Migrating to Windows
Michael Lee
Michael.Lee@mclsystemsinc.com
Fri, 19 Nov 2004 14:51:30 -0800
This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
--------------070903040109010508010809
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Hi Garry,
Actually the email I made in regards to you working for Cognos was
directly to one of your sales reps who called me to ask if I could give
him my customer information so that you guys could convert them off of
Powerhouse. I more or less asked him "what's in it for me?" and we
decided the answer was "not much". I did tell him to say 'hi' to you and
to give you my best. I remember you well and liked and respected you and
your skills.
The funny thing is that I was the one to start a lot of this flaming by
responding negatively to the posting by "Dennis". I still don't like the
posting for the same reasons but, as one can see, everyone has their own
opinion.
I do wish you personally the best and wish you and your company well...
just stay away from my clients ;-).
Regards,
Michael Lee
MCL Systems Inc.
Garry Whitworth wrote:
> There appears to be some open dialogue occurring on this
> subject and since CORE has been mentioned in a posting, I thought
> some discussion from CORE Migration would be appropriate. I hope
> this does not generate any *flames*, does not come over like
> advertising and that you are able to read this with an open mind.
> I, like Bob, am also biased, towards the CORE solution, but I will
> try to be as objective as I can. We have completed many successful
> migration projects over the years to Java, .NET, Oracle and
> Microsoft SQL Server. We have solid reference sites in production
> and customers who are re-selling their newly migrated solutions to
> markets throughout the world.
>
>
>
> For those of you who do not know me, I have worked with PowerHouse
> most of my career (17 years), In fact, as Michael Lee pointed out
> in a much, much earlier post, I started my career at Cognos on the
> PowerHouse Support Desk. I fielded thousands of calls on the
> HP3000 and Unix platform. I learned from masters like Nigel,
> Howard, Basil, Jim, Brett and Peter and others who are still at
> Cognos to this day. After my Cognos days, I spent many years as a
> PowerHouse consultant working on dozens of PowerHouse
> implementations. After that, I moved to the Cognos BI tools
> (PowerPlay and Impromptu, great products btw), and finally to my
> current position as CTO for CORE Migration. I have personally been
> involved in every migration project CORE has ever undertaken over
> the past 8 years. I believe that I can certainly add value to this
> subject.
>
>
>
> Is PowerHouse a good product? You bet it is! In fact, I think it
> is a GREAT product! I don't know of a single product on the planet
> that could allow you to build systems as quickly and more
> efficiently as we did with PowerHouse. Unfortunately, as you can
> all agree, things change and the march of progress is
> unstoppable. Cognos has moved along to the more popular (and
> profitable) desktop tools. Why? Because of the BOTTOM line and the
> return on investment to the shareholder. Back in the early
> nineties, Cognos shifted its focus from ADT tools to the BI tools.
> Since this shift in focus (a mere dozen years), Cognos changed
> from a multi-million dollar company to becoming one of Canada's
> leading software development companies generating revenues in
> excess of $683,117 M (FY2004) . The lions share of this revenue
> has been generated by the "BI" tools and it is these tools that
> that has driven Cognos to the height it has achieved. Well done
> Cognos!!
>
>
>
> I agree with many members on this list that moving to a 3GL
> exponentially increases the amount and volume of code when
> re-writing business systems with these languages. Just as Cognos
> marketed in the 80's that 1 line of PowerHouse Code = 20 Lines of
> COBOL code, we have gone back the other way (1 Line of PowerHouse
> Code = 20 lines of Java code). I've seen many companies attempt to
> "re-write" the PowerHouse business system in both Java and .NET
> and more often than not they all end up trying to solve the same
> problems...how to connect to a database, read and update the
> database, perform in-field validation in a stateless web
> environment, etc, etc. Eventually, through re-factoring exercises,
> they usually end up building a framework to support all the common
> things that are necessary to build a business application before
> they even begin to create the business forms/process necessary by
> the system.
