and Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links




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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[system]

> If support now requires the hiring of an independent I suggest we form a
> more public medium to voice concern, maybe a BLOG since they are "the
> new forum" for general communication. It would be picked up by Google
> for sure. This whole V* thing has certainly been a disappointment on my
> end, while the technology is nice and it has promise it was "released"
> and shown way too soon. Just one guys opinion. Anyone looking for an
> alternative yet. I would be interested in what you have found.

I am a consultant that has done many ERP implementations over the years but
not Vantage. In fact, I was a consultant for a short time for ASK, who wrote
the venerable MANMAN software that Mr. Caughey used to use. One of my
clients just chose Vantage and I'll be helping them again on this
implementation and we WILL use Epicor consulting.

We knew going in, and our sales rep was up-front about this, that this is
major release and that there's certainly going to be some bumps and bruises
along the way. Early adopters should not expect things to go smoothly as
pioneers are paving the way for others. The .Net framework is still
changing. Even Microsoft doesn't seem as advanced as some of the third-party
developers. .Net 2.0 just came out October 27, 2005 and Microsoft usually
gets things right on the third version - although the initial reviews for
2.0 have been good. If your company does not want to work out the kinks, by
all means, wait until 8.X. If your company doesn't mind the initial issues
and would like a chance to steer product development in their direction,
then consider moving to new releases.

However, the one thing that Epicor really should do for early adopters is to
provide reduced-fee or even no-cost consulting. Pioneers should NOT pay for
consultants to learn on the job and these pioneers already pay support for
the software so there should be no extra changes for finding bugs. Hell,
I've always thought that software companies should pay customers for bugs
out of sales commissions and support fees. It's an incentive to deliver a
better product and it keeps the reps from over promising. But I digress...

As far as taking things to a public blog, that could be counter-productive.
More users that use Vista/Vantage will mean more money for development. New
sales will need references and this is where the power is. If Epicor cannot
show a successful site then they're not going to sell new software. If they
have sites up but only after the sites were fleeced for extra consulting,
they won't dare put prospective clients in front of them. Epicor can't be
seen in the same light as the very public SAP implementation failures. I
have other clients who are looking for new ERP software and they're watching
this implementation and they're going to listen to what I say. So what is
said here does make a difference even though it's not on a public blog. You
can have the same power if/when you go to APICS meetings and threaten to
hang around the Epicor booth. ;-)

Epicor has until next Perspectives to work out these kinks and performance
issues. It will be really tough to stand up there again with a product
that's not ready for prime time.

If it's any consolation, of all of the products we looked at, Vantage seemed
much further down the road than the others.

Mark W.

[system]

I am totally frustrated with the lack of v8 support. Many times I call and I am old 'that shouldn't be happening', 'ask your consultant', or 'let me get back to you'. All answers I don't want to hear after waiting on hold for 10 minutes. And, whenever I hear 'let me get back to you', I never get a response. I have called support and created online cases several times this week, and have not had one response to any of my attempts. When I have called support, I am immediately placed into an answering machine to leave a message (yes, it is during business hours). Has anyone else run into these issues? I am starting to think everyone at Epicor is on vacation!

Keith Mailloux <keith.mailloux@...> wrote: It bothers me that a Tech Support call would end with "call your
consultant". I just approved a check for a ton of money to renew our
support contract. I encourage anyone getting that type of feed back to
post it on this board so we can track the level of support that is
available.



I don't want to Epicor bash, we stopped even trying to mess with V8 and
we were alpha testers. It is just too painful. This may be short sided
but we can't afford to do their architecture and code testing. We have a
business to run. We plan to camp out on 6.1 for a while and let new
customers shake the trees for a while. Hopefully they will have the
power and resolve to move this product forward.



If support now requires the hiring of an independent I suggest we form a
more public medium to voice concern, maybe a BLOG since they are "the
new forum" for general communication. It would be picked up by Google
for sure. This whole V* thing has certainly been a disappointment on my
end, while the technology is nice and it has promise it was "released"
and shown way too soon. Just one guys opinion. Anyone looking for an
alternative yet. I would be interested in what you have found.





