Is it me or what?

I have to concur in general. I too have been Admin since 2.11. I was a CNE through 5x, but didn't bother to go after 6x. I bought the Self Training kit as I did with 5x, but the 6x kit was a total waste of money.

When I upgraded to 6.0 from 4.11 I had to open a case and was dismally supported. I have one NW6SP3 and one NW6SP2, had serious problems applying SP3 to this one so gve up. I'll wait for SP4 for both of them and then watch for quite a while before applying. I also have three remote NW5.1SP3 servers that will probably never be upgraded, just too much to lose if something goes wrong again.

When I upgraded GroupWise from 5.2 to 6.5, I was dismally dissapointed. I am afraid to apply GW6.5SP1

Where are you Drew?

Where are you Eric?

From somebody who is a dealer/consultant for quite a few years for Novell products, the level of support and training varies tremendously depending on geographic location.

Herndon, Va. has very helpful and capable sales support, while the Silicon Valley seems to suck. Pittsburgh is OK.I just moved out to the valley and from what I can see; everything is concentrated in Irvine on the west coast.

The front line people at Novell support have become script readers (Is it plugged in?) and lack the necessary experience to be very helpful. Look, when I know more about the product then the person I am speaking to, something is very wrong.

You need to go to backline support to get anybody who has a clue. And they don't talk to users unless you bitch a whole lot (and I am NOT a typical user).

Anybody that has experience is seen as too expensive and ends up being laid off. So we get script readers.

We have tech support coming out of Bangalore (the new world support center) that sucks.

The business model for Novell is being driven in the quest for better, cheaper, faster. Good mantra, but execution is the key, and the execution is sucking these days.

I have suggested a private newsgroup for dealers, where we can post questions, ideas, and bitches about doing business with Novell. M$ has one, so why not Novell?
Anybody reading this: email the powers at Novell and suggest such a newsgroup.

These folks NEED to get a clue.

I whole heartedly agree. I too was a Novell man since just prior to 3.11. It's just like VHS tapes versus Beta. VHS won, not because it is a better format, but because of better marketing.

Novell makes it too expensive for customers to upgrade and don't give good enough support on problems. Over the last year or two I've converted most of my customers from Novell to NT. Not because it's a better Server. It takes more than being better. Also, my customer's are more comfortable looking at a windows desktop on their Server. I've had several discussions with Novell licensing and they knew they were pricing themselves out of a sale, but they did not care. I agree, it's Management's Fault. But who can fire them?

The marketing has taken a turn towards Linux. Which in some ways is a good thing and in some ways a bad thing. But most people that have installed version 5.x of Netware had very good experiences while Version 6 is a very different animal. 6 works very well when setup in the specific way that it was designed for. If you need the web access that you can't get with almost any other system (at least for small companies) Netware 6 is the 'only' solution. If all you need is an internal file/print/email system then version 5x will do that adequatly. But I've found 6 to be a very powerful tool for remote users. Being able to login over an internet connection from a hotel room is a very powerful tool. Having my drive mappings and printers from remote is also very powerfull. For Collaboration this is the way to go.
I don't know much about the marketing... but I do know that I've set it up a bunch of times (which is a steep learning curve) but when I got the order right... it worked just fine. Version 6 has a lot more features than 2000 or 2003. So its not a fair comparison to compare licensing costs for a file/print/internet network verses a fully integrated remote access solution with firewall, and the rest of the package. But I do understand the frustration of having to make a few support calls this year. All of which were solved very quickly and to my satisfaction. I've also been on many support sites and Novell is probably one of the best knowledge base in the industry. And the search engine is blazing fast compared to some of the other ones out there.

OK I'm only going to address things I personally know about. The website knowledgebase is the best I've seen, but I have been working with the Novell Support site for years. Easy & FAST. Mareting? I think they could go a long way to get the information out to the right people. I thought when I heard they hired a marketing guy that they were going to really start going, but after the initial spot (with the fish) I haven't really seen anything else. I do know that the Tech sector needs help getting the chance to go back to Novell. I've heard more techs complain that the worst thing to happen to them was when the CFO pushed to go Microsoft across the board. MS is OK in it's place, but not for all. I am a Novell preacher, but sometimes you have to deal with what is handed you. I know from information through my networking that the guys who had to get MS and talked their bosses into the NDS to control the network are a little happier.

Anyways my 2 cents

I think the management will in effect fire itself if there is no significant improvement. Microsoft has such a hold on the market that there needs to be better marketing, better products, better support and better web sites put out by those like Novell and Linux that wish to compete and be a viable force on the market. Our shop got tired of the licensing and compatiblity issues running a mixed environment and has gone to all MS on the server and workstation end. I have to say that it has made my work much easier since then. Sad but true...

My experience, once you connect with the right engineers or techs they can resolve pretty much anything. The knowledgebase onsite I find is WAY easier to use than MS'because MS makes so many other products.

I have been to SEVERAL free seminars in Vancouver that have been very informative and targeted marketing for Novell since the Ximian aquisition. They are marketing hard but also only to a target market, they don't mass produce retail products so there is no need to mass market them I think.

I don't bother with Brainshare as Novell has enough webinars and free seminars that I get my fill of product launches.

As for getting pricing, I wouldn't even begin looking to Novell for pricing. Find a partner/reseller and save 10-20% off the web proices plus get more detailed product information. My reseller was recently clearing out Border Manager and GW upgrades at ridiculously low prices that I would NEVER get online.

Drew went to "pervasive computing" I think (also a later IBM slogan!?!?)

Eric resigned.

Was a CNE since 2.11 thru 4 and didn't keep it up.

Why?

Though netware really ran by itself, weeks on end and didn't really need lots of MCSE's to manage and trouble shoot, I think that there was an air of mystery about it that didn't go well with the then emerging market. WWG really took off.

Also, as ever, sloganeering and not open standards. (Late in TCP/IP and when they came on board, not as completely as MS (Well, seemingly open standards)). Why try Unixware when Novell was closer to Unix than MS products in terms of safety, reliability asnd security.

Now it's just a niche player and I keep suggesting Zenworks in my company, but no one seriously considers it.

end

I thought they had a good idea with the Small business give-away promotion. My former employer, a network integrator, never took advantage of the program, but I'd be curious to see how successfull that was/is. I now work in-house at a NW shop, running NW5.1 and GW6.5. We may have to get a SQL server to support a new line of business app, but I fully intend to push for NW6.5 SBS when the time comes. My director is very security-conscious and I think it will be an easy sell versus Windows/Exchange. Two of the big problems I have seen, other than marketing:
1-Small Vendors (like my former employer) would rather 'homogenize' all their customers to MS as it is a much easier sell, and would keep costs down by only having to hire dime-a-dozen MCSEs. Plus, I can't confirm but strongly believe they don't push Novell due to the fact that you never see that customer again. I installed a few Novell servers years ago for very small offices, and they never needed anything else. With a Windows server, there is almost a guaranteed monthly support contract.
2-Younger MS Engineers I have worked with view Novell as a Dinosaur. I have heard PLENTY of techs/engineers criticize Novell, but in EVERY SINGLE CASE, it turns out they have very little to NO experience with Netware. I think if Novell offered a free, customized class to MCSEs that would give them a CNA cert (need to have some motivation) and concentrate on AD vs NDS, that might go a long way towards getting better word out to the masses.
I'm no AD expert, but it seems to me that MS had to create so many 'fixes' to X.500 to get it to work somewhat backward compatible that its just way more complicated than NDS. If you think of a workstation OS as a house, and a server OS as a high-rise building, can you imagine the problems of building a high-rise building on the foundation of a house?

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