International Informix Users Group (IIUG)
www.iiug.org
E-newsletter
Volume 3 - December, 2000

SUMMARY

You can update your IIUG information online at www.iiug.org/cgi-bin/update_member.cgi

I. LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT

First of all, let me welcome all the new IIUG Board members who started their assignments at the Informix User Conference in Orlando. Also, on behalf of the entire IIUG membership, I would like to extend a warm welcome to the Ardent and U2 communities.

IIUG has hit a few home runs lately: Most notably, the user conference, which was very successful and well attended (about 1800 participants). As most of you are already aware, IIUG played a major role in the conference in terms of driving the content, sponsoring events, and helping on certain logistics. I would like to personally thank the IIUG's IUC committee, chaired by Fred Hubbard, and also thank the past and current board and the membership at large for making this event well worth attending.

The new IIUG Board of Directors assumed their positions at the Annual General Meeting. Thank you for voting in the IIUG's first public election. To view the election results, you may visit www.iiug.org/about/elections/electionstart.html. For Board member biographies, see Board Biographies. Four new individuals were elected to the Board. They are Glen Jacobson, James Edmiston, Paul Mosser and Stuart Litel. On behalf of the membership, I welcome all of them. Carlton Doe, Mac Horn, and Meg Hilbert departed from the Board leaving a legacy of great work and commitment. Thank you for the many hours and great contribution.

As we progress and succeed, we also evolve. As a result of our evolution, the IIUG board has been structured to focus on key activities and best serve our members. As part of the structure, we have incorporated three main committees or groups focused on key activities. They are: Membership, Promotions and Operations. The Membership committee will be responsible to address all membership needs such as communications, enrollment, user group communication and worldwide relationship management. The Promotions committee will be responsible for developing and sustaining IIUG's value proposition, advocacy and special interest groups (SIGs), our E-newsletter, and Informix User Conferences. The Operations committee is responsible for managing and maintaining IIUG infrastructure, including the Web site, the membership database, email lists, and the IIUG archives. These committees have been structured to best serve you, so please feel free to contact them at membership@iiug.org, promotions@iiug.org and operations@iiug.org.

One of the IIUG Board's major tasks for the coming year is to seek more SIG and advocacy participation. For more details, see our charter and bylaws and Advocacy. For more information or to get involved, please write to promotions@iiug.org. In addition, I would like to encourage and seek your participation in local user groups. See Member Resources for more information.

Finally, this e-Newsletter is another communications mechanism at your disposal. It is open to your contribution and I hope that you will feel free to participate in it.

Have a happy holidays and a great New Year!

Yours truly,

Sudhir P. Nair
President, IIUG
president@iiug.org

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II. IIUG NEWS AND EVENTS

Review of IUC and Partner Forum 2000, by Ron Flannery

Following is a brief summary of the recent Informix User Conference. A more detailed report can be found right here on the IIUG site or can be found with more detail in the Pulse section of www.InformixHandbook.com.

The Informix User Conference and Partner Forum.2000 were held from October 25th-28th, 2000. Since Informix was founded in 1980, these events marked its 20-year anniversary.

In my opinion, the conference was very well-run and had few glitches. Informix had already spent a good deal of time clarifying its new direction, so there were no earth-shattering announcements. Instead, they explained product direction and solidified the message about the FOCUS that will be achieved by splitting the company in two. There were announcements about XPS on Linux as well as Arrowhead, a consolidation of database products.

Post-Conference Evaluations and Downloads of Track Sessions

Informix has taken great advantage of the Internet to enhance the conference experience. If you attended the conference and didn't have a chance to finish the conference evaluation, you can complete an online version. You can also use the Web to download the slides used at the track sessions. Here are the URLs:

Conference slides: www.iiug.org/resources/articlindex.php

IIUG Members at the Informix User Conference 2000.

Over 500 IIUG Members were in attendance and approximately 225 new members were enrolled at the IIUG booth on the conference floor. In the best exhibit booth traditional, IIUG gave away goodies to new and existing IIUG members. New members were also entered in a drawing for Palm Pilots. Winners were: Tim Shoaf, of Hughes Supply, Inc., Orlando, FL and Ron Brunko, of Sloans Lake Managed Care, Denver, CO. Congratulations!

Special Interest Groups - Fred Hubbard - SIG Chairperson

One of IIUG's best vehicles for learning, networking and influencing Informix Software is a Special Interest Group (SIG). Our Charter and Bylaws recognized this fact early on (See www.iiug.org/about/charter.html). SIGs can be grouped around a product, an industry, a language, a geography, etc. Examples include 4GL/D4GL, Spanish users, data modeling, and European Presidents.

As Informix reinvigorates its product-marketing arm, they have reached out to IIUG for product direction. We are responding in earnest by sponsoring groups for Red Brick, Universe/Unidata, and XPS. Other possibilities include IDS 7.x, Foundation.2000, Classics (4GL/D4GL, ESQL/C, SQL, and Connectivity drivers). If you are interested, please contact me at fredh@iiug.org and keep checking www.IIUG.org for the latest information.

Membership Profile Report - Malcolm Weallans

Many thanks to all of you who have already taken the time to complete your IIUG profile. So far, about 1300 IIUG members have completed the survey. We are in the process of combining the profile results with the database and are looking at ways to improve this process for future years. The results of the profiling exercise have shown that 75% of IIUG members do not belong to a local user group (LUG). Results also shows that the major countries and US states where people don't belong to local groups are places where we have, or have had, strong local groups. I would urge all of you to take part in local groups. Details of these can be found on the IIUG website ( www.iiug.org).