Keith







________________________________

From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
Of Frank Zeigafuse
Sent: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 10:16 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Re: V8 Installations



Are you upgrading from a prior version of vantage or a different system?

Frank Zeigafuse
Innovative Office Products
General Manager
Direct Phone: 610-559-6369
Email: fzeigafuse@...

Visit www.one.org to see how the world can be changed one person at a
time.



-----Original Message-----
From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
Of
jameswi2000
Sent: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 10:01 PM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Vantage] Re: V8 Installations


I'd have to say Vantage 8 is still NOT ready for prime-time. We are
supposed to be up and running by the end of the year, but the outlook
gets gloomier every day. There are many unresolved issues, and there
a lack of people at Epicor to address them or willing to address
them. Support has been lackluster, and difficult questions do not
get satisfactory answers. Their custom development group works from
home, and based on their responsiveness and the quality of work, it
seems like it -- oh but the pricing doesn't.

We constantly come across bugs. Support always seems to be a release
ahead, and then asks if you tried it out on that version. Of course
not, it's not out! It's frustrating because you don't know if it was
fixed in the new version, or if they just didn't understand what you
were reporting. It is difficult enough to describe some of these
bugs, without having support on a different version. They could at
least keep the current version around for testing. It ends up being
double work for their customers.

Epicor's answer to everything tends to be, use your consultant. We
are fortunate that we have a good one, but they don't know
everything. For example, most are not programmers. Along these
lines, I was on a call the other day where the head of development
was describing a fairly involved coding change, and when he was asked
if he could make a copy available, he said to contact your
consultant. There was a lot of grumbling on the call after that,
because we all knew that the implementation consultants aren't
programmers. I have yet to run into a Vantage implementation
consultant who was a skilled coder. He also suggested the consultant
could bring someone out to write the code for us. Well if that is
the case, then why even bother wasting our time showing us how to do
it in the first place?

They are also very stingy on documentation. They appear to be afraid
it will be given away to other users, while at the same time,
punishing its paying users. It seems the more complex the module or
issue, the less documentation there is.

I almost feel like they intentionally hide things or don't adequately
answer questions so you spend more money with them. Even with the
training classes (which are a whole other story) they don't give you
enough knowledge to be able to walk away and do your job.

To make a long story short, I don't feel Epicor really cares if their
customers have a successful implementation. I think they want to
collect your money, and then once you start getting into the
implementation, collect even more by making limited information
available to allow you to do things by yourself.

I would wait at least another 6-12 months for this release to
stabilize. We have been suffering with it for at least six months,
and when we go live, we will probably be suffering even more since
our business will be solely relying on Vantage every day.

Lastly, from what I have heard, most of the implementations do not go
live on time. We have already re-scheduled once, and may very well
need to again. Beware!










Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must
have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder
and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links
Yahoo! Groups Links










Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must
have already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder
and Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links




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Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[system]

Well put, and in general I do agree. As a long time Vantage customer and
very active proponent I can't agree more that there is safety and
strength in numbers. What concerns me are the recent postings I see
indicating you need to hire an Epicor implementation consultant to make
V8 work properly. I can understand if you were working on a new install;
that would be reasonable, we used one and it worked out well. To
upgrade, when we are basically swapping module for module, the need for
a consultant would seem unreasonable.



While I am disappointed in the performance and some other issues
regarding how the upgrade is being handled, I can live with the delays.
I am not one to run our production environment on the bleeding edge
anyway. What does bother me is what you mentioned regarding .Net. I
understand Microsoft takes a while to get things right and with Epicor
using this new technology they will certainly pay a price as well. I
believe we in the manufacturing industry call that R&D or product
liability cases :-). I have a friend who is a professional developer and
is using .Net and echo's many of the performance based issues we have
seen posted here, and concedes it is getting better, but better is a
relative term. What he did raise concerns about is that most of the
successful cases he has seen have been done on pure Microsoft code,
client, business logic and database. He thought the Progress business
logic layer would always be a performance drag. I certainly can't speak
to that as I am not well enough versed in this stuff.



It will be interesting to see how these attempted conversions play out
and how the newbies do, please keep us all posted guys.





