[28] in Tooltime
Re: vendor hell
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Kim)
Tue Feb 20 17:34:44 1996
To: tooltime@MIT.EDU
Cc: cec@MIT.EDU, pakulat@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: Your message of Tue, 20 Feb 1996 16:02:59 -0500.
<v02120d02ad4fe2cb2300@[18.81.1.116]>
Date: Tue, 20 Feb 1996 17:34:27 EST
From: Kim <kim@MIT.EDU>
=>This vendor game seems to be such a crap shoot. Anyone have any
=>recommendations/preferences as to how we proceed here?
I feel as though we're at a decision point. I think we need to do a
cost (time, money, etc), benefit, and risk analysis based on what we
know about each product. I think we need to face the reality that
there are disadvantages to each product, to accept them, and to move
on.
The down side of Remedy is security and unified name space
management. Regardless of which product we select, we'll be managing
our own name space, so I think that point is moot.
The advantage of Remedy is that they are proven in the market (the
largest help desk supplier, anyway), and the software is easily
extensible to meet both current and future needs.
The down side of Scopus is their unresponsiveness. They don't seem too
willing to negotiate on price nor fix our installation problems. This
makes me wonder whether they will be willing (and capable) of
delivering on the customizations we want. Another thing to keep in
mind is that they have only 200 installed sites, none of them are
academic.
I think we need to face the hard reality that there isn't an ideal
solution. I don't have a lot of confidence that Vantive will be any
better than Scopus or Remedy, and don't think we should spend a lot of
time investigating.
Each product we've considered has its pitfalls. I think we need to
accept the fact that there isn't an ideal solution, and make a
decision to go with a particular product. What do other people think?
Based on what we've recently learned about Scopus, and past experience
with other vendors, I think we assume the least risk for the greatest
benefit deciding on Remedy. Although Remedy doesn't meet all our
needs, perhaps we can, over time, rally with other universities to
push Remedy to implement the features we want.
