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Your source for the latest insights on HP Integrity, mission critical computing, and other relevant server and technology topics from the BCS team.

Server Design: Solving Real-World Customer Problems

jacob.van-ewyk| April 26, 2010
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Late last week,
I had the opportunity to spend some time on the phone with a customer who had a
large UNIX install base, but was considering HP and HP-UX 11i v3 for the first
time. The account team was on site, and obviously covered many more topics than
I did during my 45 minutes on the phone. However, I found the customer's
response to what I had to say quite interesting, and it got me thinking about
server design, and real-world customer problems.


 


While I covered
the whole software portfolio, the customer really had questions about two areas
- our high availability and disaster recovery portfolio, and our orchestration
capabilities. In fact, I ended up going back to our orchestration products multiple
times, just to answer all of their questions. The customer was amazed that HP
Insight Orchestration, as part of our Converged Infrastructure, could automate
such a big part of their day to day provisioning process. To them, this would
help solve a huge operational problem - reducing the ongoing maintenance costs
as part of their overall it budget. This is something HP experienced - reducing
maintenance and operations from 70% of the IT budget and reducing it to around
30% of the IT budget. The first model was making IT unsustainable.


 


This got me
thinking about the what our customers ask for in new servers. Everyone expects
that the new servers will offer more performance than the previous generation.
Everyone expects that power consumption will drop. These are good
characteristics, but is that all the innovation you want from your server
vendor? A faster chip, but in the same old box - what comes to my mind when I see the new POWER 7 servers.? With the same old maintenance
issues? A vendor who makes great hardware, but looks at customers as support
annunities? A vendor who isn't invested in reducing maintenance as percentage
of your IT budget - solving the big IT problem?


 


Intel has
released their new Itanium 9300 processor, and HP will announce its new systems
within 90 days. My question: will they just be the same old servers, just with
a faster processor? Or will they be something more for mission critical
environments? Will HP take steps to help our customers dig out from their
maintenance costs? What are you looking for in these new servers?


 


Jacob


 

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Labels: AIX| availability| customers| HP Integrity| HP-UX 11i v3| Insight Control Infrastructure Orchestration| Integrity| Intel| Itanium| maintenance| mission critical servers| operating environments| Power 7| Serviceguard| UNIX
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HP-UX 11i v3 March 2010 Update Released

jacob.van-ewyk| March 30, 2010
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HP announced
that the HP-UX
11i v3 March 2010 release is now available. In fact, while the announcement
was today, I believe that it actually started shipping over the course of the
last 10 days in different geographies.


 


What is new
about this update?


 


First,
additional products have been added to the HP-UX
11i v3 Operating Environments. The key new products included with the
Virtual Server and the Data Center Operation Environments are HP Integrity
Virtual Machines Online VM Migration and Insight Dynamics - VSE Infrastructure
Orchestration. Insight Control power management has been added to all the
operating environments. This drastically increases the value of the software
that is included in the operating environments, which customers who have
current support contracts get at no additional charge.


 


There are also
product updates: a new version of HP Integrity virtual machines, a new
directory server, additional security certifications, and management
improvements for Logical Volume Manager. If you develop code, HP-UX 11i v3
offers updated tools that comply with newer standards, make porting to HP-UX
11i v3 easier, and help speed up debugging.


Not only does
HP-UX 11i v3 have additional functionality, we've also updated how we deliver
it. Actually, it was earlier this month that we rolled out e-Delivery
for most of the world (China and Japan are in the works). The default for the
HP-UX 11i v3 images and software packages is now a download instead of a
physical media set. Manuals are also electronic, instead of paper. These types
of efforts will contribute to reducing paper manuals by 13 tons and packaging
by 142 tons  across HP by the end of
2010.


 


Finally, it
wouldn't be a proper announcement without a story about HP-UX
11i v3 customers. For this release, we have published case studies from
customers in the financial sector including Philippine National Bank, State
Bank of India, and Tekstilbank in Turkey.


