“Too many cooks spoil the broth.”
Every business manager understands the danger of subdividing a job and distributing responsibility for each of the sub-jobs among different people. Whenever anybody makes a change in his “piece,” everybody else has to worry how that change might affect their pieces. The more pieces—and the more “blaimees” — the tougher it is to get them all working harmoniously. And costs tend to increase as well, because the need to coordinate things becomes more pressing, and that kind of management overhead is expensive. The worst part is that when a problem develops, it may be hard to trace its source…because everybody points a finger toward someone else, and there is usually more than enough blame to go around.
Modern computer operating systems are extremely complex, though some do a better job of hiding their complexity “under the hood” for the sake of user friendliness. This complexity makes them especially vulnerable to the “too many cooks” problem. To avoid these pitfalls, an operating system must not only be proprietary, meaning that, almost by definition, there is a single proprietor who must enforce standards of technical integrity to ensure that all the pieces work smoothly together.
He must be willing to crack the whip on every programmer who has a hand in developing a piece of the operating system, and he must steadfastly resist the temptation to release anything before it is thoroughly tested for compatibility with every existing element of the system. Call it good management or just plain common sense, but both of these qualities are unfortunately in short supply, yet under-appreciated. That’s why we want to call your attention to the extraordinarily good management exercised by IBM. As a member of the IBM i family, you have benefited from it, though you may not realize how much.
Your IBM i operating system, (i5/OS, OS400), is, above all else, a fully integrated operating system. It includes an SQL relational database manager, powerful security, communications, backup, and systems administration, and a whole lot more. But these functions are not tacked on; they are built in. Their complete integration within OS400 means that each component not only works properly, it interfaces seamlessly with every other component. OS400 is unified, and IBM sees to it that it stays that way. IBM is acutely aware that an improvement in any one component might unintentionally introduce incompatibilities elsewhere in the system…so it tests to make sure that everything works smoothly together.
The Contrast
Other operating systems are actually layers of software. This means you get a separate relational database manager from one vendor, backup software from another, and security, communications and so on from yet others. Whenever pieces of a system have to come together from many different sources, you can bet that someone has to integrate all these add-on modules and test each one of them for compatibility with all the others. But whenever one of the software components is upgraded, or a security patch or bug-fix is released, you have a ripple effect. That’s because every new or changed line of code in any one module could adversely affect other layers of the software. These compatibility issues imply the need for software administration duties that are time consuming and expensive for the user. Even worse, the administration has to cope with a “chewing gum and Scotch tape” development process, so “fixes” have a way of not working the first time around. The fixes therefore need further fixes, and the big sufferer in this whole klugey mess is the end user. And the hassle factor is often worse than the loss of time and money. Incidentally, there is a name for this never-ending succession of fixes upon fixes. They are called “service packs.”
We recently heard that a prominent real estate development company applied no less than 33 service packs to their enterprise Windows environment. Ouch! How many updates to IBM i OS were required during the same period? ZERO.
The Bottom Line Is YOUR Bottom Line
The IBM i POWER server is designed, built and tested as a total system, fully integrating the hardware and system software components that a business needs. All of the integration and testing takes place before your IBM i POWER is delivered. This is in stark contrast to the “other guys,” whose networks must be integrated and undergo final testing at your location. The distinction is a direct consequence of the difference between built-in integration and ad hoc fixing. Companies that are having Intel-based networks installed or modified are accustomed to a wait period of weeks or months to allow their networks to “stabilize.” This sort of thing is unheard of among IBM i POWER users.
The bottom line is that the completeness and pre-integration of the OS400 operating system saves you a lot of money compared with the most popular alternatives. The average savings, taking into account setup, integration and testing, has been conservatively estimated to range from $5000 to $28,000. And that’s just the initial savings. On an ongoing basis, the savings are even greater: they can easily average $2000–$10,000 per month just to keep all the layers in good working order.
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