From: geek@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (Myrland Gray)
Subject: Re: Odesta's Double Helix and re:  LISTSERVER!
Organization: Northwestern University, Evanston Illinois.
Distribution: usa
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 1992 16:59:18 GMT

In article <1992Dec30.200953.25124@shearson.com> brekshyn@shearson.com writes:
>It's now Helix Tachnologies "Helix Express".  I have had it since 1984 and
>it is the only database I'd recommend to my small-business clients, especially
>if they want to maintain it in the future.

Actually, it's Helix Technologies. Future? Helix? *hack* --cough-- (*&^*%*&
NOT! Helix is bound to die a quick and painful death (IMHO) in the not too
distant future.

>I've never had data problems and we're
>talking eight years here!  As for technical support I have had no problems,
>mirabile dictu!  Rumour has it that the "management" of Odesta just lost it
>and ran aground - they ignored Helix in the end to concentrate on that
>silly "Geo-query" product.

Incorrect. Both GeoQuery and DataDesk which used to be distributed by (but not
written by) Odesta were dropped quite a bit before it "ran aground." The money
pit that supposedly caused the downfall was something else (essentially a mac
front end to a mainframe database).

>True, as in all things, there are problems
>even now, but Helix has been around longer than any database product
>for the Mac.

Yeah, and IBM has been around longer than Apple so they must be better, right?!
What kind of twisted logic is this? They've been around longer because they
started doing it first. The fact that they are still around does indicate that
they have been either doing something better than others or something different
than others. And it seems that from the general reaction to my other postings
here that it is the latter. I'll grant that Helix does do some pretty cool
stuff, and sometimes it even does it quickly. I don't really think it's the
worst thing in the world (as I may seem to suggest some times) - I just think
that some people are so attracted by the "simplicity" of Helix that they don't
realize it's just plain "simple-minded." It's not extensible (as is 4D), it's
not multi-platform (as are most other mac rdb's), and the list goes on...

>Also, its speed (I think MacWorld or MacUser) is faster than
>other relational db's.

I don't know what year you're reading this from. According to the last set of
tests done by MacUser, Helix was either in second or third -- out of four. To
top it all off, when the new management saw this, they were pleased! Granted,
not being last is something to be slightly proud of, but don't you think that
since speed is *such* an issue with some people wouldn't you like to place an
emphasis on this in your development group to make it even faster?! The point
I think I'm trying to get across is that Helix is not the best database, or
even the best database it could be. With some *major* work, it could be worlds
better, but the upper management was (and still is) unwilling to invest in the
product to allow for some much-needed improvements.

As a final note, if Helix Technologies were a really stable company with a
solid future why would around 25% of its original staff leave the company in
the first 9 months of business? This may be acceptable for a large corporation
that has a lot of redundancy, but not for a company already stretched thin.

Joey Gray
geek@casbah.acns.nwu.edu


>All promulgations are my own.  No corporate entity has authorization
>to represent me.

Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.databases