Re: Forged mail addresses
- From: "sanjian" <mungkb@xxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 1 Nov 2007 14:34:05 -0400
Phil wrote:
On Wed, 31 Oct 2007 14:17:24 -0400, sanjian wrote:
Umm... Autodesk isn't exactly a company that Virginia Tech can make
demands of, any more than we can make demands of Microsoft. They
have far greater concerns than just a small hillbilly college. You
know, like the entire engineering and architecture industry for
which their softweare is the defacto standard?
However, the current versions of the Autodesk Windows products are
fully Vista compliant. I've got Autodesk Maya. The latest release
(2008) brags about how great it is with Vista and the product lives
up to the hype. Moreover, in the promotional literature that Autodesk
sent along with it,
it said that Autodesk supports more platforms than any other 3D
packages.
It was unclear if they were talking only about Maya or about their
CAD/CAM offerings as well.
AutoCAD on Vista is "generally" viable, from what I've told, but not without its problems. This is likely not something students want to fight through as they're trying to get their assignments in. Revit, on the other hand, is absolutely broken on Vista, from what people who work in construction have told me. This isn't good, since it's the "next big thing" for architecture and civil engineering. Personally, I think it's more important to teach the emerging new standard of Revit than to teach Vista. If you can use XP, you can use Vista. Going from AutoCAD to Revit is far more of a change.
And, frankly, if you're dealing with people who are so dense that learning on XP as opposed to Vista is going to be any setback at all, you really need to reconsider your admissions criteria.
However, the VT Computer Tech's Computer Science Department is not
the only one with this shortcoming. Many businesses perpetuate
archaic system software environments in order to keep aging legacy
application software on life support. Industry best practice,
though, is to bite the bullet and upgrade operating environments
I can't consider that to be industry best practice. Actually, I
would generally consider it "bone headed." You go with what works,
when it works.
You may not consider it to be best industry practice, but the primary
advisor to business and government, the Gartner Group does. Going
"with what works, when it works" is a reactive approach that does you
great disservice. It's far better to formulate a policy, communicate
it to customers and partners, and implement it. Exceptions to policy
should be thoroughly investigated by a governing body and approved or
rejected as appropriate.
That sounds more like dogma than reason. And, looking at the government, I'm not sure I would put stock in anyone who claims to advise it. That's like citing the engineer behind the Pinto for best mechanical practices.
Despite what the motivational posters tell you, reactive isn't always bad. A good leader knows when to be proactive and when to be reactive. Frankly, if I'm going to be proactive right into a ditch, I may want to reconsider. That's like saying "don't wait until you get to the intersection to turn left, be proactive!"
quickly. There may be some short-term road bumps but, in the long
run, it turns out this is the best strategy. If legacy application
software is not upgraded to mesh with the modernized environment, in
most cases, it has outlived its usefulness.
Right. No need for CAD software in an engineering college. Why
would we want to teach our kids that? It's definately outlived its
usefullness.
I certainly did not say that. I will say that if your teaching
tomorrow's engineers on yesterday's software, you're in trouble.
If using XP is going to break our engineers, then we've got problems. It may be a bit of Rickover in my thinking, but I expect my engineers to use what's best, not what's newest.
Virtually every large business (and I include academic institutions
in this) wastes a lot of money by hanging on to ancient software.
If the functionality of the software is still required (and often
it is
not), it can be better provided through well-designed modern
software. Often the old applications are not upgraded because they
are a mess of poorly documented (if at all) spaghetti code. One
good outcome of Y2K is it forced organizations to put a lot of
sixties and seventies applications out of their misery.
One example does not prove a rule. Most software seems to get more
and more "messy" as newer releases come along. Some are just
abortions. Companies should upgrade when it is in their interest to
do so. They're the ones in the best postition to do the
cost/benefit analysis. If the old software still fills their needs
quite well, then why should they go through the cost of purchasing,
deploying, patching (because you KNOW the new software comes with a
whole host of new bugs) and possibly re-training, just to have the
newest?
Reading in between the lines, it sounds like there's a disconnect at
VT between those responsible for application software, system
software, hardware, and possibly network hardware and software.
That
also is common among businesses and results in poor agility for
those who do not have well integrated environments.
Well, I'll just march down to Autodesk's offices and kick their code
monkeys into gear. That'll teach 'em!
We're not talking about Autodesk that produces exemplary software.
We're talking about the IT environment in which it is being employed.
The IT environment is not some great voodoo god in the sky. It's made of software, including the operating system. If the applications aren't ready for Vista, then it's not an issue of some nebulous "IT environment." Which could be Microsoft, it could be Autodesk, or it could be both. But you want to blame it on the IT guys. What should they do, rez themselves into programs and go inside the "IT environment" and take on the evil MCP?
However, the engineers' answer applies to why VT may be slow to
modernize. It doesn't apply to your personal choices unless, for
some reason, you are required to run old, finicky software on your
machine.
The quick answer is that XP offers the best operating environment
for the software currently available. When that changes, then VT
will upgrade, and not before. That is how it SHOULD be. Upgrading
because it's the newest thing is as sensible as "because I can."
And, in my experience, XP is hardly finicky software. Yes, it may
be old, but it's also "tried and true."
I wasn't referring to the operating environment but the application
software. I would not advise an organization with a complex IT
environment to switch to Vista on launch day. Nevertheless, I
wouldn't advise them to wait a couple of years either. From the way
you've expressed the attitude
of the VT engineers, they appear content to sit on the sidelines while
technology and business practices forge ahead.
How do you get that? You say you don't expect them to switch on launch day, but you're blaming them for not switching while there are still serious issues.
.
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