>
>
>
> In my opinion, the Java and .NET programming languages have and
> will continue to become the predominant programming languages
> being used by most of the large IT departments (read: Fortune
> 500). This is not an endorsement of these products, but simply a
> recognition of market trends. If you look at the curriculum of
> Computer Science/Information Technology programs offered by
> Universities and Colleges today, you will find a healthy offering
> of Object Oriented Design, Java and .NET courses. This is what the
> "next" generation is being taught. Unfortunately, I believe we (as
> an IT industry) have taken a step backwards from the productivity
> obtained from 4GL programming languages like PowerHouse, Progress
> and Speedware (to name a few).
>
>
>
> As the business continues to evolve, those IT Managers running
> legacy business system developed in 4GL programming languages are
> being questioned by newly appointed CIO's, CFO's, Managers and
> technical staff, Often, they (the new guard) do not know of these
> development tools/languages and their use becomes suspect as a
> potential for change. Ask any IT person outside the PowerHouse
> community if they know Cognos PowerHouse, and more often than not
> you will get a blank stare. That is not to say PowerHouse and
> other 4GL languages aren't great tools, just that they are a lot
> less known in the world today.
>
>
>
> I strongly believe that the CORE solution plugs a gap between the
> 4GL and 3GL worlds. Our products are based on a solid framework
> and a dictionary from which to build business applications in Java
> and .NET. I believe that our tools embody the same philosophies as
> the 4GL programming languages of the 80's and 90's, that is,
> better productivity and reduced maintenance. Our products "plug"
> into Visual Studio .NET and various Java environments and strive
> to achieve the same productivity levels achieved with a 4GL
> programming language. In fact, with our framework, we have
> achieved a near 1 to 1 relationship between the PowerHouse code
> and newly generated .NET/Java code. PowerHouse programmers become
> productive with our tools/framework because they follow the same
> philosophy, they allow you to focus on the required business
> functionality and not the underlying "plumbing" code required to
> get the job done. As a result, the framework coupled with the
> dictionary concept from 4GL's reduces the overall amount of code
> required to be "touched" by the programmer, thereby increasing
> productivity and lowering the costs to maintain the system moving
> forward.
>
>
>
> As the years go on, it is inevitable that 4GL programming
> languages such as PowerHouse will continue to be replaced by the
> more current technologies. It is up to us as IT professionals to
> make sure that as we move our organizations forward, that we make
> sure that we continue to provide the value we have in the past,
> that is delivering quality, flexible and maintainable IT business
> services to our end-user community.
>
>
>
> Regards,
>
>
>
> Garry Whitworth
>
> CORE Migration
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
--------------070903040109010508010809
Content-Type: text/html; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1">
<title></title>
</head>
<body text="#000000" bgcolor="#ffffff">
Hi Garry,<br>
<br>
Actually the email I made in regards to you working for Cognos was
directly to one of your sales reps who called me to ask if I could give
him my customer information so that you guys could convert them off of
Powerhouse. I more or less asked him "what's in it for me?" and we
decided the answer was "not much". I did tell him to say 'hi' to you
and to give you my best. I remember you well and liked and respected
you and your skills. <br>
<br>
The funny thing is that I was the one to start a lot of this flaming by
responding negatively to the posting by "Dennis". I still don't like
the posting for the same reasons but, as one can see, everyone has
their own opinion. <br>
<br>
I do wish you personally the best and wish you and your company well...
