Friday, March 27, 2009

Pattern Finder: Google Apps: The Latest, Latest Glitch

A GAPE reality check from Burton Group Research Director Guy Greese; see his full post for context-setting

This is yet another example of how Google--fundamentally--does not understand selling to the enterprise. First, during the entire two plus years of availability of Google Apps Premier Edition (GAPE), it looks like it never had a code walkthrough to ponder the possibility of this behavior. (Given Google's branding pitch of hiring only really really smart people, I find this hard to believe.) Or, if it did, it decided it wasn't a risk worth fixing. Second, rather than issuing a quick "Thank you, we're working on it" to Ade for doing their work for them, they ignored the issue until it started turning into a PR fiasco.

When I wrote my first 55-page report on GAPE back in August 2007, I was not kind to Google, saying GAPE was not ready for primetime in large enterprises. Although I didn't say so in the report, frankly, I was figuring Google would fix the issues over time (e.g., embedded e-mail distribution lists, administration by role) and by now it would have a competitive package. Now I'm inclined to think that's never going to happen.

Pattern Finder: Google Apps: The Latest, Latest Glitch

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