________________________________

From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
Of Mark Wonsil
Sent: Thursday, November 17, 2005 9:52 AM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] Re: V8 Installations

> If support now requires the hiring of an independent I suggest we form

a

> more public medium to voice concern, maybe a BLOG since they are "the
> new forum" for general communication. It would be picked up by Google
> for sure. This whole V* thing has certainly been a disappointment on

my

> end, while the technology is nice and it has promise it was "released"
> and shown way too soon. Just one guys opinion. Anyone looking for an
> alternative yet. I would be interested in what you have found.

I am a consultant that has done many ERP implementations over the years
but
not Vantage. In fact, I was a consultant for a short time for ASK, who
wrote
the venerable MANMAN software that Mr. Caughey used to use. One of my
clients just chose Vantage and I'll be helping them again on this
implementation and we WILL use Epicor consulting.

We knew going in, and our sales rep was up-front about this, that this
is
major release and that there's certainly going to be some bumps and
bruises
along the way. Early adopters should not expect things to go smoothly as
pioneers are paving the way for others. The .Net framework is still
changing. Even Microsoft doesn't seem as advanced as some of the
third-party
developers. .Net 2.0 just came out October 27, 2005 and Microsoft
usually
gets things right on the third version - although the initial reviews
for
2.0 have been good. If your company does not want to work out the kinks,
by
all means, wait until 8.X. If your company doesn't mind the initial
issues
and would like a chance to steer product development in their direction,
then consider moving to new releases.

However, the one thing that Epicor really should do for early adopters
is to
provide reduced-fee or even no-cost consulting. Pioneers should NOT pay
for
consultants to learn on the job and these pioneers already pay support
for
the software so there should be no extra changes for finding bugs. Hell,
I've always thought that software companies should pay customers for
bugs
out of sales commissions and support fees. It's an incentive to deliver
a
better product and it keeps the reps from over promising. But I
digress...

As far as taking things to a public blog, that could be
counter-productive.
More users that use Vista/Vantage will mean more money for development.
New
sales will need references and this is where the power is. If Epicor
cannot
show a successful site then they're not going to sell new software. If
they
have sites up but only after the sites were fleeced for extra
consulting,
they won't dare put prospective clients in front of them. Epicor can't
be
seen in the same light as the very public SAP implementation failures. I
have other clients who are looking for new ERP software and they're
watching
this implementation and they're going to listen to what I say. So what
is
said here does make a difference even though it's not on a public blog.
You
can have the same power if/when you go to APICS meetings and threaten to
hang around the Epicor booth. ;-)

Epicor has until next Perspectives to work out these kinks and
performance
issues. It will be really tough to stand up there again with a product
that's not ready for prime time.

If it's any consolation, of all of the products we looked at, Vantage
seemed
much further down the road than the others.

Mark W.



Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must
have already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder
and Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links




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________________________________



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[system]

Keith wrote:

> ... What does bother me is what you mentioned regarding .Net. I
> understand Microsoft takes a while to get things right and with Epicor
> using this new technology they will certainly pay a price as well.

The future of software development is frameworks. The time where a software
company writes everything from screen handling to database access from
scratch is gone. With hardware companies reducing offerings, software
companies have to protect their investments. The goal of these frameworks is
to create an environment that will run code on many (or the remaining)
hardware platforms. The way this is done is by defining an "imaginary"
platform that has most of the library functions (screen, database access,
network capability, etc.) built-in and have developers write to this
specification. This portability has a cost and that is usually paid in
poorer performance. Sun was one of the first to develop a framework like
this: Java. Those who have used Java know that the performance in the early
days was dreadful but it has gotten much better over time. (Eclipse is good
example.)

Microsoft has taken Java one step further with .Net. To develop on the Java
platform, you need to write in, that's right, Java. In .Net, you can use ANY
language that ends in .Net (C#.net, Visual Basic.Net, Cobol.Net, etc.) You
can even mix and match languages in a single application; it doesn't matter
because everything gets compiled to native .Net code and then executed by
the framework.

