Real Time View

The NonStop community is fully aware of the danger that comes with making assumptions about NonStop; it’s time IT professionals draw similar conclusions. For the past couple of weeks I have been the primary care giver to Margo. As reported to various sites, the Friday before Christmas Day Margo broke her leg. Badly! She has been convalescing at home following surgery and while she is making great progress, she still looks to me for assistance with almost everything she wants to do. It’s been a tough job keeping her out of her office but she has been keeping visits to her place of work to a minimum. Having said this, I have paid a price albeit minor in comparison. Thinking I know the layout of our home, I have managed to hit almost everything I pass from my feet to my elbows to my hands. Turns out, apparently, I am making assumptions about the placement of items and the image I have in my mind is not accurate. Ouch! Over the course of my career I have made a couple of choices that i...

For the NonStop community, we know what looks good may not only be deceptive but borderline dangerous; mission critical applications are best served by HPE NonStop systems! There was a time not too long ago, when my appearance took on a distinctly “Steven Spielberg look”. Right down to the glasses I wore and to the cut of my hair and beard. With hindsight, the similarities became clearer whenever Spielberg was giving an interview – we shared numerous mannerisms. Without making too fine a point of this, there are photos taken of me during the 2004 Cannes Film Festival that Margo and I swear were on-sold to newspapers. Picture this, walking with Margo towards the red carpet when out of nowhere two young scantily clad ladies on rollerblades swung up to me, grabbed an arm each, turned me to the side when cameras began to flash. Holidaying in Maui, one family followed me practically everywhere I went, taking happy snaps at every opportunity. Goodness knows what now hangs on the walls of t...

No question; we know what we are driving this year! When it comes to NonStop, some questions remain but the answers will not be hard to find! This time last year I posted a blog about our trip back to Silicon Valley where I played tour guide to my good friends, Dieter and Chris Monch. Dieter and I had worked together back in Sydney, Australia, where Dieter had been Managing Director of Nixdorf Computers. Way back in the early 1980s, Nixdorf Germany bought the company I worked for, The Computer Software Company, renaming it Nixdorf Computer Software Company and leveraged the product, EDOS (and EDOS/VS) together with the skilled team of systems programmers to launch the Nixdorf line of IBM Plug Compatible Mainframes (PCMs). That’s right – PCMs from a manufacturer of key-to-disk systems, ATMs and an integrated hardware / software small business software package. Again, hard to imagine the thought process behind entering the PCM business with the slowest (but least expensive) alternative t...

Whether you are familiar with a bugle playing Taps or The Last Post, either way, finally, the sun is setting on 2020! Bring on 2021 … When we first talked about taking a break during the 2020 Christmas to New Year holiday season, we had no intention of including breaks of any other kind. But then, Margo and I were unaware that lady luck would intervene and not in a positive manner. Whereas we had been checking out locations from Key West to Palm Desert (where we have previously spent the holidays), we are now reconciled to the simple fact that we will be spending time on the couch. For those who follow Margo and me on social media channels you will have read of how Margo broke her leg in a bad fall while heading downstairs to our bar. I would like to say that a drink had been involved, but no, both of us had refrained as we were entertaining neighbors that night and it was Margo who was leading them downstairs where she had laid out a buffet that had taken all afternoon to prepare. W...

Movement of people; movement of commerce; movement of data – there’s no stopping NonStop! Roadblocks? Get over it! When will this end? When will normalcy return? When will 2021 arrive? And so the questioning continues. For a year that started without any clues as to what would follow, we have been left to wonder about our own situation with family, friends and neighbors. As news headlines continue to broadcast ominous warnings about what is still to come, we might be thinking that the time has come to lease that old missile silo, after all. Even with vaccines making their first appearance, it is going to take time and for most of us, this new life centered on being hunkered down in our own homes will continue. Living in Colorado where a massive uptick in construction is under way with new homes, new schools and yes, new roads being built. As we look around our own neighborhood, development has continued unabated such that even freshly built homes re-entering the marketplace have sold...

How much does a computer have in common with a car? Not much, until you want to purchase: For NonStop customers getting from A to B is not a good enough reason to buy!          Ever wondered what finally tips the scales when it comes to buying a new computer? Thought about what transpires behind the scenes when key pieces of software are acquired? Was it the price a choice of features or comprehensive packaging providing an all-in-one solution? There are many factors contributing to an outcome and of late, within the NonStop community, there couldn’t be more options to choose from what is being sold today.  While Margo and I aren’t involved in the major decisions influencing the technical direction at any major enterprise, it’s something we run into on a regular basis. Whether it’s buying the latest Apple iPhone or iPad or a really big smart TV, sometimes it comes down to the intangibles. Can I buy it online and can it be delivered soon? Do we like the fo...

Ever since it was first rumored by IT professionals that the label strategic came with Velcro backing for ease of re-use (on a whim by sales and marketing), seeing “strategic” appended to products raises the hackles of even the most ardent supporters about any merits such product might have! As news broke this week of HPE setting up shop in a suburb of Houston, Texas news media jumped on the story very quickly. Was this just another case of a Silicon Valley company leaving California for a more tech-friendly state? Was it a case of simply giving its employees better housing options with the benefits of a less onerous tax structure? Timed to coincide with the announcement of Q4 2020 financial results with references to sales of HPE products looking more like pre-pandemic results, perhaps the company felt encouraged to throw in a reference to changes of address for its Head Quarters.    In this announcement was a phrase that caught my attention. HPE said that it is making the de...