Response to John Dodge's comments in the 8/25 issue of PC Week , "Novell: The News is all bad or is it?"

<<< Vernon Graner CNE  09/01 8:49 PM >>>
Of course I'm sure you'll receive your fair share of knee-jerk incoherent
flame mail for the comment made at the end of your article "August 25, 1997
This PC Week Novell: The news is all bad -- or is it? By John Dodge" so in
contrast, I'll try to be refreshingly rational :) 

My two cents worth:

I feel Novell Intranetware 4.11 is superior to NT in many regards and I
will continue to use it in house as well as recommend it to many of my
customers. Here are the reasons why:

Directory Services
------------------
Novell's NDS currently has no native equivalent in the NT world. Although
NT5 is being touted as supporting an open Directory Services model, only
what is bundled with NT and available NOW is relevant. I cannot load an
"announced intention" on my client's server. So, while Microsoft is coding
and debugging their beta DS system, Novell has a mature, stable,
WAN-friendly, scalable solution that can even enfold NT4 servers into the
system with ease.

System Maturity
---------------
Novell worked hard to get the bugs out of NDS (I was a beta tester for
Netware 4.x). Creating a Directory Services system is problematic (as
Microsoft is no doubt just now discovering), but Novell has matured NDS
nicely, creating a stable and useful Directory Services model. While at the
same time, Microsoft was hard at work improving NT's GUI to look more like
Windows 95!

System Security
---------------
I think it's interesting to note that a well designed Novell network is
almost impervious to software "hacking". The only successful Novell
security breach I have encountered in my professional career (12 years now)
was a result of a social-engineering attack on a company employee and was
no fault of Novell's. While new security hazards and fixes for NT seem to
be posted on a daily basis, I can't remember the last time I had to rush to
a Novell customer site to apply a significant security fix. Although the
"Ping Of Death" had me running to a number of NT customers.

Dedicated OS
------------
While some see this as a limitation, I see it as an advantage. Because the
Novell server is just that, a SERVER, the temptation for a company to
misuse it as a workstation is nil. I've had first-hand experience with lost
and damaged data when a user decides that the NT server would be a good
place to work. Although most responsible administrators create rules
barring users from doing so, many times there are political reasons (IE:
the boss said so!) that require administrators to relinquish control of the
NT box, and with it, the stability a dedicated server should provide. This
trap isn't present on a Novell server as there is no desktop to tempt a
user (or manager!)

Hardware Resources
------------------
I see many of my customers and my peers bemoaning the fact that shop after
shop is "dumping" a stable,  reliable Novell server in favor of a
management-mandated NT server. It usually starts when some manager reads an
article (maybe yours? :) that gives Novell's obituary while singing the
praises of NT. Soon the guys in the trenches are trying to scrape together
the hardware needed to even allow NT to boot! Where I have personally used
Novell to support an amazing 130 users on a 486-66 machine with 16 megs of
RAM, an NT box with less than 64meg of RAM or a Pentium-Class processor is
considered by many to be "crippled".

In conclusion:
--------------
For the most part, I felt the bulk of your article simply made observations
and then drew some conclusions based on your perspective. I have to admit
that I was puzzled by your contradictory and inflammatory closing
paragraph. Were you trying to incite a feedback-firestorm from die-hard
Novell users?

As for NT, in a way it has been good for my company as, since we do
contract MIS for commercial customers, NT has resulted in more service
calls and subsequently an increase in revenue :) On the other hand, for
most of my customers, I feel that NT is too new, too buggy and too full of
security holes to be considered a primary OS for mission critical
environments. (Remember that "Ping Of Death!")

All in all, any NOS is just a tool and it's effectiveness in a given set of
circumstances should be the main criteria in making a software selection.
Based on this rule of thumb, I feel NT might be a contender in the future,
but for now I recommend the stable, mature Novell Intranetware 4.11 for the
vast majority of my network customers.

Vernon Graner CNE/MCP
Senior Systems Engineer
Texas Information Services
vern@txis.com 
http://www.txis.com