SCO stopping enhancements for Xenix?

[Rob Peglar]

In article <6734 at cps3xx.UUCP>, usenet at cps3xx.UUCP (Usenet file owner) writes:
(bunches of old stuff deleted)

> Overall, it makes good business sense for SCO to drop Xenix. They won't
> have the overhead of supporting double the development staff to make a
> product to compete against their own other product. I can see SCO
> stopping new development on Xenix but still selling it for a few years.
> There is a definite market niche out there for a small multiuser system
> and Xenix is it. (I'm speaking mainly of those who only need a very
> basic runtime system to support a canned application at an end user)
> 
> SCO UNIX has to be SCO's main thrust as the various buzzwords of
> compliance are what is needed for a deeper penetration of business
> markets. 
> 
> Yes, it sucks that SCO is moving in a direction of orphaning home
> hackers, but that isn't where the money is for them.

SCO is being caught in a classic dilemma.  Pretend you are Doug M.
You've got to deliver an OS (Unix) to the market, ASAP, or be swept
aside by the AT&T legions (AT&T itself, ISC, Everex ESIX, Intel, etc.)
in quick order;  OR continue to market/develop/sell/support Xenix,
an old standby which has been around now for close to ten years, but
really isn't System V.  

Think.  You can't do both (effectively), you don't have enough resources
(time, people, money, the eternal triumvirate).  What do you do?

The solution being presented the public now is, of course, a "lesser
of evils" compromise.  As an SCO developer, with close ties into
Santa Cruz on a number of fronts, and also having to deal with this
type of dilemma personally (as a manager of software R&D), I can find
it easy to defend SCO.  BUT.......SCO is making, IMHO, a number of
key mistakes, on both the Xenix and Unix front.

Unix:
1.  The product is not of expected quality, as measured by a number
of different criteria.  In general terms, the criteria are system
reliability, esp. w/regard to C2 and its side-effects;  overall
lateness/failure to deliver as promised/vagueness on the part of
SCO Engineering, as viewed through Developer Relations;  and general
non-robustness of XSight, esp. in a networked environment.

2.  The product is over-priced, given the factors in 1) above, to
the other Unix offerings on the market today.

3.  It appears that SCO Engineering is trading off resources from
addressing/fixing the basic guts-level problems generalized in 1)
above in favor of ODT.  This tradeoff appears to be costing customers,
both established and potential, a great deal of time and agony.  Some
will choose to switch rather than fight.

Xenix:
1.  The product is not being given the appropriate level of support
from the factory given its market penetration and sales level.  (Note,
SCO Xenix out-sells SCO Unix "2 or 3 to 1", from more than one high-
level SCO sales/mktg person.  SCO should still devote the lion's share
of support resources to Xenix;  but they can't, since SCO Unix is
still not very robust.  Classic problem.

2.  There exists a large internal conflict within SCO because of
the discrepancy of Xenix sales vs. Unix marketing.  Which hat do
you wear today?

3.  The product has been frozen out of development, which is understandable-
but the product is also, by resource constraint, being frozen out of
timely upgrades/fixes/SLS's/document updates.  


Well.


Whither SCO?

Stay tuned.
Rob

etc.
-- 
Rob Peglar	Control Systems, Inc.	2675 Patton Rd., St. Paul MN 55113
...uunet!csinc!rpeglar		612-631-7800

The posting above does not necessarily represent the policies of my employer.