Java's portability is stronger than .Net because Microsoft is only
developing .Net for Windows but there is an open source project called Mono
that will let you run your .Net software on Linux, Mac OS X and some
versions of Unix. Technically you could install the Mono .Net framework on
your new Mac and run V8. See http://www.mono-project.com/ for more
information on Mono.

> ... I have a friend who is a professional developer and
> is using .Net and echo's many of the performance based issues we have
> seen posted here, and concedes it is getting better, but better is a
> relative term. What he did raise concerns about is that most of the
> successful cases he has seen have been done on pure Microsoft code,
> client, business logic and database.

That is to be expected at first, but over time, competition will bring
better performance with other technologies. I keep hearing that the database
is a wash in V8. I'm sure that the Progress layer is slowing some of this
down and Crystal is an animal unto itself.

> He thought the Progress business
> logic layer would always be a performance drag. I certainly can't speak
> to that as I am not well enough versed in this stuff.

Yes, Progress adds yet another layer to the picture. However, all is not
lost. The brilliance of the .Net client is that it doesn't care what
language the server was written in. Epicor has set themselves up so that
they can rewrite one module at a time using any .Net language. As long as
the rewrite of the original functionality is written to the same server
interface, the client doesn't care. For this I have to give the developers
at Epicor big kudos. If they actually rewrote the entire Vista/Vantage
code-base in a .Net language, they still wouldn't be done ten years from
now. The current development strategy lets them leverage the legacy Progress
code until they are ready to rewrite that module. Right now we are suffering
from the splitting of the user interface from the business logic but that
will improve as they better employ caching techniques (forms should only
reload if there is a change in the form or one of its dependencies, not for
every open).

So lift your hearts. Epicor is really doing this the best way IMHO. Other
more aggressive paths would have sunk the company just like what happened to
ASK when they tried to be the first ERP company with a GUI interface in the
late 1980s (pre-Windows 3.0!!!).

Mark W.

[system]

I agree, but reality says I can't justify the performance loss for the neat stuff. I'm going live at a new site Dec 1st and like a young boy looking at a new car I keep thinking "I could do this or that with V8". I also think about the users, lead by my boss, roasting me in an open pit and I think better of going to V8.

I also can't put a server on every desk in the company. We went the route of Terminal Services/Citrix, which has served us very well. I can't afford to run 3-10 V8 users on one maxed out Terminal server compared to 40 plus users on 6.1. This may change but being a previous victim of Epicors SQL Server promises... I am not very hopeful. I'm still scratching my head wondering what happened to putting all the work on application server where it belongs? With SQL Server, the Priority Dispatch Report took 45 minutes to run instead of 30 seconds. Epicors said that was acceptable. I say it was unusable.

It all comes down to that one users we all have that says... why is it better that on vantage 6.1 the screen opened instantly and on V8 I have to wait 60 - 120 seconds. An eternity for someone who uses many parts of vantage.

Now, after my ramblings... I will say, Thanks to Epicor. I know they have worked very hard to bring us the best possible application and are working on solving these issues.

Jeremy

-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Wonsil <mark_wonsil@...>
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thu, 17 Nov 2005 16:57:52 -0500
Subject: [Vantage] .Net was V8 Installations


Keith wrote:

> ... What does bother me is what you mentioned regarding .Net. I
> understand Microsoft takes a while to get things right and with Epicor
> using this new technology they will certainly pay a price as well.

The future of software development is frameworks. The time where a software
company writes everything from screen handling to database access from
scratch is gone. With hardware companies reducing offerings, software
companies have to protect their investments. The goal of these frameworks is
to create an environment that will run code on many (or the remaining)
hardware platforms. The way this is done is by defining an "imaginary"
platform that has most of the library functions (screen, database access,
network capability, etc.) built-in and have developers write to this
specification. This portability has a cost and that is usually paid in
poorer performance. Sun was one of the first to develop a framework like
this: Java. Those who have used Java know that the performance in the early
days was dreadful but it has gotten much better over time. (Eclipse is good
example.)

Microsoft has taken Java one step further with .Net. To develop on the Java
platform, you need to write in, that's right, Java. In .Net, you can use ANY
language that ends in .Net (C#.net, Visual Basic.Net, Cobol.Net, etc.) You
can even mix and match languages in a single application; it doesn't matter
because everything gets compiled to native .Net code and then executed by
the framework.

