A virtual 3000 leads the top stories of 2012
December 26, 2012
Analysis by Ron Seybold
First in a series
When summing up the last year of 3000 community news and developments, the story which appears the biggest covered the first 3000 which a manager could no longer see.
Emulator news from Stromasys, whether about ship dates and demonstration, adoption for production, or a free version including HP's MPE/iX, pulled the system's future into the present day. The Charon HPA/3000 became an installed reality at production sites and a free download for the widest share of the community. At the same time, HP's Unix platform shed the FUD from Oracle, thanks to the courts, and cloud hosts clambered into the server picture.
A dozen stories floated to the top of my news view during the past year, some of them related to another, others standing alone in their importance. The year didn't carry a marker like the 2010 end of all HP support for MPE, or the first-decade anniversary of the HP pullout (and subsequent HP3000 Reunion) of 2011. But 2012 marked 10 years of serious migration plans and actions, and we looked for evidence that the greatest share of migrations were ended. Whether a vendor or a customer was homesteading or making its transition, the year delivered that constant element of any IT calendar: change.
Emulator solution: from demo, to adoption, to freeware -- A virtualized MPE server, working as a 3000 emulator, made the transition from alpha test to a springtime beta demo, and finally a production and freeware reality. The last state of existence emerged as a target in mid-year when Stromasys announced new plans for a 2-user freeware version of HPA/3000. It took more than four months to create a evaluator and hobbyist version of the software. Stromasys referenced production status at an Australian company in October. A public webinar demonstration in April showed how an LDEV 1, acting like the entire HP 3000 cradled on a beefy laptop, could be virtualizated in a disk image file -- to reduce the need for further HP iron to preserve MPE/iX.
Oracle is forced to shed its HP Unix doubt-fest -- The 18 months of lawsuits and a trial between HP and its enterprise rival (and database ally) Oracle came to an end with an HP victory. Oracle was tagged for damages to HP's business in an amount still to be specified, after the database giant produced evidence that the Itanium HP Unix platform had a future in severe doubt over the past five years inside HP.
In the end, a judge in California ruled that the software vendor -- whose hardware unit is run by former HP CEO Mark Hurd -- must keep developing for Itanium hosts like the Integrity servers. The news lifted a shadow off HP's only single-vendor alternative being offered to migrating 3000 sites. Without the court victory, HP would've suffered critical wounds to the only platform for HP-UX. At the same time, HP carried its message of an Odyssey for Unix customers outward, one that could bring HP Unix growth to a standstill.
Cloud destinations emerge for migrations -- In a blend of the stories of migration and emulation, the rise of cloud hosting took significant steps forward for 3000 owners on the move. Solutions as complex as manufacturing systems got enthusiasm and serious looks from longtime 3000 vendors. HP's own cloud solution, HP Cloud, went from beta test to SLA status during 2012, with veteran Terry Floyd also eager to make it serve as a host for the freeware emulator. HP Cloud supports Linux (and Windows, but not HP-UX) to give it the penguin cradle needed for HPA/3000. Kenandy Software pulled from the best of MANMAN designs for a 2.0 release of its social ERP solution. At the same time, cloud outages from Amazon Web Services prompted a closer look at system availability.