IT Productivity & E1 8.12

jdel6654

VIP Member
I am working in a heavily "seasoned" XE installation. Everything customized & mix of World / OneWorld. Aside from the obvious reasons, I am attempting to divine arguments for and make the case for an 8.12 upgradation.

Having worked with all releases B73.1 to 8.12, I can argue until I'm blue in the face about how much better 8.12 is than XE. Unfortunately, IT managers (being managers that they are) have a difficult time understanding the cumulative qualitative improvements in JDE software circa 1999. So, I am going to throw down the gauntlet and put it in terms Dogbert and pointy-haired types would appreciate - IT productivity (specifically headcount).

So, long story short, I would like to get some empirical data from other JDE people on the productivity impact of 8.x releases on an IT organization. Basically, I would like to find out whether 8.x has significantly improved productivity / reduced man-hours at your company in the areas of system admin, development, CNC, etc. Basically, I would like to get some data on how much less or more time FTEs or consultants (developers, CNC admin, system admins, security admins, analysts) are having to work on JDE after going from XE to 8.x.

I would sincerely appreciate your help / input.
 
I would have thought that the IT Productivity is WORSE. Newer technology normally requires an INCREASE in support and maintenance due to extra complexity.

Instead of managing a citrix farm, you now have to manage a J2EE Application Server farm - something that takes a little more "nounce" than the average citrix duffer. Look at costs between a citrix guru and a Websphere guru.

CNC is the same - there are still package builds and deployments. Not sure what productivity advantages there are any different.

Security is TONS better. Now you have a hierachial security structure. But at the end of the day, thats only helpful in the setup. Continued maintenance wouldn't be much different.

No. From an IT perspective, there is either little difference or more increased man hours. However, from a FUNCTIONAL aspect, the changes are VERY substantial, and its possible to roll out MORE functionality into your organization (and we all know that ends up requiring more IT management !)
 
Hi,

I agree that most improvements come from functional area,
which is the link between the ERP and the business itself!

However, from the technical point of view, I think that
E812 is more stable than Xe, and there are some niceties
like not having to run R92TAM & R98CRTGL and WebGen anymore.

On the other hand, you'll have to deal with WAS or OAS which
are more complex beasts than Citrix or pure WTS.
 
666,

sorry dude, but when you look at all the new pieces of technology to be understood, mastered,secured, and managed I'm with your managers.
You may be thinking there will be less time running around from PC to PC dealing with fat client issues . . . so far the web issues out-weigh that in my mind.

Cheers,
 
oh, the web is definitely more stable. And certain functions are a little more stable - but Xe is solid as a rock. Going from Xe to EO8.12 is often compared to the same challenges as World going to OneWorld.

As for the R92TAM and R98CRTGL ? Give me a break. Those are done in your sleep at a good site - and are only ever done once the data dictionary changes. Usually, good CNC people keep copies of those TAM files located somewhere. By the way, you can still run those under EO8.12 - Data Dictionary is still held in TAM files on the fat clients (developer machines).

A bigger challenge for those of us used to citrix development boxes is how to deploy development clients to developers - especially remote developers. We still haven't figured out a way to get the 8.12 clients to run in development mode under a terminal server yet - so the only current solution is vmware virtual clients. Don't worry - we're still working on it though !

OAS/WAS is definitely a FAR more complex management beast than Citrix ever was. Not only that, but most companies are then also publishing Internet Exploder through Citrix to ensure management of the browser isn't an issue - so in actuality, you're ADDING additional skillsets to the solution. Believe me, you do NOT want to manage users' friggin browsers (toolbars, spyware, purple monkeys). Talk about IT productivity in the toilet !
 
[ QUOTE ]
oh, the web is definitely more stable. And certain functions are a little more stable - but Xe is solid as a rock. Going from Xe to EO8.12 is often compared to the same challenges as World going to OneWorld.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry. I just re-read this, and it didn't seem to read correct. I meant to say :

...the web is definitely more stable on 8.12 compared to the web on Xe and ERP 8.0 - and certain functionality is more stable between 8.12 and older versions - but, still, Xe is as solid as a rock (as long as all the updates have been applied !)....
 
XE is supported until 2013. Rumor is 8.12 is only supported until 2010 or 2011. What I'm telling clients is that unless they have a compelling "business" reason to upgrade they should stay put on XE. I echo Jon's sentiment; “XE is rock solid."
 
remember - its only "premier" support that ends. In effect, that type of support is only required for 5 years. All EnterpriseOne products have "lifetime" support beyond that.

Hopefully by 2011, any bugs in EnterpriseOne 8.12 will be fixed or identified !

But, I agree. You need a compelling business reason to move. Not just because of support.
 
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Unfortunately, IT managers (being managers that they are) have a difficult time understanding the cumulative qualitative improvements in JDE software circa 1999.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sometimes purely technical non-managers fail to see that there are a multitude of valid business reasons for NOT undertaking an upgrade.
 
[ QUOTE ]
I am working in a heavily "seasoned" XE installation. Everything customized & mix of World / OneWorld. Aside from the obvious reasons, I am attempting to divine arguments for and make the case for an 8.12 upgradation.

Having worked with all releases B73.1 to 8.12, I can argue until I'm blue in the face about how much better 8.12 is than XE. Unfortunately, IT managers (being managers that they are) have a difficult time understanding the cumulative qualitative improvements in JDE software circa 1999. So, I am going to throw down the gauntlet and put it in terms Dogbert and pointy-haired types would appreciate - IT productivity (specifically headcount).

So, long story short, I would like to get some empirical data from other JDE people on the productivity impact of 8.x releases on an IT organization. Basically, I would like to find out whether 8.x has significantly improved productivity / reduced man-hours at your company in the areas of system admin, development, CNC, etc. Basically, I would like to get some data on how much less or more time FTEs or consultants (developers, CNC admin, system admins, security admins, analysts) are having to work on JDE after going from XE to 8.x.