Java's portability is stronger than .Net because Microsoft is only
developing .Net for Windows but there is an open source project called Mono
that will let you run your .Net software on Linux, Mac OS X and some
versions of Unix. Technically you could install the Mono .Net framework on
your new Mac and run V8. See http://www.mono-project.com/ for more
information on Mono.

> ... I have a friend who is a professional developer and
> is using .Net and echo's many of the performance based issues we have
> seen posted here, and concedes it is getting better, but better is a
> relative term. What he did raise concerns about is that most of the
> successful cases he has seen have been done on pure Microsoft code,
> client, business logic and database.

That is to be expected at first, but over time, competition will bring
better performance with other technologies. I keep hearing that the database
is a wash in V8. I'm sure that the Progress layer is slowing some of this
down and Crystal is an animal unto itself.

> He thought the Progress business
> logic layer would always be a performance drag. I certainly can't speak
> to that as I am not well enough versed in this stuff.

Yes, Progress adds yet another layer to the picture. However, all is not
lost. The brilliance of the .Net client is that it doesn't care what
language the server was written in. Epicor has set themselves up so that
they can rewrite one module at a time using any .Net language. As long as
the rewrite of the original functionality is written to the same server
interface, the client doesn't care. For this I have to give the developers
at Epicor big kudos. If they actually rewrote the entire Vista/Vantage
code-base in a .Net language, they still wouldn't be done ten years from
now. The current development strategy lets them leverage the legacy Progress
code until they are ready to rewrite that module. Right now we are suffering
from the splitting of the user interface from the business logic but that
will improve as they better employ caching techniques (forms should only
reload if there is a change in the form or one of its dependencies, not for
every open).

So lift your hearts. Epicor is really doing this the best way IMHO. Other
more aggressive paths would have sunk the company just like what happened to
ASK when they tried to be the first ERP company with a GUI interface in the
late 1980s (pre-Windows 3.0!!!).

Mark W.


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[system]

Ok, so I couldn't resist wading in...

> The future of software development is frameworks.
> The time where a software company writes everything
> from screen handling to database access from scratch is gone.

This has been true for decades. Developers have been using pre-built
collections of code to abstract their work from the complexities of low
level system interaction ever since they abandoned assembler as the language
of choice. The current "framework" hysteria is more about controlling the
purse strings than providing a sound technical foundation.

During the rise of the PC era it was sacrosanct that the OS was the
"platform" and he who controlled the platform ruled the market. Along came
bad old Java and suddenly the "platform" became the framework as SUN sought
to make the OS irrelevant by making the platform OS neutral. After failed
attempts to technically and legally co-opt the new platform, MS embarked
upon an enormous effort to supplant the new platform by creating a platform
framework of their own. So goes the "framework" as platform.

> The goal of these frameworks is to create an
> environment that will run code on many (or the remaining)
> hardware platforms.

Regardless of their individual technical idiosyncrasies, the goal of these
frameworks is to maintain a dominant technical platform for the controlling
vendor into the next decade. The fact that one may be OS agnostic while the
other is language agnostic is, in the long run, fun for marketers and makes
great fodder for developer quibbling but is worth little else.

Sure empowering developers with more efficient means to develop and deploy
software is a noble goal for the developer but is it worthwhile uber alles?
Just look at all of the self flagellating hoopla that has preceded the
actual wide spread deployment of .NET, SOA, Web Services, et al... Vantage
8 users are getting a first hand look at what it means to have to run four
(count them, four) server processes just to get their database to
communicate with their presentation layer. And what a presentation layer it
is, business logic fed from the app server tier into a runtime JIT compiled
CLR code base that has to engage in an array of caching schemes just to have
sub-par performance? Can you really excite your user base by noting the
fact that the GUI can be quickly modified in any number of available
languages while they quietly ossify waiting for a traveler? In fact, if you
really want to watch heads explode, just mention that most, albeit not all,
of the cool new user modifiability available to Vantage users for the first
time in V8 was available in Vista 4 running on Visual FoxPro over a DECADE
ago and it was fast.

