[32] in Tooltime
Re: vendor hell
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Lynne E. Sousa)
Fri Feb 23 15:57:42 1996
Date: Fri, 23 Feb 96 15:57:26 EST
To: Kim <kim@MIT.EDU>
From: "Lynne E. Sousa" <sousa@MIT.EDU>
Cc: tooltime@MIT.EDU, cec@MIT.EDU, pakulat@MIT.EDU
I too believe we have gone to vendor hell. I am not sure the right move is
back to Remedy where it will be our responsibilty to shoe horn our security
requirements in around their prototocols. I think Scopus continues to be a
viable candidate, provided we can get them to negotiate with a little more
spirit. I do not think that Scopus should be thrown out because of the Mac
limitations. the answer may simply be that for the most part we run the
client software on existing pc and unix platforms. I know this may not be a
popular answer but at least scopus has security features built upon
something known and reliable as opposed to having to grown our own security
solution every time Remedy comes out with a new release. The same answer
about the mac client in Scopus applies to the Remedy mac client as well.
Vantif may have what we need but at this point in time I do not believe that
we need to add a third question mark to the equation. if we are going to
move forward with vantif then KILL Remedy. we do not need to be juggling
three vendors. I will be back at MIT on monday and will have alittle more
time to cinsider these options.
Lynne
At 17:34 02/20/96 EST, Kim wrote:
>
>=>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.
>
>
>
Lynne E. Sousa
Consultant
Client Services