LUG corner: Malcolm Weallans - "LUGNUT" (Local Users Group liaison on the IIUG Board of Directors)

IIUG is currently working with people in Hungary, Jamaica, North Africa, Toronto, Eugene Oregon, Kansas, and Russia to set up new local user groups. If you need any more information concerning local user groups, please contact either Dawn McGuire at dmcguire@informix.com or Malcolm Weallans at malcolm@iiug.org. They will gladly assist you and put you in touch with the local user group organizer. And if any of you are interested in setting up a group in your local area please contact Dawn and Malcolm for more help and information.

Has your LUG had elections this year? Does the IIUG have the correct contact information for your LUG? Did you know the IIUG Website has a Calendar on which you can post your LUG Meeting dates, etc.? Did you know that your LUG could appoint someone to the International Users Group Leadership Council (IUGLC)? Contact ug@iiug.org for more information.

Please view the IIUG Events web page at: www.iiug.org

To list your local event in this newsletter or on the IIUG web site, please send your event information to ug@iiug.org

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III. BOARD NEWS

A. Announcement of Board for the 2000-2001 Term.

The online elections for the IIUG Board of Directors is now complete. The new Board was determined by popular vote of the IIUG membership via the www.iiug.org website. Your Board of Directors in order of the election results are as follows: Ron Flannery, Sudhir Nair, Sounia Nejad Chaney, Fred Hubbard, Paul Mosser, James Edmiston, Stuart Litel, Glenn Jacobson, Malcolm Weallans, Bernd Langer, and Rob Vorbroker. Informix has appointed as its Board representative to be Shawn Dagg, former IIUG President and long-time Board member.

B. Review of IIUG Board Committees and Goals for this Year.

The Board will once again work in three teams. The Membership Team will be headed by Malcolm Weallans and will include Bernd Langer, Sounia Nejad Chaney and Glenn Jacobson. The charter of the Membership Team is to 'Serve membership needs and to explore avenues of increasing breadth of membership'. The Promotions Team will be headed by Rob Vorbroker and will include Fred Hubbard, Shawn Dagg and Ron Flannery. The charter of the Promotions Team is to 'Promote IIUG to Users and Informix'. The Operations Committee will be headed by Stuart Litel and will include James Edmiston and Paul Mosser. The charter of the Operations Team is to 'Manage IIUG Infrastructure issues'.

C. Peter Gyenes Meets the IIUG Board

During IUC, Peter Gyenes, Chairman and CEO of Informix Corp., parent company of Informix Software and "NewCo" and a driving force behind the company split and reorganization, met with the IIUG Board of Directors for over 2 and 1/2 hours! Gyenes really valued the message that the users could provide, and in fact he incorporated much of it into his Partner Forum and IUC presentation slides and into the plans for the new Informix companies. Here is a brief excerpt of the "roundtable" session that is documented by Ron Flannery and can be found right here on IIUG.

BOARD: Just what is going on with Informix?

GYENES: In the last few months, I've talked to many of our users and customers. They often asked the exact same question: "When are you going to get your act together?" As you know, Informix has gone through numerous changes and has taken its hits in the market. People want to know when we're going to decide what we'll be when we grow up. What they mean is, "when are we finally going to be a company with reliable performance in the market?" That's why we split the company into two separate operating businesses: one for database and one for E-business solutions software.

There is a terrific opportunity for Informix Software to be a database company. People know that we have the best technology and now is our time to prove it, with unmitigated focus on being a database company.

At the same time, by applying ruthless focus on our E-business software solutions, we can capitalize on that high-growth market that depends on being database agnostic.

BOARD: The IIUG board represents over 10,000 users worldwide. We're here because we believe in the mission of the user community. We feel that it's really important that Informix supports the user groups and of course, the users. What are your plans for the user group?

GYENES: User groups are fundamental. Many members of the new Informix management teams come from the systems and software industry. We have a really good track record of succeeding with cycles of technology, selling and creating new technologies, working with VARs, OEMs, and working globally. We can try lots of strategies, but the only one that will work is working with the users in the field.

Our management team members are users and have worked with user groups for a long time. It's not just something we've read about; we have done it for many iterations of technology. It's not just for the company to have a user group; it's for the USERS to have a user group.

D. Feedback: How can the IIUG Board help you?

We are always looking for input from IIUG members. This is in fact your organization. What else should we implement to better serve you? Please let us know via one of the means listed at the end of this newsletter.

IV. INFORMIX NEWS

Details on the Split of Informix, by Joe Lumbley

Following is part of an article written by Joe Lumbley and posted at www.devx.com. The article presents Joe's perspective about the division of Informix into two companies. Joe Lumbley is an Informix DBA, developer and the author of several books on Informix, including "Informix DBA Survival Guide".

While database companies such as Oracle are running full-speed to transform themselves from database companies into e-business solution companies, Informix has come back to its roots. This was made abundantly clear to the 1,800 people attending the Informix User and Partner Conference, October 24-28, 2000, in Orlando, Florida, when Informix Software President James Foy delivered his keynote address: "We're Informix Software, we're a database company, and we're back.". "We're proud to be a database company", he added.

For the complete article and in depth analysis, go to www.devx.com/free/hotlinks/2000/ednote1101/ednote1101.asp.

Informix's Corporate Strategy

Informix announced the company's focus, structure and key appointments. Building on 20 years of database management system (DBMS) products and technology excellence, Informix Software will focus on delivering industry-leading, cost-effective database management systems to meet the needs of today's business users in the Internet era. For the complete press release, please see www.informix.com/informix/press/2000/oct/leading.html

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