Ok, I know, VFP is hardly the future and .NET/SOA/Frameworks will be
technically viable for at least the next half decade if not more. But as
far as this new platform having a lock on the future, don't kid yourself.
There are several new technologies leveraging to be the next platform of
choice: multi-agent systems, constraint based code building and, in the near
term, web 2.0 technologies like AJAX are moving to make the current
platforms obsolete.

That's it, I'm off to my cabin in Montana to write a disjointed monograph
about the evils of technology and code Fortran on my Osborne One. What?
Oh, I guess it's been done...

Michael

Michael Barry
Aspacia Systems Inc
866.566.9600
312.803.0730 fax
http://www.aspacia.com/

[system]

I just want to thank all of you for your insight into this situation...my
boss is a technically-oriented fellow, and I am happy to have all of this
ammo for the "wait and watch" view. I especially don't want to be roasted
on the spit of "shoulda waited" just because I can use twenty-seven
languages while I wait for the quote worksheet to calculate.

Having problems with a couple of users right now in 6.1 and speed issues
because no matter what I do to the registry, I can't get it to take less
than 45 seconds to log on, and opening the quote module takes 15-20. I've
un-installed progress and cleaned the registry three times, gonna give it up
and reformat the hard drive next week. I can't imagine what it would be
like for that to be the normal way things work. I'd be working at the new
Sam's club in a month.

Anyway, thanks again for this thread for those of us who are not so deeply
technical.

Lydia

-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Barry [mailto:mbarry@...]
Sent: Friday, November 18, 2005 8:02 AM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [Vantage] .Net was V8 Installations


Ok, so I couldn't resist wading in...

> The future of software development is frameworks.
> The time where a software company writes everything
> from screen handling to database access from scratch is gone.

This has been true for decades. Developers have been using pre-built
collections of code to abstract their work from the complexities of low
level system interaction ever since they abandoned assembler as the language
of choice. The current "framework" hysteria is more about controlling the
purse strings than providing a sound technical foundation.

During the rise of the PC era it was sacrosanct that the OS was the
"platform" and he who controlled the platform ruled the market. Along came
bad old Java and suddenly the "platform" became the framework as SUN sought
to make the OS irrelevant by making the platform OS neutral. After failed
attempts to technically and legally co-opt the new platform, MS embarked
upon an enormous effort to supplant the new platform by creating a platform
framework of their own. So goes the "framework" as platform.

> The goal of these frameworks is to create an
> environment that will run code on many (or the remaining)
> hardware platforms.

Regardless of their individual technical idiosyncrasies, the goal of these
frameworks is to maintain a dominant technical platform for the controlling
vendor into the next decade. The fact that one may be OS agnostic while the
other is language agnostic is, in the long run, fun for marketers and makes
great fodder for developer quibbling but is worth little else.

Sure empowering developers with more efficient means to develop and deploy
software is a noble goal for the developer but is it worthwhile uber alles?
Just look at all of the self flagellating hoopla that has preceded the
actual wide spread deployment of .NET, SOA, Web Services, et al... Vantage
8 users are getting a first hand look at what it means to have to run four
(count them, four) server processes just to get their database to
communicate with their presentation layer. And what a presentation layer it
is, business logic fed from the app server tier into a runtime JIT compiled
CLR code base that has to engage in an array of caching schemes just to have
sub-par performance? Can you really excite your user base by noting the
fact that the GUI can be quickly modified in any number of available
languages while they quietly ossify waiting for a traveler? In fact, if you
really want to watch heads explode, just mention that most, albeit not all,
of the cool new user modifiability available to Vantage users for the first
time in V8 was available in Vista 4 running on Visual FoxPro over a DECADE
ago and it was fast.

Ok, I know, VFP is hardly the future and .NET/SOA/Frameworks will be
technically viable for at least the next half decade if not more. But as
far as this new platform having a lock on the future, don't kid yourself.
There are several new technologies leveraging to be the next platform of
choice: multi-agent systems, constraint based code building and, in the near
term, web 2.0 technologies like AJAX are moving to make the current
platforms obsolete.