I would sincerely appreciate your help / input.

[/ QUOTE ]

It is my belief, based on experience with all releases from B7.3.2 on every platform out there, that once 8.12 is properly setup, the IT administrative costs are much lower than that of Xe. The implementation costs seem to be a bit higher due to the addition of the web pieces that you may or may not have in Xe. I believe that the admin costs due to the support of development and the admin costs due to maintaining stability of a creaky old system based on antiquated technology are much lower in 8.12 than older releases.

Now if only I (or anyone else on here) had the actual numbers to back up the claim.
 
[ QUOTE ]


On the other hand, you'll have to deal with WAS or OAS which
are more complex beasts than Citrix or pure WTS.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not sure how one can substantiate this claim. Just set the thing up, tune it a bit and let it work. Admittedly the setup can be more time-consuming but once up and running I rarely see problems with WAS.
 
Sometimes purely technical non-managers fail to see that there are a multitude of valid business reasons for NOT undertaking an upgrade.

In my experience, in general, there have been very few situations where business software (and technology in general) takes a step backward. This is even more so true in the last 5 years.

In this case (XE to 8.12), I think you would be hard-pressed to find anyone familiar with 8.12 telling you that you should NOT upgrade if you can afford to. The "valid business reasons" rarely are, in fact, business reasons. They are either obscure, misinterpreted statements from the uninformed about the software _or_ luddites delaying the inevitable obsolescent business process or procedure.

The fact is that so much has changed since 1999 in all aspects of information technology. Quite frankly, I am blown away by the number of businesses throwing support/maintenance fees and not taking the upgrades from JDE that these fees provide for.
 
Well, this is where I disagree. The old XE on WebSphere is nuttin' like 8.12 on OAS.

With every upgrade there is a hump, but long-term, 8.12 / 8.97 will improve developers and CNC admins productivity in a very big way.
 
Thank you for you assessment. This is / was my sentiment as well.

I guess 8.12 / 8.96&7 are new enough that JDE shops are not able to realize this gain in productivity at this time.
 
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XE is rock solid

[/ QUOTE ]

XE also has some major functionality gaps. Saying XE is rock solid is like saying World is / was rock solid. Expensive systems with limited functionality are capable of being "rock solid" because of their limited use.
 
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The "valid business reasons" rarely are, in fact, business reasons. They are either obscure, misinterpreted statements from the uninformed about the software _or_ luddites delaying the inevitable obsolescent business process or procedure.

[/ QUOTE ]

I see that anyone who disagrees with your poorly formed opinion is either a Luddite or misinformed. Your ad hominem attack displays your complete ignorance of what may or may not be a valid business reason.

Every company would upgrade if there was no cost involved at all. The fact of the matter is that it costs quite a pretty penny to upgrade, and for every business on earth, cost is a factor. In addition to direct costs (consultants, hardware, training, etc.), there are indirect costs, such as the time internal resources are taken away from their primary responsibilities in order to facilitate an upgrade, the disruption to business, etc. From the business perspective of this company, the productivity of CNCs and developers isn't even a top consideration; improving the productivity of the workers who actually bring money into the company is, but is it justified by the cost? In our case, management has decided that the answer is "No."

Those are just a few of the reasons this company has chosen not to upgrade, and every one is most certainly valid.

Clearly, you should stick to your isolated world of tech stuff, and leave business to people with actual business sense.
 
Bill,

Well said. We looked at upgrading from XE to 8.9 several years ago. It was crazy expensive (we're talking in the multiple millions) and unjustified. Several years later, we have a justified reason and we are moving forward to 8.12. It is still going to cost millions of dollars, but now we have a business case. Unless you are a consulting firm upgrading a lab environment, upgrading for the sake of upgrading does not make good business sense.

Gregg
 
Gregg,

Did that multiple millions cover your US operations, or your global enterprise? I wouldn't be surprised if that's just for your US ops.

Heck, when we looked at upgrading to 8.10, we couldn't justify the $600k in direct costs, based on the few new features that were useful to our business (dual UOM, some additional AB associations, and cross-docking). Since we only had one CNC and (at the time) two developers, any gain in productivity on the technical side was minimal. Developers don't code much faster because of an upgrade, and testers certainly don't test faster.

I'm hoping that management will agree to an upgrade to 9.something, but that still depends primarily on compelling business reasons that outweigh the cost of the upgrade.
 
[ QUOTE ]
Gregg,

Did that multiple millions cover your US operations, or your global enterprise? I wouldn't be surprised if that's just for your US ops.

[/ QUOTE ]

That covered just North America. We still would have had to run seperate projects for Asia, Europe, and South America. Our global migration to 8.12 will take years to complete.

Gregg
 
Who said anything about upgrading for the sake of upgrading?

I completely and totally agree with _not_ upgrading for the sense of upgrading - which is exactly why I said 8.12/8.97 and not 8.x. There are so many things that aren't in or working in XE Update X that it would take hours just to go over them in a separate thread. This is not the point of this thread.

The reality is that the money is there - it's just being wasted on other things. The greatest of which are inefficient office workers banging around on old, buggy, unreliable systems (has nothing to do with IT). But I also see it situations like developers rewriting things like the JDE transportation system (when Oracle/JDE should have and did rewrite it for them in 8.x). It's also in overpriced and poorly performing hardware. You see wasted resources (and time=money) in other areas but every company is different.

If a company is paying millions for consultants to do the upgrade - then that company is not dealing with the right consulting companies effectively. This is not 1998 and there are many more JDE functional consulants than even 5-10 years to do business with.
 
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