When Business Objects will cease to support version 5.1

general discussion
1

Hi Guys,

I am trying to build a business case for magement to consider the upgrade to version 6.5.1 (currently we are on 5.1.9).
I wanted to know when Business Objects are expected to cease the maintenance for version 5.1. Any ideas?

Thanks,
Gilad

gweinbach :israel: (BOB member since 2004-06-25)

2

Patch Support will cease 31st Dec 2006. Tech Support will cease 31st Dec 2007

irish_stan :ireland: (BOB member since 2003-05-13)

3

Sorry, when BO6.5.2 is available?
Thanks :smiley:

sscremin :it: (BOB member since 2005-06-28)

4

Hi Sabrina,

Good question. It was supposed to be July (oh that’s this month ) but no sign yet, rumour has it now as August :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf: .

irish_stan :ireland: (BOB member since 2003-05-13)

5

This has been discussed on the following thread:

Regardless of when BOBJ will discontinue the support, my advice to you is to upgrade to XI r2 as soon as it becomes available. It went in beta testing this month. My guess is that the earliest release date might be the late 4th quarter of this year. You do not want to stay in version 5 for too long. A rule of thumb… as a software gets older and older, it becomes harder and harder to find resources and to support it.

substring :us: (BOB member since 2004-01-16)

6

I agree that it makes sense to get off v5 as soon as possible, but for a non-Webi deployment v6.5 to me is the logical next step. Given the initial releases of 6 were so problematic, there’s nothing to say XIr2 won’t be any better (although one would hope Busobj have learnt their lesson!).
YMMV :slight_smile:

RobinM :uk: (BOB member since 2003-02-25)

7

Well, I could be wrong. But IMHO, the version 6 is going to be another dead end. At this time, there is no plan to release 6.5.2. So the 6.5.1 might be the last one on the v5/v6 path.

The future of Business Objects is on XI, just like the future of Microsoft is on .NET. Of course you don’t have to upgrade (or shall I say “migrate”?), but you will find your skill set becomes obsolete very quickly, just like the programmers who were using Visual Studio 6.

Yes, I understand that many companies out there are still on version 5 (just like many companies are still using VB6 or older). It all depends on how deeply entrenched they are and what are their budgets. I am just suggesting that they should upgrade (or migrate) if they can.

substring :us: (BOB member since 2004-01-16)

8

Hmmm, I’ve had tech support reps say that 6.5.2 is due out very soon – it fixes some bugs we’ve been seeing, so I hope it is in fact forthcoming.

6.5.2 is probably the last 6.5x release, I’d imagine. However, to go to XIR2 right away is probably risky. You’d want to wait until XI R2.1 so that the bugs are shaken out…

dnewton :us: (BOB member since 2004-01-30)

9

I’m with you. One might even want to wait until the “.3” release…

Anita Craig :us: (BOB member since 2002-06-17)