10/12/2012 7:50:05 PM #

Micro Focus marketing for ALM tools not dev tools.

Colin |

10/12/2012 8:20:12 PM #

This is how MicroFocus marketing team is investing their money this quarter

Just unbelievable

Andreano Lanusse |

10/13/2012 4:05:37 AM #

No idea what Microfocus is doing. From what I have seen
a) Cobol in Visual Studio
b) Cobol combined with Winforms Controls
c) Mobile development and testing
d) Spreading an agile image to cowboys. Not sure. It's a nice idea, but I am not sure if a cowboy walking backwards is an appealing message. Assuming the results shipped last decade did not fit and software quality dropped - simply a combination of a huge number of systems focusing on dramatically increasing the throughput of business transactions (bubble in the service business) had been built the first time in a new model. It's neither the language nor the methodology. Maybe somehow the false application of the second ... but there are a lot more other reasons... - Java/BPMS would be a comparison where COBOL still fits in, monolithic legacy. On the other hand the Cloud promise - 'We provide the developer, IT department don't care' -> Argument from DataCenter movement (IBM for example spreads this myth as well, others with so called competence centers in countries with almost no labor rights). With little fantasy this video and campaign could address those who still want the developers from their region.

What I don't like about the whole campaign - message touch upon fear. 555-COBOL.

Maybe you remember the 'young inspired' technical engineer found at the Quest website. I thought if this is a character a potential Quest customer should compare too, then this is the no future option for no one.

I think http://www.compuware.com/ are doing it little better, because of Uniface, assuming Uniface would be as powerful as it was in the (think) 80s.

But in the end similar to MTV most of the products with a long tradition end up as a special-interest channel on 'Pay TV'. We are on channel EMB.

Bunny |

10/13/2012 6:35:49 AM #

Fantastic marketing video. Thank you for posting this.

Steve Faleiro |

10/13/2012 7:33:52 AM #

They get kudos for attempting it anyway ;)

I dunno what to think either, but this is probably a stunt the original Borland could have pulled back in the day. Quite a few notches about the EMBT marketing efforts for sure in terms of polish and creativity, no idea if it'll hit the mark though.

Eric |

10/13/2012 9:52:40 AM #

Say: a pity that Delphi was not sold into more brave hands.

(Instead of those loosers which keep silent and capricious. Proudly (?) using f*cking outdated tools (QC/issue-tracker/svn repo) and great to know them invest into better piracy-'preventing'-methods (and slow down XE3). Keep on rolling, my SA won't (and I'm sad about this: I hoped for a great FM - but without trust into the company...)).

tim |

10/13/2012 10:24:54 AM #

The video stinks but he still has some excellent quottes
(E can stll learn from that <g>)

http://frankborland.wordpress.com/

• Keep it open
• Don’t make it big, make it better
• Focus on the user experience
• Meet every platform need
• Make it affordable
• Listen to the community

Marius |

10/26/2012 1:59:44 AM #

It's too bad that Embt didn't buy the Borland trademarks and names, and re-brand all of the language tools under their original moniker.  Anybody who's been around a while still associates "Borland" with "Turbo Pascal" and even Delphi.  But COBOL?  Come on .... :o

The only thing I remember about Borland and COBOL is listening to Philippe Kahn talking about how MicroFocus would build smarts into their compilers that would recognize when various COBOL benchmarks were being compiled and would magically generate hand-optimized code to run them in a way that would virtually guarantee they'd win the benchmarks.  He said, "We don't do that with our compilers.  They win benchmarks because they're just THAT GOOD!"

David S |