Re: Soft-Switch and X.500--Zisman Quo

Hoyt Kesterson <hoyt_kesterson@ppd-smtp.az05.bull.com> Wed, 01 September 1993 01:05 UTC

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Date: 31 Aug 93 17:37:51 U
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From: Hoyt Kesterson <hoyt_kesterson@ppd-smtp.az05.bull.com>
To: jpslone@mmc.com
Cc: hoyt_kesterson@ppd-smtp.az05.bull.com, dssig@nist.gov, osi-ds@cs.ucl.ac.uk, osi-ds@eso2.orl.mmc.com
Subject: Re: Soft-Switch and X.500--Zisman Quo

In response to your letter received 31 Aug 1993  at 11:28

remember that softswitch sells very nice gateway products to interconnect all
those different products. extensive deployment of standardized mail (x.400) or
directory (x.500) products eventually removes the need for those gateways.

unfortunately, those who write in the weekly press tend to describe x.500 as
too complex (i guess because many of the words in the documentation are too
long). most of these guys have never read the thing - they get their input from
companies like softswitch. the only way to fight this kind of rumor campaign is
to go out to these conferences and do presentations of your own (hopefully
about products you have built).

i recently talked to someone who was at the meeting in atlanta and got so mad
she walked out. my conversation with her reveals that the term "directory
synchronization" is interpreted several ways. that makes it even more difficult
to criticize.

my concern is that these people say that they just want to do a simple thing
with a simple mechanism; later they say that they want to add a feature that
will require a simple extension to the mechanism; finally they say that they
have too much investment in their now complex mechanism to consider going to
the standard mechanism and why didn't those standardization groups accommodate
those mechanisms already deployed.

   hoyt (my own opinions of course)

Re: Soft-Switch and X.500--Zisman Quo Hoyt Kesterson