Arthur Francis Tyde III

It was an honor to be a featured presenter at the Intel Free and Open Source Government Forum in conjunction with the 2006 China International Software & Information Service Fair held in Dalian. In attendance were industry notables such as Javier Sola of the Khmer Software Initiative and Danese Cooper of Intel. Spending time with Javier, Danese, and Joya Chatterjee were the highlights of a very well organized event. Danese is an absolute font of information on all things happening in the space. She is a passionate industry advocate and it was interesting to hear her presentations on Intel's Open Source Strategy. Danese is capable of putting solid business logic together that give Intel executives the ammunition they need to support the FOSS agenda and remain true to their business building agendas. As the former CTO of the Free Standards Group I found Javier Solas work on translation issues related to the Khmer language fascinating from both social and linguistic perspectives. Javier is not just translating stuff into Khmer – he is putting together a standards based framework for supporting local language transition which is highly portable and deserves more attention. Javier and his team have made it possible for the Khmer government to plan a complete FOSS transition as part of their ICT master plan. Strangely, his presentation segued into mine rather well which isn't something I would have predicted.

My narcoleptic test (presentation) was called "FOSS Metrics, Migration and Support - Overview, Cost & Industry Statistics, Tools, Services." Pretty hard-core stuff detailing the analysis of an IT environment, the availability of tools, and the issues involved in migrating to FOSS solutions in medium to large enterprise business environments. Cost and statistic models were discussed in painful detail. A copy of the presentation has been uploaded to the Intel FOSS Government Forum Wiki, it's a pretty active forum. The Intel forums have been both successful and valuable across Asia. I base this observation on the number of people who have contacted me about migration issues after the shows are over. My hope is that organizations seeking to make a transition to FOSS do so with reasonable plans and expectations, such that the transition is painless and produces the greatest financial benefit. I remain available as an adviser to organizations considering such migrations. Ultimately, it's about running a leaner and meaner IT environment, doing more with less, and contributing to the Technology Sovereignty,” of your region.

A copy of my presentation can be found here!

I travel a lot, and friends of mine travel even more. I noticed that Doc Searles, David Sifry and Chris Dibona are still making the rounds to events like OSCON. Now Doc is going from Santa Barbara to Portland – and the obvious choice (from my perspective) is First Class on Amtrak. Going by rail is so much more civilized than flying. That said, ages ago, Ben Gross offered what has become one of my most treasured travel tips. If you spend a lot of time in the air SeatGuru can not be underestimated. Being a commuter in Asia means I am often flying from China, to Japan, to Seoul, to Manila, then on to Singapore and Kuala Lumpur. I track, I backtrack – and I often make rubber glove flights. (last minute tickets which result in regular amateur prostate exams) Because the region is served by so many airlines, and I am such a budget guy – I fly them all, and often that mean sitting in coach. Be well armed – know about SeatGuru.

Sun Tzu would have expected some kung-fu action out of Oracle by now! Consider this question, what do you think would happen if China suddenly switched to the Euro as the basis for settling all it's international debt? That one move would essentially turn the lights out on the US economy. If Bush and Taiwan piss off the mainland Chinese, they won't go to war with us, they'll take out our economy. Oracle has a similar advantage over IBM right now... But let's examine the outcome before we carpet bomb Armonk.

I have a lot of respect for the BMOC at KSQL as any fellow pilot is a brother. While I don't know the guy, most of the people I do know connected with him say he sort of a dick. However, his execution, engineering acumen, business savvy and sense of personal style can't be denied. Larry Ellison is a guy who gets things done. I have also met Safra Catz at various Bay Area political and charitable functions. She is also smart and competent, (and she's pretty hot, a good hire on all fronts) but I am distressed at Oracle's lack of action or direction in the Operating Systems space. Strategically – Oracle could change the face of the industry with a couple of brave acquisitions and take a chunk out the competition in one well timed move. It's high time to shake things up, because while the Financial Times article where Larry discussed getting into the Linux business was good for some yucks it's time to see the bullshit walk and the money talk.

Database software works better when you have a tightly tuned operating system. IBM is sticking it to Oracle with DB2 and a successful (yet vulnerable) Linux strategy. IBM makes it easy to choose DB2 on Linux reaping the rewards of folks who are simply worn out dealing with Windows (security issues, an OS that seems like a buggy tar pit) and see Linux as a viable platform with perceived performance and cost advantages. Microsoft is chasing IBM and Oracle with their modestly successful Microsoft SQL Server product, software that directly benefits from control of the OS and many speculate that MS has a number of stack specific versions of its OS products ready to hatch. Heck, even puny MYSQL just by virtue of it's existence is forcing Oracle (and IBM) to grant some pretty hefty price concessions to customers who use it simply as a way to bargain down their database spending. Either way – this is an expensive marketing battle in a mature market that apparently is being fought with no long term goal. Sure, you steal a couple of market share points here and there, but it's a never ending struggle. Let's see a Siebel / Peoplesoft style consolidation play on the Linux space and by virtue of that offer IBM a little payback for that wonderful DB2 billboard on Highway 101 at the Oracle exit.

I speak to a lot of senior IT deployment managers - It is this analysts observation that most enterprise customers would welcome a supported distribution by Oracle, whereas they would not welcome yet another OS offering from IBM (perhaps Linux/2). Interestingly, Oracle is already a shareholder / founder of Linux distribution company Miracle Linux, part of the Asianux kiretsu so there had already been some testing of the waters. It's also worth noting that the majority of IBM enterprise customers (more than 80%) running Linux on the mainframe are using Novell (SuSE) Linux and (almost) every one of these is also a big DB2 customer. Some marquee names, Deutche Bank, Korean Airlines, many Wall Street financial houses, these are companies that Oracle should be selling to but have traditionally been blue (IBM) shops. Cracking true-blue accounts is the bane of any sales executive surfing in IBM's wake. Oracle can crack these accounts with a killer OS strategy.

What should the strategy be? Here is my recommendation. Oracle should gain controlling interest of both Red Hat and Novell. Don't argue over which one to buy, buy them both, consolidate them, fire some people (I am happy to provide that list for a small fee), hire some other people (that list you get for free) but the net fallout is this. First, you have consolidated the business Linux space under one brand with the chops to get the job done and inspire confidence in the enterprise customer. Oracle is capable of putting at least as much muscle behind Linux support and services as Microsoft can muster for Windows. Oracle is also a much better brand that can do much more with the assets of both these companies than they would ever be able to do independently.

Shortly after the purchase Oracle discontinues support for DB2 on Oracle platforms, but will offer free migration tools and discounted support and license deals to shops that make the switch. Make it hard for people to use DB2, and take Red Hat out of the picture and you force IBM customers to run back to Microsoft as a place to run DB2 (which will never happen) or make a simple DB concession for the privilege of continuing to run a great operating system supported by a trusted provider. Novell brings a lot of great technology to the table, some of the best is directly targeted at Active Directory and other areas where Microsoft is strong. Oracle not only gains one of the better Linux platform development teams but they also pick up a bunch of supporting technologies that while Novell has been completely inept in capitalizing on you can almost guarantee that Oracle will know what to do.

Lastly, with the right marketing you now have Oracle customers demanding that IBM support Oracles OS on their mainframe products... Next step is closing the books on Sun – more on Jonathan's nightmare scenario after I get a steak, some wine – and hang out in Second Life for a while!