During a Webcast it called quickly to round out its migration advice about spooler and printing options, HP said it hopes to release more information soon about the costs of MPE licenses for use with 3000 hardware emulators. Patrick Santucci asked about details on the licensing of MPE to run on an emulator, an issue that customers also asked about at HP World. A number of customers had pointed out at the Los Angeles show in September that this needed to be decided soon. Mike Paivinen, who gave the HP World presentation to OpenMPE, agreed. “A number of us informally told HP we expected this to mean by Thanksgiving,” said John Burke of Burke Consulting and Technology Solutions, who monitored the Webcast. HP’s 3000 business manager Dave Wilde answered Santucci’s question by reiterating comments on collecting feedback from sources. Eventually, Wilde said HP wants to release more information after the first of the year.

Burke reported that the Webcast on spoolfile and printing strategies offered a lengthy set of product presentations from third-party vendors: MB Foster promoting Reveal, Adobe, and Quest Software detailing NBSPOOL and Vista+, all solutions available on 3000 platforms today as well as on Unix and NT systems. HP said customers can listen to the full broadcast on the HP Web site this month at www.hp.com/products1/mpeixservers/news_events/webcast_schedule.html.