Top Stories of 2007
January 2, 2007
After taking a day of rest from reporting and commentary, we're returning to the scene today with a look forward rather than back at your HP 3000 community.
(So you'll know, January 1 will always be an R&R day for us at the 3000 NewsWire. Almost every other holiday is not observed worldwide. But the start of a new year — at least by all standards other than Chinese, Jewish, or Buddhist — crosses nearly every culture and political geographies. Just recall the video of celebrations around the world. In short, nearly all of our readers treat January 1 as a special day, the beginning of something new.)
Today you may be full of ideas and resolutions for 2007, ranging from revised schedules for transition to redoubled promises to surf the 'Net less and practice personal communication more regularly, Whatever your resolutions, they'll get altered by more than your resolve. 2007 will bring changes to your community, change which few individuals control.
As an example, companies which serve the community will decide to reduce the resource devoted to the HP 3000. Others will seize on the opportunity of change — HP will shift its 3000 resources toward environments approved by the vendor — and the third parties will step up to attempt to capture the business.
One man's trash is another man's business model. This chestnut has been in action in your community for many years. HP stopped its MPE/3000 education business several years ago. MPE-Education.com opened its doors in 2006 to take over, led by seasoned trainers with access and time to renovate HP's teaching materials. (The training group has offered a new model recently, a register-until-it-fills plan to ensure that a class makes. HP's scheduling of MPE training had plenty of cancellations in its waning days.)
That leads me to the Top News Stories of our New Year. HP factors in many of them, since it's the biggest resource that is reducing its community involvement specific to the 3000. Please let us hear from you on how likely you believe these stories will appear.
To begin, let's recap our Top of 2006 list. Many of these dozen stories form the genus for this year's anticipated (I hesitate to use "predicted") stories of 2007.
1. Customers reported that HP's divisions didn't know the vendor discarded its "gone in 2006" schedule for HP's end-of-operations for the 3000.
2. 3000 advocacy and user group efforts serve the 3000 customer during 2006 the first Greater Houston RUG's 3000 Conference to OpenMPE's constant effort to clarify and form HP post-2008 3000 policy and procedures.
3. Third parties warned the community about data-corrupting Large File Datasets in IMAGE. The action proved the expertise for IMAGE resides comfortably outside of HP's labs.
4. A high-end Series 987 server sold for less than $300 in public auction, which proved 3000 hardware is getting inexpensive.
5. MPE-Education.com took the community's first step into independent, HP authorized 3000 training.
6.Advant released the first Generic REplacement Boxes
for HP 3000s, PA-RISC servers shipped ready for either a HP 9000 or HP 3000 personality,
applied by the a third-party SSEDIT program.
7. HP released the third PowerPatch for its penultimate release of MPE/iX
HP retires its Large Files Dataset project for IMAGE/SQL.
8. 5. HP reinstated MPE/iX Professional Certification holders
9. HP chairman Patricia Dunn resigned over a HP spying program to stem board leaks
10. OpenMPE earned its first revenues from HP
11. HP rolled out revised HP-UX virtualization plus low-to-midrange 3600 and 6600 Integrity servers
12. HP retired its Large Files Dataset project for IMAGE/SQL., even though it had a tested repair ready for rollout — because the change would drain resources from 3000 software suppliers and customers.
Now to our Top 2007 stories. Rank them in your own order.
1. HP continues to step back from its traditional offering for the platform. Third parties continue to pick up HP's slack.
2. Migration projects ramp up seriously, with many more companies choosing to move their applications. Off-the-shelf solutions decline in favor but remain a viable choice for some companies which are not wedded to their application business rules.
3. HP releases the certification process for MPE/iX skills, permitting third parties the opportunity to create a guild of HP 3000 expertise — to be used both in homesteading and migration plans.
4. HP restates its one-to-one MPE license-to-system policy, to attempt to maintain the business model that ruled the community since 1972.
5. Third parties resist the HP licensing policy on an informal basis, fueled by some customer desire to find an interim solution to what Advant's leaders call "Hospice 3000: Death with Dignity."
6. HP grows its revenues and profits to maintain its number one rank among IT suppliers, but keeps its earnings growth spurred by cost reductions as HP faced increased competition from an IBM unconcerned with PC business.
7. The 3000 NewsWire publishes several Special-Editon printed issues which focus on migration information, specializing on the shift from MPE/iX to the Integrity/HP-UX landing place. (Of this forecast we are quite certain.)
8. Customers face a growing choice between maintaining support contracts for MPE software versus driving the monies into transition projects. Migration customers begin to realize this choice impacts the health and survival of vendors who remain a key element in mission-critical levels of service.
9. HP 3000 hardware continues to plummet in price, including more N-Class and A-Class servers available to the market.
10. OpenMPE meets weekly by telephone, learns much that it cannot share outside its board of directors — including details on what building an HP 3000 bug-fix lab will require. Companies begin to budget for after-HP patch support.
11. Linux gains ground as an alternative for the 3000 customer who migrates away from the platform. HP demonstrates that it can be a sound player in the open source effort.
12. The Second Annual HP 3000 conference takes place in a month (September) far offset from when HP offers its Las Vegas-based HP Technology Forum (June). Customers seeking training get to choose on price and HP participation levels, as well as the spectrum of HP 3000 content at these conferences.