Conference ulysse::rdb_vms_competition

    Acumate is the US name for a UK developed product Acumen.
    The UK company is:-
    EFFEM Management Services
    Shoppenhangers House
    Shoppenhangers Road
    Maidenhead 		SL6 2PX
    0628	75667
    
    I spoke to a contact there about Rdb vs Oracle. He went away to talk to
    his techies as to whether Oracle was "faster" than Rdb. The short
    answer was "B***ocks". The long answer was that for database access
    Acumen/Acumate puts the same overhead on whether accessing Oracle or
    Rdb and as Rdb is "a lot faster" than Oracle, Acumen access would be
    quicker to Rdb than Oracle. Clearly a badly designed/implemented Rdb
    could be slower than Oracle...
    At Effem UK a man called Ian Sharpe might be a technical contact.
    
    He suggests you "have this out" with the US people.
    Information Systems International (ISI)
    100 International Drive
    Mount Olive
    New Jersey
    07828-1808
    tel 201-691-3500
    The man in charge is Gavin Leslie - a man I knew when he was in the UK.
    I believe the UK account manager of Effem is Ian Kirkley @BSO. I think
    UK Marketing use Acumen - try Crawford Russell @RDL.
    
    Andrew Dodd UK EIS Leeds

    I believe the Digital relationship manager for Effem is Wendy Vincent
    in BOIS.

<<            <<< Note 633.1 by BAHTAT::DODD "gone to Helen's land" >>>
<<                            -< Seems to be untrue >-
<<
<<    At Effem UK a man called Ian Sharpe might be a technical contact.
<<    
<<    He suggests you "have this out" with the US people.
<<    Information Systems International (ISI)
    
    Well, never a dull moment in peanut land (M&M that is!).....
    
    Since Evan Bauer and I worked on the Rdb/ACUMATE stuff for ISI this
    past winter, maybe I should tell what occured.  As far as I know, we
    were never in competition vs. Oracle excepting that Oracle is the
    standard at ISI and if Rdb could not handle it, they would go back to
    Oracle.  Well, to make the story short, we outperformed the
    expectations of ISI, and now they are putting more in the database
    since the users are delighted with the performance.
    
    The problems that I believe that Ian Sharpe is discussion is the
    performance problems they were having before system (VMS) tuning and
    Rdb tuning (design mostly).  Once everything was tuned, they were
    extremely pleased with the performance.  That was probably never
    relayed to Ian, although he probably would not believe it since he is
    totally an Oracle bigot.
    
    Therefore, I would agree that there is no way that ACUMATE/ORACLE
    should outperform ACUMATE/Rdb.
    
    chuck

    I am a sales account manager and have worked very successfully with
    EFFEM who supply ACUMEN in the UK. Jointly we have opened up a new
    account in competition with ORACLE and various UNIX suppliers to
    provide an RDb/ACUMEN VAX/VMS MIS system.
    
    I apprecite that personalities differ across the globe and that
    this will influnence the attitudes of oganisations and how they
    work together. I would, however, like to point out that the comments
    made in some the replies to this NOTE do not ring true with me.
    Ian Sharpe is the EFFEM client manager for my customer and has been
    nothing other than a DEC and RDb supporter.
    
    I would highly recommend EFFEM as a valuable CSO to work with in
    the UK who are keen to support our product strategies in proposed
    solutions.
    
    
    Regards
    
    
    Paul

    Many thanks to all who have responded. I have followed up with the
    contacts but am still awaiting the imfamous list of concerns from
    EFFEM.
    
    Will post the results here
   

    Well we received the report. While we thought we were getting a
    list of concerns, we received a copy of a report from the Mars Group
    Project entitled "VAX/VMS Environment Relational Database Evaluation,
    Digital Equipment Corporation RDB vs Oracle RDVMS, Evaluation Summary".
                                      
    It is too long to go into details here, but suffice to say it reads
    like a report produced by an ORACLE shop seeing how RDB measures
    up to Oracle in functionality. There are a number of errors and
    misinterpretations and very Oracle requirements. This was not a
    generic DB evaluation.               
                          
    It seems that both Digital and Oracle provided rating numbers for
    a list of requirements and reviewed them once Effem consolidate them.
    If someone knows who worked on this, please let me know. We don't
    want to start tearing apart a report we had input too without
    understanding thoughts that went into it.
                                     
    The bottom line is that from this report, Information Services
    International, a Division of Effem Services Inc has decided to make
    a 3 to 5 year commitment to standardize on Oracle. Primary reasons:
                                     
    	* Leverage Oracle's functional and technical superiority
                                     
    	* Maximize existing associate Oracle Knowledge and experience
                                     
    	* Leverage Oracle's integrated and supported tools
                                     
    	* No overwhelming cost advantage to move to RDB.
                                     
    I think the 2nd point says it the most. Here's an Oracle shop who
    has too look at why they would want to move to RDB and I think are
    quite happy where they are.      
                                     
    This looks like a job for Super Marketing and Super Business
    Management. I'll be in touch with Wendy shortly.
                           
    I thought everyone, on both sides of the pond, should be aware of
    this report.

    I received a call from Gavin Leslie at Effem Services in New Jersey
    after talking with Wendy. He was quite upset that the impression
    had been created that Effem was pro ORACLE and not pro RDB.
    
    In a nut shell, they will do what is right for the customer. Fair
    enough.
    
    Effem has an agreement with Digital but NOT ORACLE! Seems that the
    parent company, MARS Group has the ORACLE connection and slant.
    
    While they do have a lot of ORACLE expertise, because of their Digital
    relationship, they are very pro RDB and have done a number of
    installations with the ACUMATE product. They have been running into
    a few problems with RDB due to complex access SQL statements. Seems
    they've hit a few limits most never think of. These have been directed
    to RDB Engineering.
    
    So, final work is that Effem and ACUMATE are very interested in
    using RDB.