Vantive: Love and Hate
Vantive is user-friendly:
– You love the layout of screens, the workflows and the ease of edit, search and update functionality. It’s very intuitive, and easy to train new employees to use it. With QueWeb, you can keep Vantive’s ease of use and intuitive workflows, without keeping Vantive. QueWeb can replicate your Graphic User Interface (GUI), workflows and business rules, so that the switch to QueWeb will be transparent to the user. You will enjoy the same GUI and same business rules, while running on state of the art technology that is 100% flexible.
Vantive works and is stable:
– You have invested sweat, blood and tears to ensure that your Vantive application works, not to mention a lot of time and money. Queplix can reuse as much Vantive infrastructure as possible, including the hardware, data model, business rules, integration points and Graphic User Interface, so that you don’t have to throw it all away and start from the beginning. At the same time, QueWeb is not using any of the Vantive’s code – it merely extracts business functionality from Vantive and replicates your own business rules and workflows, while allowing you or our developers to enhance them.
Vantive is paid for:
– Queplix will ensure that you can extend your investment in Vantive and prolong the life of the application. Queplix will reuse as much Vantive infrastructure as possible, including hardware, data model, business rules, integration points and Graphic User Interface, so that you don’t have to throw away the investment that you already made and start from scratch.
Your users have been trained:
– User training can become a huge part of your organization’s P&L. With Queplix, the conversion from Vantive to QueWeb is as transparent as your organization wants it to be. QueWeb can replicate all GUI elements and Business Rules—and can add any additional business rules you need.
Developers are trained to customize Vantive relatively easily:
– Using Stored Procedures and VBA as well as Forms designer and Tools, Administrators and Developers are trained to implement changes to the system, as long as they are within the boundaries of Vantive customizations. In QueWeb, you use a lot more advanced and lower level Integrated Development Environment (Such as IBM’s Eclipse) to implement any changes to the system, its GUI or Business logics. Java is a powerful language and QueWeb does not require you as a Developer to write complex Server-side code. Most customizations are done on the Business layer, and are written in JSP. However, no boundaries for the customizations are imposed by Java IDE.
Vantive is not supported
With PeopleSoft and Oracle both announcing the end of Vantive support, your organization is faced with a difficult decision: upgrade to PeopleSoft, switch to different application, or stay with Vantive and support it yourself. Queplix can offer you a fourth alternative—transparently convert from Vantive to QueWeb—replicating all GUI elements and Business Rules. What’s more, Queplix offers an excellent support structure.
Alternatives are expensive
Whether you migrate to PeopleSoft or Oracle or switch to a different application, the costs are high. Taking into consideration the costs of license fees, professional services fees, infrastructure and support, costs can run up to several million dollars for several hundred users. Queplix, on the other hand, will ensure that you can extend the life of your investment and your existing application.
Vantive is based on old technology
Vantive is not compatible with latest versions of Windows and UNIX.
Substantial differences exist between the desktop application’s User Interface and Web User Interface. While stable, Vantive’s User Interface is not the friendliest and could be substantially improved if desired by using standard QueWeb Components: - Locator screens are replaced with built-in and customizable Search Grids
- Single Form is used in QueWeb to Search and Enter new or Update existing Data, eliminating the need to open multiple windows at the same time
- All Advanced SQL Search operators are available in QueWeb in addition to few standard operators supported by Vantive (directly in GUI fields)
- Multi-language support with UTF-9 and UNICODE
- Screens can be customized virtually without any limitations
- Permissions are application-controlled, with security provided by the Java Application Server
- Database load is minimized by utilizing the connection pooling and JSP/Servlets, instead of the Stored Procedures
Limited Customization
The VanWeb architecture is based on static application data that should be published after every change to the Vantive application layer. Also, the Vantive client has limited availability of native GUI controls (like date, edit mask, Grid and etc.), though they are available as third party ActiveX controls. This creates version dependency. Form customizations are limited only to data fields. Also, Application Meta Data is separate from Application Server and VanWeb, the system has limited security, and it does not take advantage of best-of-breed technology.
Limited Integration
While Vantive has limited built-in Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), QueWeb is based on an industry-standard J2EE API and can integrate with any other system natively, as long as it has an API. QueWeb also presents an additional integration module: Script Scheduler. Utilizing this module, an administrator can import and export data from other systems automatically based on the predefined schedule, as well as schedule and launch any external scripts (SQL, PERL, UNIX Shell scripts, Windows BAT, etc.) and log their results in the QueWeb logging module.
Vantive's web client is limited
The VanWeb client is very limited compared to the Desktop application, and virtually no usable web interface exists for Vantive. VanWeb is not a true thin client application, but rather a web-enabled application with many Active-X controls to download on the client desktop.
Vantive’s research Agent is not stable, not easily implemented
QueWeb utilizes a Full-Text Search (FTS) agent, which automatically scans emails attachments, ticket attachments, catalogs, database BLOBS and CLOBS and any other large data containers; these documents are automatically indexed by the FTS and available for searching from the same GUI, using all standard SQL relational operators as other regular fields. In fact, users can use a combination of regular fields’ constraints and Full-Text Search documents in the same query from the GUI. A stand-alone FTS module is also available in QueWeb to allow more advanced search options and indexing.
No CTI support in Vantive
QueWeb can work with Avaya’s IP Agent© and Definity© switches natively, and most other CTI hardware and switches. QueWeb will present a screen-pop with the contact information through POTS or VoIP lines and capture vital contact statistics and allow multi-channel communications.
Email Processing not available in Vantive
An advanced Inbox module extends QueWeb’s Standard email functions. This is a complete server-based process, not requiring any client email application (such as Outlook), but can work in parallel with Outlook, providing better accountability for emails and skill-based routing rules.
No Built-in Report Writer
QueWeb is shipped with a built-in Ad-Hoc report writer. It is designed with the ultimate ease of use in mind: users create public or private reports by clicking on the GUI fields to be included in the report on any field/form or screen. All joint and SQL queries are automatically created and optimized transparent to the users. Ad-hoc reports can be saved and distributed to other users by email using a report scheduler module. Report interface allows for conditional formatting and HTML-editing of the reports.
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