That's it, I'm off to my cabin in Montana to write a disjointed monograph
about the evils of technology and code Fortran on my Osborne One. What?
Oh, I guess it's been done...

Michael

Michael Barry
Aspacia Systems Inc
866.566.9600
312.803.0730 fax
http://www.aspacia.com/

[system]

==========
I can't get it to take less than 45 seconds to log on,
==========

Just incase you haven't already....have you tried clicking on the splash screen to make it go away? We used to wait a very consistant 45 seconds to get the login screen - usually right after the splash screen went away. Thanks to a post here we now routinely click once on the splash screen, it goes away and the login screen pops up a couple seconds later. Only gotcha....you then, most of the time, have to click in the username field before typing. Small price ot pay for faster login.

-Todd C.

-----Original Message-----
From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com]On Behalf Of Lydia Coffman
Sent: Friday, November 18, 2005 10:41 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: RE: [Vantage] .Net was V8 Installations


I just want to thank all of you for your insight into this situation...my
boss is a technically-oriented fellow, and I am happy to have all of this
ammo for the "wait and watch" view. I especially don't want to be roasted
on the spit of "shoulda waited" just because I can use twenty-seven
languages while I wait for the quote worksheet to calculate.

Having problems with a couple of users right now in 6.1 and speed issues
because no matter what I do to the registry, I can't get it to take less
than 45 seconds to log on, and opening the quote module takes 15-20. I've
un-installed progress and cleaned the registry three times, gonna give it up
and reformat the hard drive next week. I can't imagine what it would be
like for that to be the normal way things work. I'd be working at the new
Sam's club in a month.

Anyway, thanks again for this thread for those of us who are not so deeply
technical.

Lydia




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[system]

Couple of other checks:

1) Connected to a 100MB hub (I still have a 10MB hub on the rack for
those users who annoy me)
2) Virus software setup to not scan the epicor folders

Butch


________________________________

From: vantage@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
Of Lydia Coffman
Sent: Friday, November 18, 2005 8:41 AM
To: 'vantage@yahoogroups.com'
Subject: RE: [Vantage] .Net was V8 Installations


I just want to thank all of you for your insight into this
situation...my
boss is a technically-oriented fellow, and I am happy to have all of
this
ammo for the "wait and watch" view. I especially don't want to be
roasted
on the spit of "shoulda waited" just because I can use twenty-seven
languages while I wait for the quote worksheet to calculate.

Having problems with a couple of users right now in 6.1 and speed issues
because no matter what I do to the registry, I can't get it to take less
than 45 seconds to log on, and opening the quote module takes 15-20.
I've
un-installed progress and cleaned the registry three times, gonna give
it up
and reformat the hard drive next week. I can't imagine what it would be
like for that to be the normal way things work. I'd be working at the
new
Sam's club in a month.

Anyway, thanks again for this thread for those of us who are not so
deeply
technical.

Lydia




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[system]

> Ok, so I couldn't resist wading in...

At the risk of completely glazing over a "gang of over 2000 eyes"...

First, I completely agree that one of the motivations behind all of the
frameworks is to carve out a business advantage. But if it were that alone,
that would not be enough. (Mac OS X anyone?) There needs to be a good reason
for a company to use the framework in the first place. It must provide some
benefit: faster code, portability, stability, ease of
modification/deployment, etc.

On November 14, 2001, HP announced that it will no longer support the MPE
operating system, of which most of you probably have never even heard of.
Hundreds of companies have to find a new platform to run their businesses
and software vendors who used the MPE-centric screen/database routines now
find their applications obsolete.

The reason HP did this is because they said, "the ecosystem is dying". The
pool of users, developers and third-party applications became unsustainable
in their estimation.

> Regardless of their individual technical idiosyncrasies, the goal of these
> frameworks is to maintain a dominant technical platform for the
> controlling vendor into the next decade.

Again, I agree that companies want to stay in business and will try to ride
their framework to riches. ;-)

> Sure empowering developers with more efficient means to develop and deploy
> software is a noble goal for the developer but is it worthwhile uber
> alles?