just stay away from my clients ;-).<br>
<br>
<br>
Regards,<br>
<br>
<br>
Michael Lee<br>
MCL Systems Inc.<br>
<br>
<br>
Garry Whitworth wrote:<br>
<blockquote type="cite" cite="mid000001c4ce7d$4905b080$a401a8c0@GARRY">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; ">
<meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document">
<meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 10">
<meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 10">
<link rel="File-List" href="cid:filelist.xml@01C4CE53.5E6B3C30">
<title>Message</title>
<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<o:OfficeDocumentSettings>
<o:DoNotRelyOnCSS/>
</o:OfficeDocumentSettings>
</xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
<w:WordDocument>
<w:SpellingState>Clean</w:SpellingState>
<w:GrammarState>Clean</w:GrammarState>
<w:DocumentKind>DocumentEmail</w:DocumentKind>
<w:EnvelopeVis/>
<w:Compatibility>
<w:BreakWrappedTables/>
<w:SnapToGridInCell/>
<w:WrapTextWithPunct/>
<w:UseAsianBreakRules/>
</w:Compatibility>
<w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel>
</w:WordDocument>
</xml><![endif]-->
<style>
<!--
/* Font Definitions */
@font-face
{font-family:Verdana;
panose-1:2 11 6 4 3 5 4 4 2 4;
mso-font-charset:0;
mso-generic-font-family:swiss;
mso-font-pitch:variable;
mso-font-signature:536871559 0 0 0 415 0;}
/* Style Definitions */
p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal
{mso-style-parent:"";
margin:0in;
margin-bottom:.0001pt;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";}
a:link, span.MsoHyperlink
{color:blue;
text-decoration:underline;
text-underline:single;}
a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed
{color:purple;
text-decoration:underline;
text-underline:single;}
p
{mso-margin-top-alt:auto;
margin-right:0in;
mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;
margin-left:0in;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";}
span.EmailStyle18
{mso-style-type:personal;
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-ansi-font-size:10.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial;
mso-ascii-font-family:Arial;
mso-hansi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
color:windowtext;}
span.EmailStyle19
{mso-style-type:personal;
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-ansi-font-size:10.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial;
mso-ascii-font-family:Arial;
mso-hansi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
color:navy;}
span.EmailStyle20
{mso-style-type:personal-reply;
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-ansi-font-size:10.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial;
mso-ascii-font-family:Arial;
mso-hansi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
color:navy;}
span.GramE
{mso-style-name:"";
mso-gram-e:yes;}
@page Section1
{size:8.5in 11.0in;
margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in;
mso-header-margin:.5in;
mso-footer-margin:.5in;
mso-paper-source:0;}
div.Section1
{page:Section1;}
-->
</style><!--[if gte mso 10]>
<style>
/* Style Definitions */
table.MsoNormalTable
{mso-style-name:"Table Normal";
mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0;
mso-tstyle-colband-size:0;
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-parent:"";
mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt;
mso-para-margin:0in;
mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";}
</style>
<![endif]-->
<div class="Section1">
<blockquote
style="margin-top: 5pt; margin-right: 0in; margin-bottom: 5pt;">
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">There appears to be some
open dialogue occurring on this
subject and since CORE has been mentioned in a posting, I thought some
discussion from CORE Migration would be appropriate. I hope this does
not
generate any *<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">flames</span></b>*, does
not come over like advertising and that you are able to read this with
an open
mind. I, like Bob, am also biased, towards the CORE solution, but I
will try to
be as objective as I can. We have completed many successful migration
projects
over the years to Java, .NET, Oracle and Microsoft SQL Server. We have
solid
reference sites in production and customers who are re-selling their
newly
migrated solutions to markets throughout the world.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">For those of you who do
not know me, I have worked with
PowerHouse most of my career (17 years), In fact, as Michael Lee
pointed out in
a much, much earlier post, I started my career at Cognos on the
PowerHouse
Support Desk. I fielded thousands of calls on the HP3000 and <span
class="GramE">Unix</span>
platform. I learned from masters like Nigel, Howard, Basil, Jim, Brett
and
Peter and others who are still at Cognos to this day. After my Cognos
days, I
spent many years as a PowerHouse consultant working on dozens of
PowerHouse
implementations. After that, I moved to the Cognos BI tools (PowerPlay
and
Impromptu, great products btw), and finally to my current position as
CTO for
CORE Migration. I have personally been involved in every migration
project CORE
has ever undertaken over the past 8 years. I believe that I can
certainly add
value to this subject.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">Is PowerHouse a good
product? You bet it is! In fact, I
think it is a GREAT product! I don’t know of a single product on the
planet that could allow you to build systems as quickly and more
efficiently as
we did with PowerHouse. Unfortunately, as you can all agree, things
change
and the march of progress is unstoppable. Cognos has moved along to the
more popular (and profitable) desktop tools. Why? <span class="GramE">Because
of
the BOTTOM line and the return on investment to the shareholder.</span> Back
in the early nineties, Cognos shifted its focus from ADT tools to the
BI tools.
