Hewlett Packard Outsources VMS Support to India ( for Techies Only )

The Inquirer ^ | 09/13/2006 | Charlie Demerjian

[DigitalVideoDude]

For each of these HP platforms, can you tell me which type of emulation is supported for Telnet access? VT220? Or is it proprietary HP emulation?

Thanks.

[Fury]

Wow...

We run 7.3-2 on an AlphaServer ES40 w/ 4.5 Gb of RAM, two EV67 500Mhz CPUs, etc, etc. Use it for our central data server (which uses Oracle RDBMS).

WE RARLY re-boot the system - only after applying some system patches and/or running AUTOGEN.

Very good OS and hardware. Meanwhile, the folks are re-booting the Windows 2003 Servers on, shall we way, a more "frequent" basis.

But, we will be moving away from VMS and onto some other platform in ~two years, probably something that runs AIX or Linux.

[Incorrigible]

There should be no need to reboot the Windows Server 2003 boxes any more frequently.

Afterall, Windows NT, and its progeny, was written by the people who wrote VMS!

[Fury]

They BARELY speak english and the english they do speak just goes down a set script.

I have been known when dealing with our other hardware/software vendors to say "You need to annunciate. If I cannot understand what you are saying, I need to speak to your supervisor." For what we pay for VMS hardware/software support (~$48,000 per year), I expect folks I can understand.

[FreeInWV]

Hilarious indian tech support video (big):
http://www.dumpalink.com/media/1121074726/Tech_Support

2 more sequels at:
http://www.illwillpress.com/vault.html

[Fury]

There should be no need to reboot the Windows Server 2003 boxes any more frequently.

I'll pass that long to the Windows folks! ;)

I believe the Windows systems suffer some of that downtime due to getting hit by worms/virii at times. The last worm I remember VMS getting hit by was the WANK worm in 1989...

[SMM48]

This is the same thing Dell did. I had a few occasions to use the service. It was horrible. I could barely understand the person in India. I had to keep asking the person to repeat. I will never buy another Dell.

[stripes1776]

Wasn't the guy who wrote Windows NT for Microsoft a VMS expert?

[SirLinksalot]

But, we will be moving away from VMS and onto some other platform in ~two years, probably something that runs AIX or Linux.

That's what I am observing too.

It's looking like the reason why people are moving away from OpenVMS inspite of the fact that it is one of the best architected and most secure system around is simply -- COST.

However, maybe with this outsourcing to India, they are trying to solve this problem although it remains to be seen if this long term strategy will work or simply serve to drive people away from OpenVMS.

Also, it looks like by moving away from the less well known ALPHA to the more popular ITANIUM, HP is trying to make use of Intel's economies of scale to drive down the OpenVMS cost.

One can only hope that it will give OpenVMS a new lease on life.

It is getting extremely hard to get good OpenVMS developers nowadays as a lot of them are moving away to Open Source based OS like LINUX. The good ones are aging and many are looking towards retirement. In the meantime, I don't see young grads being attracted to a career as an OpenVMS expert.

[Mr. Quarterpanel]

Tandems are used extensively in the Telco industry. Telco-Grade (fault tolerant) equipment is essential to good business practices, and since Stratus went under, Tandem is the only game in town. High availability hardware or kernel clustering cannot maintain dialogue context which is essential in Telephony.

Yeah, they are still around.

[Fury]

Good post.

We're moving away due to more and more end-user reporting tools not being further developed/supported for VMS. Additionally, Oracle seems to be doing a bit of foot-dragging on its' releases for VMS.

[Incorrigible]

Windows NT and VMS: The Rest of the Story

From the December 1998 Edition of Windows IT Pro

Is NT really new technology? When Microsoft released the first version of Windows NT in April 1993, the company's marketing and public relations campaign heavily emphasized the NT (i.e., New Technology) in the operating system's (OS's) name. Microsoft promoted NT as a cutting-edge OS that included all the features users expected in an OS for workstations and small to midsized servers. Although NT was a new OS in 1993, with a new API (i.e., Win32) and new user and systems-management tools, the roots of NT's core architecture and implementation extend back to the mid-1970s.

And now...the rest of the story: I'll take you on a short tour of NT's lineage, which leads back to Digital and its VMS OS. Most of NT's lead developers, including VMS's chief architect, came from Digital, and their background heavily influenced NT's development. After I talk about NT's roots, I'll discuss the more-than-coincidental similarities between NT and VMS, and how Digital reacted to NT's release. . . .

 

[tundra1946]

Work on the Alpha microprocessor was terminated several years ago.

[ExTexasRedhead]

"...if XYZ computers started advertising quality tech support in America...that would be "racist."

IMO, they would take over the computer market in the US. Those of us spending big bucks on equipment, would purchase that item from "any" company advertising their Tech Support in the USA. I had a brand new (expensive) PC, 5 days out of the box and the Bombay Tech Support technician "messed it up." I'm not a happy HP consumer.

[txhurl]

I wonder if there is any more MPE-XL out there in the world.

[stripes1776]

From the December 1998 Edition of Windows IT Pro

I don't have the article, but your post joggled my memory. I think the guy who headed the project was David Cutler. I had forgotten he came from DEC.

[Jeffro35744]

Tandem is now HP Non Stop

Integrity servers are 64 bit Itanium servers that can run Windows, VMS, HPUX, Tru64 Unix and Linux

You seem to know what you're talking about.

I have a few questions regarding installation trends :

1) Do you see a trend towards -- keeping, adding or moving away from Non-Stop and VMS platforms ?

2) Of the above operating systems using the same Itanium processor, which ones do you see as the one companies are buying into ?

My guess is -- Linux and HPUX (not Non-Stop and OpenVMS). Am I right in saying that ?



To Answer:

1) Open VMS will eventually go away, However it has a very loyal base that will at least keep it around for a while.

Non Stop is a totally different animal w/ different hardware. As far as I know it will be around for a long time serving the data critical market which is its niche. The platform is really cool and its redundancy is amazing. This "solution doesn't just mirror data it can mirror actual CPU instructions real time in a different city w/ redundant hardware. Thats why Telco, Banks, Stock Markets etc use it.

2) Windows, Linux and HPUX will be the dominant players. All in different markets. A lot of the new HP solutions ( such as RISS (which is a data data compliant solution) uses Linux as its primary OS, which may then be connected to a Windows network and/or a unix network. Tru64 and MPE are slated for the Axe and VMS will follow eventually.