Recipe for migrating from SCO to Linux

[Bill Campbell]

On Wed, Jun 30, 2010, Fairlight wrote:
>You'll never BELIEVE what scooter6 at gmail.com said here...:
>> I am strongly entertaining the thought of migrating our company OFF
>> of SCO OpenServer 5.0.5 onto a flavor of Linux.  Has anyone written a
>> recipe for doing this, step-by-step?  I realize I have to get different
>> licensing from filePro, etc. and if memory serves me correctly, they also
>> have something that converts files from SCO to Linux?
>
>No file conversion is necessary.  They're same-endian platforms.
>
>Aside from making sure libtermcap is installed, and possibly twiddling your
>termcap settings, there's really not much difference between moving
>SCO->Linux as opposed to SCO->SCO if you were switching between systems.

There are still some issues with FilePro using xterms on Linux.
We use a slightly hacked version of the FilePro termcap and
startup scripts so that die-hard Linux types (e.g. me) can work
without having to get other terminal software.  One of the main
things I like to do is get rid of FilePro's color choices, much
preferring a vanilla xterm with black text on a light background.

Probably the biggest issue is training people to hit ctrl-C
instead of the DEL key.

>> Amongst other things, my reasoning is getting a stronger platform as our
>> company continues to grow rapidly.  We are up to about 60 end-users and
>> still climbing.  I have heard that on a proper Linux server, indexing,
>> amongst other things, run much quicker on Linux than on SCO?  Is this
>> true? Can anyone confirm this?  In other words, if you took 2 IDENTICAL
>> servers, one with SCO and one with Linux, and indexed the same file, is
>> there a NOTICEABLE speed advantage on the Linux side?
>
>There was a noticeable speed difference on identical hardware when filePro
>on Linux was the SCO version and had to run under iBCS...it was still
>faster than SCO native.  It's faster yet natively, in my experience.

Agreed.

>> On a different note, I also want to look into converting our character
>> based filePro to have more of a Windows feel, using more mouse than
>> keyboard, etc. but I think that's a pretty large undertaking as our
>> system has a LOT of different menus, data files, browses, etc.
>
>And that's a bit of a dead end.  fileProGI is Windows-only.  Reface needed
>a unix host, but I thought it was a Windows front end.
>
>> But for now, I'm mainly looking for the conversion to Linux - speaking of
>> which, does the community favor a specific Linux flavor over others?  I
>
>Currently my pick is CentOS 5.4.

I'll second that.

>> will be looking to get a dual or quad processor server with a LOT of RAM,
>> etc to assist in the speed aspect as well.  Currently, we use NetTerm on
>> the end-users PC's to access filePro - and I will be looking to switch
>> all of them to puTTy - is that do-able to whatever Linux platform we
>> choose?
>
>NetTerm!  I used to use that!  :)
>
>PuTTY works with any host that runs telnetd or sshd.  That would include
>all linux distributions.

Most of our folks are using Anzio on their Windows machines, with
at least one Mac user using Powerterm which has good SCO emulation.

PuTTY works well too.  The iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad iSSH and
TouchTerm Apps should also work, but I'm waiting to get an iPad
before testing as they're basically toys on my iPod Touch, more
proof-of-concept than really useful, perhaps with a bluetooth
keyboard they might work.

>> Any tips, tricks, pointers etc that you guys can contribute would all be
>> appreciated.  Thanks

Hire somebody who's done it before to help?

Bill
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