HP releases Year 2000 White Paper
While its own advice on MPE/iX issues covers a mere two pages,
HP's 37-page
white paper on making transitions to Year 2000-ready software has been
released. "Year
2000 Issue: An HP Perspective" delivers many pages of advice on planning system
transitions to handle the millenium change, counsel that applies to all
platforms. HP
calls its strategy Cure 2000, explaining issues and strategy options for
customers and
identifying three levels of solution for Year 2000 work: 2000-safe, for
software; 2000
ready, for hardware; and 2000-compliant, for systems whose hardware and
software will
"operate in a well-defined, predictable manner when using dates beyond the
year 2000,
and will not result in errors related to the year 2000 rollover."
The paper provides a list of service and product resources to assist in the migration of MPE/iX, HP-UX and Windows NT systems. Two suppliers appear on the HP 3000 resource list for the first time:
* Allegiant Legacy Solutions, (513.984.1822) listed as providing analyze/scan and modify/compile/test tools;
* Denkart, Inc. (415.369.2330) and its Via2000 solution, listed under modify/compile/test tools.
The paper's MPE/iX information covers only previously released information -- version 6.0 will be Year 2000-safe, the CALENDAR intrinsic had no changes planned, and Command Interpreter (CI) commands and variables will be changed or added. But the lone example of a successful transition comes from Bombardier, Inc., whose success came from work on an HP 3000 Series 995/400. The company is reworking its 2,000 programs in-house, with a target completion of this year.
HP's Software Product Manager Kriss Rant stressed that HP 3000 sites don't have to wait for MPE/iX 6.0 to begin their transitions. He said the CSY division is considering an early release of the CI date-related commands and variables later this year through its Jazz Web site, before the 6.0 release ships, "so customers can pilot them in their environment before 6.0 comes out."
Rant said HP plans to update the paper with additional information on its own plans, new tools available and a list of Year 2000-safe applications. To receive the free paper, customers can order part number 5965-7014E. It's also available as a 152K Acrobat Reader file over the World Wide Web.
Java rolls out for reporting -- Quest Software (714.720.1434) has released
this Java
based client for its Vista Plus electronic report distribution software.
The software's
server component runs native on MPE/iX systems. Vista Plus can export
reports generated
from HP 3000 applications for use in PC programs such as Lotus 1-2-3 and
Excel, and it
gives users the ability to view PCL5 formatted reports.
Omnidex Stars twinkle for 3000s
DISC (303.444.4000) announced that its Omnidex database indexing
software
supports Star Schemas for use in data warehouses on HP 3000s. DISC said
Oracle and
IMAGE/SQL databases on HP 3000s can take advantage of the Omnidex ability by
installing the software on top of existing star schema. In one benchmark,
DISC said an
ad-hoc query that had taken eight hours to execute against an
80-million-row fact table
produced results in under a minute using Omnidex for Star Schemas.
The software is priced on a CPU basis starting at $25,000, with a typical Series 959/100 implementation costing $75,000. Omnidex also supports Sybase and Informix databases on other platforms, as well as an interface to the World Wide Web.
HP opens Bridge of high availability discounts
Installing any of four HP 3000 price list products will trigger
discounts between
now and the end of September, as HP rolled out its Bridge the Waters
promotion for HP
3000s:
* Customers upgrading to MPE/iX 5.5 get a 10 percent discount off TurboStore/iX 7x24 True Online Backup when they buy the software along with installing the upgrade;
* Buying the new Legato Networker Client software earns a 20 percent discount off the TurboStore product, and;
* Purchasing either HP's Workload Manager or AutoRestart/iX will earn a 10 percent discount off upgrades from a Series 939KS server to any higher level 9x9KS server.
HP says customers can't combine these Bridge the Waters deals with any other current promotion except TradeUp 97 (see our December 1996 FlashPaper for details on TradeUp 97).