Have heard these sad stories of fool hardy conversions from MV to solutions selected as a result of recommendations by consultants, accountants and teh like.
We have developed and implemented systems in MV over 40 years.
The frame works that we built 30 years ago still stand robustly .
The key words used when confronted are:
1) They say Legacy system: we counter by saying you mean a 9am to -5pm system?
2) The say MultiValue ??? We say: you mean you want to see the data like you see in a pivot table in Excel right ? or do you want an entity relationship diagram?
3) They say difficult to maintain and modernize the system: We say we are technology independent .. tell us what you want and what frame work you want us to use to develop in? we will use the framework that you recommend.
1) dont forget when we first used MV to develop systems the frame works were mainly I/O (input output) . These systems were used by people who came in at 9 am and worked on thier green screens to input data from forms that were filled up by hand. A program processed that data to produce reports (Print-outs) or display screens that produced results in a fraction of the time it took to produce the same manually.
We have used the simple fact that as the world changes so fast, each major change of requirement makes the older process a Legacy.
So we have evolved from 9-5 to 24x7. people dont fill up forms by hand any more.. they do it on-line on a web browser... now they do it on their mobile phones.
very soon Artificial intelligence will be the fad..( I love my Alexa)
One thing does not change: That is the Risks that are taken by business inherent in the actions of each entity connected to that business.
A frame work that looks after "Risk Management" at all levels is perpetual.
so the answer to questions 2) and 3 ) are important to understand and present with knowledge ability and conviction.
we have saved many millions of our clients money by keeping their applications legacy free and upto date.
WE have lost some battles in the early years when Windows 98 was around and were ashamed of green screens..
Not any more ! .. some of our users adore a green screen where a whole process is started and finished with one Carriage Return.
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Andy Jayasinghe
MD
Data Management Group Ltd
London United Kingdom
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