The last NonStop TBC held in
Burlingame, CA
It is hard to
have a conversation today where the word hybrid does not come up. You may be
interested in cars and wonder whether your next vehicle should be a Plug-In
Hybrid or better still, a pure Plug-In Electric. For countries like Australia,
Canada and the US the distances out west (in all cases) tend to favor those
vehicles that come with some form of Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) as the
charge station infrastructure leaves a lot to be desired.
We have known of
hybrid diesel electric power trains that drive trains and of late, cruise
ships. We have also known of the hybrid grains that farmers sow each year even
as we know that animal breeding programs have led to hybrid stock – those that
provide meat even as access to feed and water diminishes. One such hybrid example
that, to be honest, intrigued me is the hybrid bison and cow, otherwise known
as the beefalo!
However, it is
in the technology arena where concept of hybrids is being raised far more
frequently. Long gone are the days when enterprises committed to just a single
vendor and long gone too are the days where enterprises ran infrastructure
entirely by themselves or outsourced it all, as today we have a mixture in both
instances. For the NonStop user for much of the NonStop systems existence it’s
been about hybrid deployments. Whether front ending an IBM or even Unisys
mainframe or simply passing messages back and forth to a Unix server, NonStop
systems rarely existed on their own. NonStop systems targeted the high value
mission critical transaction processing that benefited the most from a fault
tolerant platform.
With the
diversity that exists today in the world of hybrid IT, the complexity has grown
almost exponentially. Not only are the on-prem systems diverse but there are
also the many cloud service offerings making their presence felt. As we
normalized the world of communications that led to a simplification in
networking, it became easier to plug into our tech infrastructure almost
anything that came with an IP address. But where do we turn to for information
on what works best and where the greatest value from deploying NonStop can be
achieved?
For a short
time, it seemed that user groups were falling out of favor, being replaced by
discussion boards and more recently, all manner of online forums, including
blogs. Our need to attend an event replaced by a ZOOM, or equivalent, call it a
habit that was easily sustained. Surely productivity was given a boost when we
never had to leave our computer. However, even as the global pandemic
contributed to a sizeable uptick in this behavior, we have seen our attitude to
communicating like thislose its sheen. We simply want to catch up with our
colleagues and to discuss in-person the models, products and features that are
proving most beneficial to enterprises.
Margo and I have
been actively involved in user groups for many years. Dating back to the days
of ITUG we volunteered our services and were elected to the ITUG Board where we
were diligent in the services provided. For many years one of my
responsibilities was the oversight of RUGs and in the early 2000s there were as
many as 30 plus active RUGs, worldwide. The purpose in fostering such groups
was to encourage a dialogue at the reginal level and to that end, ITUG
succeeded.
It is then with
an almost childlike amazement that we watch as the enthusiasm for Chapters,
RUGs, SIGs and Tech Forums flourish anew. Irrespective of the type of user
event, whether vertically localized geographically or horizontally globally
product or technology specific, there is no better way to network than there is
today with user communities. In the hybrid IT world of today that we all live
in, it’s good to know we aren’t alone or that the decisions we are talking
through are not decisions we alone are taking. For the NonStop community, it
has always been about customer references, customer case studies and yes,
customer presentations.
And why not?
What the NonStop community has excelled at is in not holding back. Even when
those presenting are from vendors who are fierce competitors of HPE and
NonStop, once they take the stage little else matters other than what they have
now achieved. Working with ITUG RUGs all around the planet one thing stood out
above all else and that was the clearly enthusiastic willingness to talk about
something new that was achieved using NonStop systems.
Chapters, RUGs,
SIGs and Tech Forums; so many places, so many people, so much information!
However for the past two years the global pandemic did bring with it changes in
our behavior. Not just our appreciation of the value proposition of Zoom and
the likes but rather, a creeping sense of isolation. Happy we may be tuning
into a video call but then again, serious doubts emerged over whether it was
all worth it. Couldn’t I get the same information from the slide decks provided
after the fact?
Turning to
popular social media channels proved to be no substitute to the real thing and
the NonStop community sorely missed the opportunities in-person events
provided. Whether you call it networking, industrial socializing or simply
catching up for a brief chat with long time but rarely seen friends there was
nothing like the buzz that emanated from a well put together event.
HPE was well
aware of the potential value of in-person events. After two years of virtual
experiences, HPE has changed tactics and elected to go in-person for 2022. As
tempting as it may have been to keep going with virtual events that attract a
million viewers, then again, were they the target audience? It also didn’t
matter how much money HPE would have saved in continuing with virtual events,
time had to be called as even the highest placed HPE Executives missed the opportunity
to take their message directly to the community.
Three things
strike me as plausible reason to return to in-person events and they are
steeped in the history of user events. From the earliest days of events we
quickly found out the attendees didn’t participate solely to talk to others
about the prices they paid for hardware, software or services. Furthermore, it
didn’t matter all that much about the prices set for an event; if the content
was timely and good, communities showed up in droves. Finally, and perhaps most
important of all, there was no substitute for market sampling as good as a user
event and smart product managers have always excelled in tapping into community
sentiment.
Information is
abundantly on show. Whether you graze down the exhibit halls sampling the
always present trash and trinkets as you pull data sheets from the racks or
simply wait for the evening social gatherings to catch up on the many opinions
that are always forthcoming following any major announcement, the value is unmistakable.
You want to embrace hybrid IT? Well, here are the fifty shades of hybrid; one
of which will be exactly what you are looking for.
NonStop
Technical Boot Camp 2022 (NonStopTBC22) will follow HPE Discover 2022 and will
likewise be an in-person event. It will be held back in Burlingame, California,
where it was last held will ensure a familiarity that will aid in our own
integration back into the world of hybrid IT. The one thing that hasn’t changed
is that there will be updates on new products, new markets and yes, new users
and for that, whether we call it THE event, a super Chapter or RUG or even a
gathering of Tech Forums and SIGs it matters little.
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