Date: Sat, 17 Jun 2000 07:43:40 -0600 From: Joe Warner <jswarner@uswest.net> To: Some Person <ntvsunix@hotmail.com> Cc: freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: FreeBSD at work Message-ID: <394B808C.1C4E25A7@uswest.net> References: <20000617074140.89748.qmail@hotmail.com>
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I work for a company (SMS) http://www.smed.com/ that writes medical software on the AS/400 for hospitals. Which, incidentally, will be purchased by Siemens Corp. http://www.siemens.de/en2/html/ by the end of this month. I'm an Operations Technical Analyst and have worked in the tech dept. for the last 3 years. My main responsibilities are AS/400 administration, LAN administration and special projects. I've used Linux, mostly Caldera & Red Hat, for the last 2 years and belong to a local linux users group (LUG). Wes Peters was the main influence for me switching to FreeBSD. He came to one of the LUG meetings and did an excellent presentation on FreeBSD and tossed new CD ROM sets of FreeBSD 3.4 into the crowd. I was lucky to have been paying attention and caught one! Since I've started using FreeBSD, I haven't looked back either. I'm not trying to say anything derogatory about Linux either. I'm very grateful for the exposure to Unix that I got from using Linux. For me, Linux provided the necessary background/experience to allow me to make the transition to FreeBSD. Everything about FreeBSD just makes more sense to me and seems to be organized into a more logical order. Each day I work on the PC I've installed FreeBSD on, I find something new that is built into the system, which impresses me. I could list those things here but this response is going to be long enough! 8^) Ok, I'll mention a couple..I like how easy it is to load software/updates and how easy it is to compile the kernel. The primary OS of choice in our shop is WIN NT 4.0 and IBM OS/400 (V4R4) and like you, having been struggling with finding ways to impress upon management and the like, how powerful, cost effective and useful an OS like FreeBSD would be to utilize. So far, the best way I've seen is to demonstrate it's abilities in a more tangible manner, like setting up and demonstrating a web server or demonstrating it's network analysis capabilities with programs like TCPDUMP or Ethereal. Our head LAN administrator wanted a good LAN sniffer to trace bottlenecks on our LAN/WAN and couldn't convince management to purchase a sniffer or good sniffing software that would run on NT. I was able to show him/them that we already had a solution with FreeBSD. As a result, they were pretty impressed. One of my managers made a valid point when he said that having only one or two people experienced with using FreeBSD or Linux won't work but if we get half the department trained on it, then we would be in a better position to use it and integrate it into our network structure more. I recently had someone on the linux-advocacy newsgroup tell me he thought I was into "silly stuff" for trying to implement an OS like FreeBSD or Linux where I work. He said that it won't be cost effective because it would be too expensive to replace OS' like NT or OS/400 with Linux or FreeBSD. He hinted that it wouldn't make sense to replace technology already in place that works. I feel he misinterpreted my intentions. My goal isn't to replace existing technology. My goal is to find and utilize technology that works! And FreeBSD certainly fits the bill. > > > Unfortunatly, I've run in many many times that FreeBSD could have been used > in replace of NT for our clients, much better, much faster, more reliable, > much more powerful, more granular in that it gives so much more control over > everything and anything, cheaper and the list just goes on and on... > Only reason I don't get to actually implement this type thing is that these > seniors have no idea how to use FreeBSD and literally have no concept on how > it can outbeat MS Windows XX/XXXX in just about any area! > It really bothers me! > Any suggestions on how I can actually give them a better idea what it can > really do and maybe the chance to atleast give it a try. After all, it's > 100% free!!! This could save my company, as well as our clients lots of > money!!! Ahhh, drives me nuts thinking of it... > > > Just thought I'd pass on the news that FreeBSD had it's debut and > >was put into action today where I work. As I said in a previous email, > >I installed FreeBSD 3.4 on a Compaq Deskpro 2000 (266mhz) machine the > >other day and the install went without a hitch. I gave it a dedicated > >IP address and got an Apache v1.3 web server going and an FTP server. > >I've been tasked with managing our local intranet and plan on using the > >FreeBSD machine as a test bed for comparing cost, stability and > >performance to other web servers on different platforms like NT and > >OS/400. I think it's already won the cost comparison. I created a home > >page and linked it to all of our Lotus Notes databases, that are > >currently running on an AS/400 (V4R4) Domino Server. I couldn't believe > >the difference in speed! Accessing the databases through my Apache > >server is a lot faster than using the notes client! The pages look a > >lot better in HTML than the old boring flat database style you see when > >using the notes client. Anyway, I gave my managers a demonstration and > >they were pretty impressed. I think this is just the beginning. I > >don't think I'm going to have a problem of finding ways to justify the > >use of FreeBSD where I work anymore. FreeBSD rocks!! 8^) > > > >Joe > > > > > > > >-- > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >Only two things are infinite, the Universe and human stupidity, and I'm > > not sure about the former. > > -Albert Einstein. > > 1879-1955. > > > > > > > > > >To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > >with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message > > ________________________________________________________________________ > Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com -- Only two things are infinite, the Universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. -Albert Einstein. 1879-1955. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message
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