{"id":729,"date":"2008-07-17T11:40:44","date_gmt":"2008-07-17T16:40:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/?p=729"},"modified":"2008-07-17T11:40:44","modified_gmt":"2008-07-17T16:40:44","slug":"an-ibmers-journey-to-acquire-cawily-product-information","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/2008\/07\/an-ibmers-journey-to-acquire-cawily-product-information\/","title":{"rendered":"An IBMers Journey to acquire CA\/Wily Product Information"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a post many months back I spoke<\/a> to why I thought IBM was like an open source company. The analogy was that nearly all of IBM Tivoli’s product, support, best practices and user groups are open to anyone to access. Unfortunately, nearly every other vendor doesn’t have such an approach in place. Here’s my story of my journey to get product information for CA\/Wily Introscope and CEM. I’m glad it had a good ending, but it sure could have been easier!<\/p>\n

When customer’s ask, it’s usually all hands on deck to figure out how to get things done here at IBM Tivoli. When presented with a challenge on integrating one vendor’s technology with another vendor’s technology, your options vary greatly and depend upon how well vendors choose to play with one another or how open their technologies are.<\/p>\n

The task at hand – leverage the powerful data, metrics and KPIs that the CA\/Wily Introscope\/CEM products provide and incorporate them into aggregate business service management displays within TBSM v4. Simple as it sounds, we ask all of the standard questions. Tell me about the data collected, how its stored, and if there is a standard API or ODBC interface to get at the data. The challenge here with the CA\/Wily product is the non-standard JDBC API (and .jar file) it uses for Introscope and the WebServices API for CEM. You really need some documentation and\/or examples to get moving here.<\/p>\n

These questions usually lead us in one direction or another, but most often the internal emails begin to fly and folks hit Google. I spent nearly six hours executing every known Google trick I know to search for documentation or any other resources on what my options may be. Results – nada. Everything I needed was “behind the firewall” at CA\/Wily. I posted a note to my blog, which resulted in a few new paths to follow. One of my regular followers put me in touch with their CA\/Wily SME and he shared his expert advice on what they do, but understandably, was uncomfortable providing copies of manuals. (Thanks Jay, Steve, Tom, Abbas)<\/p>\n

I found CA\/Wily’s User Group\/Forums and requested an account. This was sent to an email alias and a nice lady said, as I expected, “you’re not on our customer list”. I replied, this time from my IBM email account stating that I’m sure we’re partners and I’m seeking information for a joint customer on how to accomplish an integration. She forwarded my email to the CA\/Wily – IBM Tivoli Relationship Manager and I received a phone call and an email from her. (Thanks Marilyn!)<\/p>\n

The CA\/Wily Relationship Manager exceeded my expectations and took ownership of the situation. She tracked down account teams in two separate geographies, created a support case and rallied the troops. In the end, I received the necessary manuals and SME contacts I needed to move forward.<\/p>\n

I’m pleased with the cooperation I ultimately received, but continue to think that it shouldn’t have to be this difficult. I think this is where the next generation companies will take the leadership roles. Transparency, honesty, “on-demand” information access, “real-time” support and enablement, cooperation between vendors for the client’s benefit, etc. The level of effort it takes to transform into this type of organization is immense, the commitment and investment in FTEs to sustain it for the long haul is significant. The benefits in the long run should be what keeps those clients coming back for more.<\/p>\n

We’re heading in the right direction here at IBM and within Tivoli. I do worry though as the times get tough, that these programs and investments will be the first on the chopping block. Every product’s investment plan should fund these initiatives for the long haul. The support model for a community driven approach shouldn’t be thought of as a ratio (1 FTE managing dozens of blogs, wikis, communities, etc.) and that the community must be invested in (incentives, bounties, individual\/group goals and objectives – PBC\/IDP, etc.). <\/p>\n

What are your thoughts on open access and transparency within the vendor community? What are your plans?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In a post many months back I spoke to why I thought IBM was like an open source company. The analogy was that nearly all of IBM Tivoli’s product, support, best practices and user groups are open to anyone to access. Unfortunately, nearly every other vendor doesn’t have such an approach in place. Here’s my […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,83,25,38,95,39,62,92],"tags":[966,570,1023,573,933,523,572,934,574,571],"class_list":{"0":"post-729","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-best-practices","7":"category-ca","8":"category-general","9":"category-ibm","10":"category-tbsm","11":"category-tivoli","12":"category-user-group","13":"category-value","14":"tag-ca","15":"tag-cawily","16":"tag-community","17":"tag-forums","18":"tag-ibm","19":"tag-integrations","20":"tag-manuals","21":"tag-tivoli","22":"tag-usergroups","23":"tag-wily"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=729"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1264,"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729\/revisions\/1264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dougmcclure.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}