Our
memories may fade but when it comes to NonStop then, after all these decades,
it’s still the premier fault tolerant system available today!
We are preparing for a return to the road as we look
ahead to upcoming events. Not just HPE Discover in Las Vegas but key Regional
User Group (RUG) meetings as well. With just one road trip we plan on hitting
Dallas for N2TUG and then pass through Phoenix and Scottsdale on our way to Las
Vegas for 2017 HPE Discover. It may be the beginning of summer, where the
temperatures in this part of north America really start to climb, but having
the opportunity to spend time out on the highways, driving the company command
center, is always something we look forward to doing. Each time we do it we
find new things to look at and new places to stay and even though we may be old
hands at all of this, there are still moments where our memories about a place
isn’t as strong as we had expected them to be. With the passage of time, the details become hazy. More often than not, memories I recall aren’t quite as accurate as they were just a short time ago. I am often being left to double check my facts before committing them to paper or as is more relevant today, the internet. And yet, when it comes to technology, I can recall with clarity almost every product and feature with which I have had a connection. Whether it was selling and installing operating systems for IBM mainframes, standing alongside the first Nixdorf ATM as it was uncrated in a Sydney warehouse, giving presentations on SNA following IBM’s introduction of token ring LANs, or simply promoting the latest NonStop system as it came to market.
I will always remember one of my last duties as your ITUG chairman of the whirlwind trip that took me from Copenhagen to Beijing to Seoul and then to Taipei as part of the NonStop team launching the HPE Integrity NonStop line of systems based on the Itanium chip set. Being welcomed into Beijing with a title of chairman didn’t do any harm either and I will always remember the warmth of the NonStop community with which I engaged at that time. But are the memories I have of Tandem Computers and, of late, NonStop, still relevant to today’s marketplace? Has the haze that so often clouded my memories altered reality? Or have the changes taking place with NonStop proving to be more substantial than everything that has come before – has the time come to take off my rose-tinted glasses and really look at how good NonStop has become?
The
Eiffel Tower and the Taj Mahal are mine to see on clear days
You thought that I would need a crystal ball to see right through the haze
You thought that I would need a crystal ball to see right through the haze
I can see for miles and miles …
These lyrics come from a popular song by The Who, I can see for miles. Margo and I joined with many from the NonStop community when, a few years back, they performed at a HPE event in Las Vegas. Just seeing them on stage performing brought with it many memories from my youth but about that, I will leave for another post. However, it was the reference to seeing “right through the haze” that has had me thinking about just how clearly we view the roadmaps for NonStop and just how clearly we see NonStop supporting our business. Yes, the technology that is NonStop is impressive but do we all share more than that with our colleagues – do we really see the contribution NonStop can make to our business or are we simply sitting back, hopeful that our crystal ball will be more revealing?
On the other hand, when it comes to crystal balls perhaps their role has lessened when it comes to seeing what’s coming next for NonStop. In fact, with what we now know, it’s as if there have been many doors thrown open, each of which calls for greater NonStop participation. What I mean is that even without the aid of a crystal ball, with just the inclusion of a few words here and there and a label thrown in for good measure, we can see what’s happening with NonStop with a lot more clarity that we could have seen only a year or so ago.
With the passage of time, the details become hazy. Have
we driven through this township just a short time ago? Isn’t this road looking
familiar and haven’t we seen this vista once or twice already? While it is true
that landscape can look familiar, it is true that the solutions provided on
NonStop can look familiar too. And this is no accident and is a reflection upon
what NonStop does best. However, with what we are seeing coming from HPE is
that we are crossing into new territory where the landscape no longer looks
familiar.
These advances for NonStop reflect real business needs – some of these needs being driven by changing external forces, including financial and market presence whereas others by changing technology, such as cloud computing and the emergence of the IoT. Businesses want to cut costs, reduce their dependency on technicians (do we even want an IT department?), respond to market changes more quickly (can we support mobile devices?) as they look to innovate their way to attract new customers.
What NonStop does best is to provide the premier fault tolerant system to a world that now runs 24 x 7! A world where “almost” is simply not “good enough.” With all the bravado that they can muster, all of the big technology providers promote how well they have built in redundancy and yet, as we saw with the Amazon S3 storage outage, it is still not as continuously available as mission critical applications expect. No, almost available is not continuously available. What fault tolerance brings to the table is a manner of operational support that allows business to meet these needs to minimize financial loss from outages and any subsequent conflicts even as it satisfies the requirement for fewer technicians.
