I am sorry that your distributor was unable to provide sufficient support and we were unable to provide sufficient centralised backup. I accept the criticism of the execution of our model, i.e. using distributors and it is something we continue to work on to improve, but not the model itself.

The product is generally accepted by our customers and the market as being easy to install and use. To quote from an SC magazine review which awarded the product 5 stars for ease of use, ‘The installation of 4TRESS AAA was as easy as can be expected. The offering can leverage existing SQL (structured query language) or Oracle databases, but ships with its own SQL MDSE database, which we used for testing. The software installs into two components a server module and a console module. The console module was among the better modules we used and it had a logical layout which was easy to use, even for the novice, and the commands were simple to understand. If you have worked around a Radius server before, the 4TRESS AAA server should hold no surprises. We found the interface to be intuitive.’

To repeat the point I made above ‘The product does support replication between different databases instances to enable high availability, without relying on the underlying database replication capabilities.’ In other words, using the external database for HA is not a mandatory choice.

“It is true that we donít provide direct support to Customers with small user base as you can understand and agree it becomes hard for us to maintain high quality of service if we take on all the small customers”

I do not agree. Customers are the reason for your business not the cause of it. Small customers become big customers, and they create market momentum.

Further, maintaining a high quality of service means good management and investment to achieve it. You are suggesting that your company does not or cannot do either. That suggests……..ah well, that might be a bit harsh. I don’t believe you can abrogate support for your customers by claiming its too hard.

Since you have no capability to support small to medium customers (by your own admission and by my criteria), then don’t sell packages for small companies. I have stated that distributors are inadequate, and your product does not seem to have the necessary market penetration for them to give it focus. (How can one person, who spends less than one day a week on your product be a quality service experience ? ).

“You also commented that from a high(sic) Availability perspective the product was useless, which is an unfortunate observation, given that it is not true.”

Indeed it is true. From my position, your attempt at HA is certainly useless. HA using an external database is unacceptable as a mandatory choice. By forcing external dependencies you:

(1) increase complexity and thus reduce reliability
(2) increase the MTTR
(3) make troubleshooting more complex.
(4) operational costs are higher

Further, as the solution crosses operational boundaries it is not suitable for any networking focused deployment (as I noted in the article).

Your documentation on HA is (was?) vile. The hidden cost of MSSQL was not a pleasant experience.

Compared with Cisco Secure Access Control Server with its integrated database and replication engine, the ActivIdentity product is much more complex to maintain and install.

PS I don’t mind who you are or where you are from. I have my opinion and I choose to express it. I wasted way too much time getting your product to install and be usable. Particularly, I wasted weeks of man time on the deployment instead of getting support and getting assistance. This reflects badly on your company.

Tech Support:
We have a global team of support engineers based in AMERICAS, EMEA and APAC to provide continuous 24×7 support services to our End Customers, Partners, Distributors and Resellers.

We do have a two tier support model. This includes Standard Support (8×5) where end-customers obtain Support Services through their ActivIdentity Certified Channel Partner; and Premium Support (24×7) where end-customers engage directly with ActivIdentity for their Support Services.

It is true that we donít provide direct support to Customers with small user base as you can understand and agree it becomes hard for us to maintain high quality of service if we take on all the small customers. That being said itís very unfortunate that our Distributor couldnít provide you proper guidance & support. We do require our Distributors to maintain a minimum of two technical people certified by ActivIdentity on staff at all times.

It’s also worth making the point that competitor products typically follow a similar model.

High Availability
You also commented that from a high Availability perspective the product was useless, which is an unfortunate observation, given that it is not true. The product does support replication between different databases instances to enable high availability, without relying on the underlying database replication capabilities. I do take the point that we could probably do a better job of documenting this.

Please note that ActivID 4Tress AAA does support Oracle along with MS SQL Server as database.

We do have a lot of smaller customers with less than 100 staff.

PS – If its any consolation, I am English, albeit working in America. Not sure whether that makes things better or worse;)