RE: [MLUG] mlug?

["Spurling, Shannon" <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

Yes, I believe that is it. The other packages that people gave were not a 100% compatible drop in replacement for exchange. This one is supposed to be. In fact, you would probably be able to replace a server cluster at a time. Best part is, you don't have to run it on NT. It runs under Solaris, FreeBSD and Linux. I still don't like the idea of a server with a GUI. It just seams unwarranted and wasteful. Novell is a different story. That text/curses like stuff can't really be called a GUI. I just think that kind of overhead is ridiculous. And I still have the question of how you can give halfway decent instructions to any one trying to manipulate something through a visual interface. A picture might be worth a thousand words, but it takes at least a thousand times that to describe how to precisely manipulate things in one. And I am not talking about the drop downs and stuff like that. How many times have people said something like "Double click that icon, not look for blah icon." "I'm not seeing blah icon!" " What do you mean, it should be right there." "Right where?" "In the window labeled widget." "You mean the words on the top of the box?" "Yes." "Oh! I was looking at that other window."
GUI's have a good place, but if you want to give precise support, there is nothing like a command line and a standardized set of commands. Call me old fashioned, but I think Red Hat could probably beat any NT server in head to head tests if they didn't install and run X on all of them by default any more. A GUI is more of a liability than a resource. Once you get admins that have to have a GUI to admin, you have just opened the flood gates to letting good admins be replaced by cheaper less experienced people.
Sorry for the Rant.

Shannon Spurling
WAN Engineer -Specialist

MOREnet, Network Services, Core Network
3212 LeMone Industrial Blvd.
Columbia, MO 65201

Main:(573) 884-7200   Fax:(573)884-6673

EMAIL:PROTECTED
EMAIL:PROTECTED



-----Original Message-----
From: Atkinson, Nathan K (UMC-Student) 
Sent: Sunday, December 08, 2002 11:06 PM
To: EMAIL:PROTECTED
Subject: Re: [MLUG] mlug?


I believe the software you're referring to is Communigate Pro by Stalker 
Software.  Unfortunately most decisions are bureaucratically driven 
rather than technically driven.

Nathan A.

Spurling, Shannon wrote:

> Actualy, the migration to Exchange wasn't exactly driven by staff 
> either.... Several evaluations of the exchange platform pointed out 
> problems and several reasons not to standardized on that platform, but 
> they were ignored. It was touted as the most complete intergrated 
> communication solution. Remember, very few university wide decisions 
> are actualy made by or on behalf of actual staff. Now I saw a more 
> reliable and extendable server solution that is exchange compatable, 
> and I can't remember where I saw it or who sold it. I runs under 
> windows or unix, and has Mac, Unix, and Windows clients available for 
> it. It's not free software, but the liscensing costs a lot less than 
> Microsoft. Even if something like that were given as an alternative, I 
> doubt it could be accepted. Microsoft has somehow gotten it's claws 
> into the University, and I doubt they would let it happen.
>  
> Shannon
>
>     -----Original Message-----
>     *From:* King, Jonathan W.
>     *Sent:* Sun 12/8/2002 6:46 PM
>     *To:* EMAIL:PROTECTED
>     *Cc:* King, Jonathan W.
>     *Subject:* Re: [MLUG] mlug?
>
>
>     On Sun, 8 Dec 2002, John Borchardt wrote:
>
>     > hey, what the heck is going on with mlug?  the website hasn't been
>     > updated for like a year, and there isn't even any
>     > freesoftware.missouri.edu anymore.  does mlug even have a president?
>     > does he or she do anything?  when was the last
>     > meeting/presenation/expo/installfest?
>
>     Dunno on all counts.  Before the school year I and a couple of other
>     people volunteered to give presentations, but nobody ever got
>     around to
>     setting anything up...as far as I know.
>
>     [snip]
>
>     > so what?  is it okay for mlug to ostensibly do nothing while the
>     rest of
>     > the campus migrates to exchange server, outlook webmail, and winxp?
>
>     I doubt that migration to Exchange is anything that MLUG could have
>     influenced given that there was some fairly vocal opposition
>     expressed at
>     the time by some departments and faculty...who in practice do have at
>     least a bit more influence than your average sporadic undergraduate
>     organization.  I think a lot of the complete universality of MS
>     owes a lot
>     to the fact that it (and its file formats) were adopted as being
>     official
>     by the staff, which means that everybody else had to come along
>     for the
>     ride, at least if you wanted to send any electronic documents to them.
>
>     Actually, in my classes I forbade electronic submission of papers
>     and such
>     for the opposite (but identical in spirit) reason: I didn't want
>     to deal
>     with a bunch of dorkily formatted Word (random version here)
>     files.  This
>     year, I do accept these from (smaller) upper division classes
>     since I can
>     easily convert them into PDF.  Not the best end result, but I can live
>     with it.
>
>     jking
>
>     --
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>
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