Since this shift in focus (a mere dozen years), Cognos changed from a
multi-million dollar company to becoming one of Canada’s leading
software
development companies generating revenues in excess of $</span></font><font
size="1" face="Verdana"><span
style="font-size: 8.5pt; font-family: Verdana;">683,117</span></font><font
size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"> M </span></font><font
size="1" face="Verdana"><span
style="font-size: 8.5pt; font-family: Verdana;"> (FY2004)</span></font><font
size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"> . The <span
class="GramE">lions</span>
share of this revenue has been generated by the “BI” tools and it
is these tools that that has driven Cognos to the height it has
achieved. Well
done Cognos!!<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">I agree with many members
on this list that moving to a 3GL
exponentially increases the amount and volume of code when re-writing
business
systems with these languages. Just as Cognos marketed in the 80’s that
1
line of PowerHouse Code = 20 Lines of COBOL code, we have gone back the
other
way (1 Line of PowerHouse Code = 20 lines of Java code). I’ve seen many
companies attempt to “re-write” the PowerHouse business system in
both Java and .NET and more often than not they all end up trying to
solve the
same problems…how to connect to a database, read and update the
database,
perform in-field validation in a stateless web environment, etc, etc.
Eventually, through re-factoring exercises, they usually end up
building a
framework to support all the common things that are necessary to build
a
business application before they even begin to create the business
forms/process necessary by the system.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">In my opinion, the Java
and .NET<span style=""> </span>programming languages have and will
continue to become the predominant programming languages being used by
most of
the large IT departments (read: Fortune 500). This is not an
endorsement of these products, but simply <span class="GramE">a
recognition</span>
of market trends. If you look at the curriculum of Computer
Science/Information Technology programs offered by Universities and
Colleges
today, you will find a healthy offering of Object Oriented Design, Java
and
.NET courses. This is what the “next” generation is being taught.
Unfortunately, I believe we (as an IT industry) have taken a step
backwards
from the productivity obtained from 4GL programming languages like
PowerHouse,
Progress and Speedware (to name a few).<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">As the business continues
to evolve, those IT Managers
running legacy business system developed in 4GL programming languages
are being
questioned by newly appointed CIO’s, CFO’s, Managers and technical
staff,
Often, they (the new guard) do not know of these development
tools/languages
and their use becomes suspect as a potential for change. Ask any IT
person
outside the PowerHouse community if they know Cognos PowerHouse, and
more often
than not you will get a blank stare. That is not to say PowerHouse and
other
4GL languages aren’t great <span class="GramE">tools, just that</span>
they
are a lot less known in the world today.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">I strongly believe that
the CORE solution plugs a gap
between the 4GL and 3GL worlds. Our products are based on a solid
framework and
a dictionary from which to build business applications in Java and
.NET. I
believe that our tools embody the same philosophies as the 4GL
programming
languages of the 80’s and 90’s, that is, better productivity and
reduced maintenance. Our products “plug” into Visual Studio .<span
class="GramE">NET<span style=""> </span>and</span> various
Java environments and strive to achieve the same
productivity levels achieved with a 4GL programming language. In fact,
with our
framework, we have achieved a near 1 to 1 relationship between the
PowerHouse
code and newly generated .NET/Java code. PowerHouse programmers become
productive with our tools/framework because they follow the same
philosophy,
they allow you to focus on the required business functionality and not
the
underlying “plumbing” code required to get the job done. As a
result, the framework coupled with the dictionary concept from 4GL’s
reduces the overall amount of code required to be “touched” by the
programmer, thereby increasing productivity and lowering the costs to
maintain
the system moving forward.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">As the years go on, it is
inevitable that 4GL programming
languages such as PowerHouse will continue to be replaced by the more
current
technologies. It is up to us as IT professionals to make sure that as
we move
our organizations forward, that we make sure that we continue to
provide the
value we have in the past, that is delivering quality, flexible and
maintainable IT business services to our end-user community. </span></font><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"> <o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">Regards,<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">Garry Whitworth<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;">CORE Migration<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="2" face="Arial"><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
</blockquote>
</div>
</blockquote>
</body>
</html>
--------------070903040109010508010809--