Raise your stock, maybe, with emulation
January 25, 2013
You might not have any COBOL running at your 3000 installation. We just heard from a customer who was in this unique position, this week. He is also a candidate to let the Stromasys emulator take over for his 3000 iron -- even at the regular production-grade emulator price of $25,000.
We haven't seen much of this yet. Most of the inquiries are "will it run?" or "how can I get it for less?" or "what promise do I have my software can be licensed on it?" That last one is the least predictable, unless you have your own application in-house, and use only MPE utilities from third parties. No problems there.
Apparently in that in-house situation, a Maryland IT manager asked me if it's feasible to let the emulator make him a hero, by raising his stock in his career at his company.
The transfer from PA-RISC HP systems to Intel-based hardware -- of Pascal programs -- would do the job to get to heroic reality.
Do you realize how much my personal stock would rise if I could go to management and say this?
"Our existing legacy TurboIMAGE data bases on the HP 3000 and the code that runs them (a few Pascal programs that drive VPlus for entry, a few more Pascal programs, and a few Query files that generate reports) can be replaced by Intel hardware and mass storage."
If the above statement (in quotes) were true, and we could make it happen for $25K, we might become a Stromasys customer.
Is it realistic?
We'll see once we interview him and learn about licensing. But with a budget ready, in-house code at hand, and nothing but standard MPE/iX FOS software, there shouldn't be a problem here. This may be a way to get a stock rise -- something Apple would love to see happen pretty soon. Personal stock is easier to lift than the corporate securities. Switching to Intel-based MPE provides security, so long as the software licenses don't get in the way.