If, and I stress if, the promise that clients automagically get updated when
they login then it will help out all of the administrators who won't have to
go from workstation to workstation at every upgrade/update. Not wiping out
discs and reinstalling Progress may seem worthwhile to some people on this
list. Some might even like being able to switch to another user without
logging off the original user. Finally, .Net is supposed to eliminate the
issues related to "DLL hell". I'm sure many users on this list would welcome
that.

> business logic fed from the app server tier into a runtime JIT compiled
> CLR code base that has to engage in an array of caching schemes just to
> have sub-par performance?

I'm too new to speak to the implementation that Epicor developers have
chosen. Hopefully they can tweak the current version and not have to change
the architecture too much to improve performance. I wasn't here for it but
I'm sure that when Vantage went client-server things got slower too. In
fact, that's probably why some of you still run Terminal Services. Imagine,
this is what we now are calling "The good ole days". ;-)

> Can you really excite your user base by noting the
> fact that the GUI can be quickly modified in any number of available
> languages while they quietly ossify waiting for a traveler?

Right now, my users are excited about not having character-based screens,
not having to wait until a report is finished before accessing another
screen, being able to have more than one command on a screen at one time,
and having a computer platform that will still be supported next year...

(I keep hearing about this printing issue and it just doesn't seem like it
is an issue with the user interface, at least it shouldn't be. Are not
reports running at the server? These are Crystal, right?)

> ...In fact, if you
> really want to watch heads explode, just mention that most, albeit not

all,

> of the cool new user modifiability available to Vantage users for the
> first time in V8 was available in Vista 4 running on Visual FoxPro
> over a DECADE ago and it was fast.

And I'm sure the same complaint was lodged when the code was moved to
Progress or even newer versions of Progress. The older, less flexible, soon
to be outdated code is always faster. But let's be real, there were
limitations to the primarily single-user VFP too. "Everybody get out while I
re-index..."

> Ok, I know, VFP is hardly the future and .NET/SOA/Frameworks will be
> technically viable for at least the next half decade if not more. But as
> far as this new platform having a lock on the future, don't kid yourself.

I'm not kidding myself. .Net is just a player, albeit a large one at this
point in time and quite frankly I think the Java framework is more mature.
However, .Net is further along than Java was in the same number of years.
Meanwhile, Google is the one trying to fulfill Sun's mantra, "The network is
the computer". The point is that things will change. We sat on this system
for 20 years but we did not put ourselves in a situation that could evolve.

As for kidding oneself, how are the Visual FoxPro or Progess ecosystems?
Vantage was completely beholden to Progress, so they added SQL server to
start to relieve this dependency. Even Progess separated their name-sake
database from their toolset. What if Progress or a part of Progress is
bought by Oracle or by Microsoft? What would happen to Vantage? There are
business risks everywhere you go whether you stand still or move.

> There are several new technologies leveraging to be the next platform of
> choice: multi-agent systems, constraint based code building and, in the
> near term, web 2.0 technologies like AJAX are moving to make the current
> platforms obsolete.

If, again I stress if, Epicor did this correctly, separating the
presentation layer from the business logic and database opens up the
possibility of using these new presentation technologies - unlike V6.x. In
fact, I had just read that you are now able to access Vantage information in
SharePoint Services - Microsoft's web portal. An HTML client is already at
hand for V8 users. At least that's what the press release said. ;-)

(Multi-agent systems and constraint-based coding is a programming
methodology popular with the AI crowd and not really a framework for screen
IO, data or network services, etc.)

> That's it, I'm off to my cabin in Montana to write a disjointed monograph
> about the evils of technology and code Fortran on my Osborne One.

You're starting to scare me Barry. That's sounding a little too Unabomber to
this Midwestern guy... ;-)

> Oh, I guess it's been done...

It certainly has been done. The MANMAN software that we are replacing with
V8 *is* written in FORTRAN. It's fast and reliable, but the framework on
which it runs is gone, much like Visual FoxPro. For everyone, there's a time
to wait and a time to move. For many of you, you are probably better off
waiting for the stability, but for us, it's time to move.

Mark W.

P.S. Missed Montana this summer but saw some Wyoming, Utah, Nevada and
California - simply gorgeous.