 


I will likely
blog a little more about this HP-UX 11i v3 release in the next few weeks.  There is a lot of new functionality, and I
will try to cover some of it in a little more depth.


 


Jacob


 


 


 


 


 


 

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Labels: customers| e-Delivery| HP-UX 11i| HP-UX 11i v3| HP-UX 11i v3 March 2010| HP-UX 11i v3 Update 6| Insight Control Infrastructure Orchestration| Insight Dynamics - VSE| Integrity Virtual Machines| operating environments| OS| Thermal Logic| UNIX
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About the Author
  • Kirk Bresniker is the Vice President/Chief Technologist for HP Business Critical Systems where he has technical responsibility for all things Mission Critical, including HP-UX, NonStop and scalable x86 platforms. He joined HP in 1989 after graduating from Santa Clara University and has been an HP Fellow since 2008.
  • I’m the worldwide marketing manager for HP NonStop. I’ll be blogging and tweeting out news as it relates to NonStop solutions – you can find me here and on twitter at @CarolynatHP
  • Cynthia is part of the HP ExpertOne team. ExpertOne offers professional IT training and certifications from infrastructure refresh to areas that span across the datacenter like Cloud and Converged Infrastructure.
  • I have worked with NonStop systems since 1982. I am a Master Technologist for HP and am part of the IT SWAT organization, the Cloud SWAT and work with HP Labs. I report into the Enterprise Solutions and Architecture organization.
  • Joe Androlowicz is a Technical Communications and Marketing manager in HP’s NonStop Product Division. Joe is a 25 year journeyman in information systems design, instructional technologies and multimedia development. He left Apple Computer for Tandem Computers to help launch G03 and hasn’t looked back yet. He previously managed the program management team for the NonStop Education and Training Center and drove the development and growth of the NonStop Certification programs.
  • As a recent college graduate I am new to the world of converged infrastructure, cloud and big data. I am very excited about the innovation HP can bring to the future of mission critical IT.
  • Hello! I am a social media manager for servers, so my posts will be geared towards HP server-related news & info.
  • HP Editor-Enterprise Group: ISS, BCS, Converged Infrastructure (CI), Converged Cloud, Converged App Systems (CAS), and ExpertOne
  • Luke Oda is a member of the HP's BCS Marketing team. With a primary focus on marketing programs that support HP's BCS portfolio. His interests include all things mission-critical and the continuing innovation that HP demonstrates across the globe.
  • I’m the Worldwide Product Marketing Manager for HP Serviceguard Solutions for Linux in BCS. I’ll be blogging about the latest news and enhancements as it relates to this product.
  • Greetings! I am on the HP Enterprise Group marketing team focused on Content Marketing for Business Critical Systems. Topics I am interested in include mission-critical computing, scale up x86, and Converged Infrastructure, Converged Systems.
  • As a Managing Consultant for HP’s Enterprise Solution & Architecture group, I collaborate with client business and IT senior management to understand, prioritize and architect advanced use of data and information, drawing insights required to make informed business decisions. My current focus leverages event-driven business intelligence design techniques and technologies to identify patterns, anticipate outcomes and proactively optimize business response creating a differentiated position in the marketplace for the client.
  • Vinay Gupta is an HP Distinguished Technologist and the NonStop Manageability Architect. He joined Tandem in 1994 after graduating from Indian Institute of Technology. He has worked on many NonStop manageability applications over time. He works across various groups within NonStop and HP to ensure consistency and interoperability in manageability interfaces and applications. He is also a member of DMTF workgroups.
  • Wendy Bartlett is a Distinguished Technologist in HP’s NonStop Enterprise Division, and focuses on dependability – security and availability - for the NonStop server line. She joined Tandem in 1978. Her other main area of interest is system architecture evolution. She has an M.S. degree in computer science from Stanford University.
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