Comments on: Analyst group disses Hewlett-Packard report about mainframe migration http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/mainframe-blog/analyst-group-disses-hewlett-packard-report-about-mainframe-migration/ A SearchDataCenter.com blog Wed, 25 Nov 2009 23:57:17 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 By: Jelo http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/mainframe-blog/analyst-group-disses-hewlett-packard-report-about-mainframe-migration/#comment-7 Jelo Thu, 04 Dec 2008 05:45:05 +0000 http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/mainframe-blog/analyst-group-disses-hewlett-packard-report-about-mainframe-migration/#comment-7 Tuomoks is on the button: same-old, same-old. Everybody born since 1980 thinks Fibre Channel is new stuff: in fact ICL (International Computers Limited, a UK company) was using fiber-connected disk storage in the mid-80s already in their VME mainframes, with multiple redundant paths and load balancing..... They had a 4-node HA cluster connected with a processor-to-processor multi-optical fiber interface. They pioneered Virtual Machines. They pioneered running UNIX in a VM shell. They kicked IBM butt big-time, but their pathetic marketing and consequent low market share finally sunk them. Tuomoks is on the button: same-old, same-old. Everybody born since 1980 thinks Fibre Channel is new stuff: in fact ICL (International Computers Limited, a UK company) was using fiber-connected disk storage in the mid-80s already in their VME mainframes, with multiple redundant paths and load balancing…..
They had a 4-node HA cluster connected with a processor-to-processor multi-optical fiber interface. They pioneered Virtual Machines. They pioneered running UNIX in a VM shell. They kicked IBM butt big-time, but their pathetic marketing and consequent low market share finally sunk them.

]]> By: Tuomoks http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/mainframe-blog/analyst-group-disses-hewlett-packard-report-about-mainframe-migration/#comment-6 Tuomoks Wed, 03 Dec 2008 21:43:07 +0000 http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/mainframe-blog/analyst-group-disses-hewlett-packard-report-about-mainframe-migration/#comment-6 Does anybody who counts (makes decisions) take vendor reports seriously? As the article says - all vendors are there to make money and it is up to the consumers / users / customers / .. to do the homework. Yes - even the vendor (supported) studies, evaluations, benchmarks, etc have a value but only if you know how to read them! Anyway, it has been mainframes against other types of systems / infrastructure a long, long time and for some strange(?) reason people get hurt because they don't (want to?) understand the differences. The fact that no hardware (nor software) is suitable for everything has to be learned over and over again. For certain tasks as massive data processing or high security you can't beat mainframes even today, maybe in 20 to 30 years? Many have tried, many have failed. Today IBM has kind of monopoly in mainframes - Amdahl, Hitachi, etc are gone (unfortunately IMHO), HP, SUN, etc are not mainframes, not even near. The funny thing (a myth!) about mainframes is that they are difficult and need a lot of support personnel - WRONG! It is much easier to manage a mainframe environment than for example MS Exchange (or whatever) or Apache or WebSphere or .. and they are just one application environments! Maybe the corporations / companies should look the reason why the IT organization is so big - maybe it has more to do with "management" style (more head-count == more power == more money) than the real needs - has anyone ever thought about that? OK, back to the the topic. Even IBM has problems selling the mainframe, too many distractions! AIX is as good Unix as you can get, IBM servers / blades / whatever support Solaris, Windows, Linux - another issue.. Or think about virtual machines (think back to 60's!) - IBM has killed VM many times and started it again? Where do you think VM's and LPAR's etc came? Running thousands of separate system in a box size of a fridge? Does anybody who counts (makes decisions) take vendor reports seriously? As the article says - all vendors are there to make money and it is up to the consumers / users / customers / .. to do the homework. Yes - even the vendor (supported) studies, evaluations, benchmarks, etc have a value but only if you know how to read them!

Anyway, it has been mainframes against other types of systems / infrastructure a long, long time and for some strange(?) reason people get hurt because they don’t (want to?) understand the differences. The fact that no hardware (nor software) is suitable for everything has to be learned over and over again. For certain tasks as massive data processing or high security you can’t beat mainframes even today, maybe in 20 to 30 years? Many have tried, many have failed.

Today IBM has kind of monopoly in mainframes - Amdahl, Hitachi, etc are gone (unfortunately IMHO), HP, SUN, etc are not mainframes, not even near. The funny thing (a myth!) about mainframes is that they are difficult and need a lot of support personnel - WRONG! It is much easier to manage a mainframe environment than for example MS Exchange (or whatever) or Apache or WebSphere or .. and they are just one application environments! Maybe the corporations / companies should look the reason why the IT organization is so big - maybe it has more to do with “management” style (more head-count == more power == more money) than the real needs - has anyone ever thought about that?

OK, back to the the topic. Even IBM has problems selling the mainframe, too many distractions! AIX is as good Unix as you can get, IBM servers / blades / whatever support Solaris, Windows, Linux - another issue.. Or think about virtual machines (think back to 60’s!) - IBM has killed VM many times and started it again? Where do you think VM’s and LPAR’s etc came? Running thousands of separate system in a box size of a fridge?

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