The HPE NonStop product management and development teams have been doing an outstanding job lifting the fog that has oftentimes surrounded NonStop. The group embraced standards and openness, as it moved to the Intel x86 architecture, and it added support for virtual machines. And yes, the integration we seeing being supported by such items as NSADI along with a willingness to talk about hybrid IT – the integration that results clearly points to further convergence in the future.
This is now becoming well-known throughout the community and is beginning to make an impression with leading industry analyst groups, including Gartner and Forrester Research to name a few. And as members of the NonStop vendor community continue to increase development funding for hybrid middleware and solutions, NonStop will likely become even better known among those tracking industry trends.
HPE Discover is always a litmus test of just how well NonStop is fairing within the bigger HPE. Last year, HPE CEO Meg Whitman welcomed Home Depot to the stage, one of only three or four parties to be on stage with Whitman. As she introduced Home Depot she made a specific reference to NonStop that was a surprise to many. I was sitting in the blogging community area and those bloggers turned to me and asked if I could tell them just a little more about NonStop. This year, we may not make it back onto the stage with Whitman, but it will be interesting to see whether NonStop continues to make inroads into verticals like telco and technologies like the Edge and IoT.
It is very true that with the passage of time the details become hazy. However when it comes to the memories I do have about the early days of Tandem Computers, for instance – and I arrived at Tandem just as the VLX was unveiled with stories circulating within the company about an upcoming smaller and lower-priced CLX – there is nothing hazy about them at all. The attributes of NonStop instilled in me all those decades ago remain.
Those earlier times are still very clear and with clarity come an appreciation for where Tandem, now NonStop, is headed. What the latest NonStop systems bring to the table is a capability that at the low-end should see inclusion in the Edge and IoT initiatives even as at the high-end should see inclusion in the Hybrid IT initiatives. And no, I don’t need a crystal ball to tell me that there will continue to be a strong market for NonStop for many more years to come.
These advances for NonStop reflect real business needs – some of these needs being driven by changing external forces, including financial and market presence whereas others by changing technology, such as cloud computing and the emergence of the IoT. Businesses want to cut costs, reduce their dependency on technicians (do we even want an IT department?), respond to market changes more quickly (can we support mobile devices?) as they look to innovate their way to attract new customers.
What NonStop does best is to provide the premier fault tolerant system to a world that now runs 24 x 7! A world where “almost” is simply not “good enough.” With all the bravado that they can muster, all of the big technology providers promote how well they have built in redundancy and yet, as we saw with the Amazon S3 storage outage, it is still not as continuously available as mission critical applications expect. No, almost available is not continuously available. What fault tolerance brings to the table is a manner of operational support that allows business to meet these needs to minimize financial loss from outages and any subsequent conflicts even as it satisfies the requirement for fewer technicians.
The HPE NonStop product management and development teams have been doing an outstanding job lifting the fog that has oftentimes surrounded NonStop. The group embraced standards and openness, as it moved to the Intel x86 architecture, and it added support for virtual machines. And yes, the integration we seeing being supported by such items as NSADI along with a willingness to talk about hybrid IT – the integration that results clearly points to further convergence in the future.
This is now becoming well-known throughout the community and is beginning to make an impression with leading industry analyst groups, including Gartner and Forrester Research to name a few. And as members of the NonStop vendor community continue to increase development funding for hybrid middleware and solutions, NonStop will likely become even better known among those tracking industry trends.
HPE Discover is always a litmus test of just how well NonStop is fairing within the bigger HPE. Last year, HPE CEO Meg Whitman welcomed Home Depot to the stage, one of only three or four parties to be on stage with Whitman. As she introduced Home Depot she made a specific reference to NonStop that was a surprise to many. I was sitting in the blogging community area and those bloggers turned to me and asked if I could tell them just a little more about NonStop. This year, we may not make it back onto the stage with Whitman, but it will be interesting to see whether NonStop continues to make inroads into verticals like telco and technologies like the Edge and IoT.
It is very true that with the passage of time the details become hazy. However when it comes to the memories I do have about the early days of Tandem Computers, for instance – and I arrived at Tandem just as the VLX was unveiled with stories circulating within the company about an upcoming smaller and lower-priced CLX – there is nothing hazy about them at all. The attributes of NonStop instilled in me all those decades ago remain.
Those earlier times are still very clear and with clarity come an appreciation for where Tandem, now NonStop, is headed. What the latest NonStop systems bring to the table is a capability that at the low-end should see inclusion in the Edge and IoT initiatives even as at the high-end should see inclusion in the Hybrid IT initiatives. And no, I don’t need a crystal ball to tell me that there will continue to be a strong market for NonStop for many more years to come.
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