Real Time View

NonStop – 50 years on and legendary!

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As active as I am, I publish on numerous social media channels together with digital newsletters and magazines. The commentaries, including the present one, are focused on just a few topics. Among the most prevalent comments are those that relate to age, and I guess when it comes to me personally, I have to accept those comments without debate. However, when it comes to NonStop systems, the door swings wide open, and I take advantage of such opportunities to extoll the virtues of NonStop. Following a brief exchange, correspondence ends rather quickly.

The single biggest mistake made within the industry is confusing what is old with what is truly legendary. As you can imagine, I take this as a personal vendetta. Surprised? At first glance, a solution that has been in the marketplace for fifty years has to be old. End of debate. But herein lies the assumption that creates the disconnect. If we simply left it to the original NonStop system to counter such a statement, then perhaps those discriminating against NonStop might have a point. Transition to the modern NonStop systems we have today, and the conversation quickly peters out. Disappearing behind the absence of further comments.

According to sources I trust – yes, I read it on the internet – the difference is relatively straightforward. What is simply old is “Something that is passed down through generations, while legendary means very famous and admired.” Think Michael Jordan (Basketball), Steve Smith (cricket), or even Pele (Football). They are legendary figures. By this definition, NonStop has created a legendary presence among technologists. Being legendary, it continues to morph into solutions of importance for these present times. Furthermore, evangelizing NonStop is the domain of those with “skin-in-the-game” who view NonStop as more than just a product and who truly believe, and are committed to, NonStop, the legend.

It’s hard to ignore the continued success of clouds and the cloud service providers hawking such a technology. But seriously? The cloud concept is just a reinvention of the time-sharing combined with service bureau mentalities packaged as something new and exciting. Seriously, for many, it continues to be a day late and a dollar short. The cloud experience may be a strong argument favoring the embracement of clouds, but for the NonStop community, it’s already at hand with how NonStop is put together. There can be no denying that at its purest level, NonStop is today’s cloud in a box. Pathway – TS/MP is a premier container environment while at the same time, more than adequate at orchestration. Understanding the value that this provides is a lightbulb moment as it is clear why these past fifty years are being celebrated.

This is the stuff of legends and, as such, is becoming increasingly harder to ignore.

As for NonStop SQL, designed from the get-go never to require downtime, especially that dreaded “Planned Downtime” that allows certain vendors to continue to argue that their systems have five nines of uptime. Again, seriously? Yes, our SQL is offline, but it was planned – surely you can work with that? From time immemorial, planned downtime has been a constant in the world of IBM Mainframes. While they are getting better at finessing such outages, the architecture of its premier database offering was never intended to run 24 x 7 x forever. Or so I continue to be reminded whenever I raise the topic.

So, the legend of NonStop lives on.

And unlike the famous Edmund Fitzgerald, NonStop sails on weathering whatever storms come its way. Really? Storms? It’s more like a light breeze in a teacup. There is evidence that early NonStop models dating back to the NonStop II of the 1970s continue to run without a reboot or IPL. Amazing, eh? In today’s world, where it’s continuous supply chain distribution and just-in-time deliveries, this cloud-in-a-box with a database that never shuts down cannot escape its legendary moniker. Quite simply, name anything that comes this close to what NonStop delivers!

TCO is perhaps the second most common topic that generates commentaries. Here, fortunately, the response is an easy one to make. Have you checked the invoices coming from your cloud service provider? Cannot make sense of the many line items? You know you had pre-req’d many items? As an enterprise, you have to be aware of how running mission-critical solutions would come with a sizable premium. As for staffing, any short-term gain leaves you totally at the mercy of consultants should the time come for the pursuit of cloud repatriation. It is hard to ignore how replacing those technically savvy folks within the IT organization with accountants trying to keep on top of the billing would seem to contradict the pursuit of a reduced TCO. Now, there you have, the beginnings of a truly tempestuous storm in the making.

It looks less and less like the stuff of legends as judgment becomes clouded; is it just good storytelling?

There are so many anecdotes floating around on social media highlighting the pitfalls of pure cloud-based deployments that the cloud already has a lot of ground to cover if it is ever considered legendary. It’s unfortunate to note that historically, the lifespan of any major technology swing is always short-lived, and the cloud looks likely to fall into the short-lived category. Let the pundits rail against the cloud naysayers, but ask yourself, is it desirable for our enterprise and mission-critical applications? Can we really afford the missteps a total cloud operation will most certainly lead to?

“On Nov. 10, 49 years ago, the Edmund Fitzgerald and her 29 souls saw the last light of day as they traversed Lake Superior,” said a staff writer on the nearby local paper, the News Advocate. Next year, it will be fifty years. I was reminded of this tragedy as I was prepping this column, and it struck me that at the time of this tragedy and the legend that was to arise, thanks to the lyrics of the song by Gordon Lightfoot, the legend of NonStop was just beginning.

Fifty years on, and the legend lives on; NonStop is celebrating.

And there is a reason why NonStop became legendary and distances itself from further conversations about older systems. NonStop has maintained its relevance; its presence in the market remains unmatched when it comes to availability, scalability, and overall data integrity. Elasticity? Yes, that, too, is covered through readily accessible containerization with Pathway – TS/MP.

Legends are made, after all, and not born.

The collection of individuals dedicated to the idea that fault tolerance still provides value, a much-desired level of service unmatched today, and the continuity of experience with the willingness to communicate (the arrival of new solutions on NonStop) assures us all of the potential for even more in the 2025. Enough said. NonStop may not come up in conversations the same way as Jordan, Smith, or Pele might do, and yet, for those close to the industry, it goes without saying: NonStop is a legend without peer.

The passage of a significant milestone like a golden anniversary, where today it continues to anchor many mission-critical applications, speaks volumes. And with that, the legend truly lives on, and it’s all because of us. A community that is on board, 24 x 7!  

Author

  • Richard Buckle

    Richard Buckle is the founder and CEO of Pyalla Technologies, LLC. He has enjoyed a long association with the Information Technology (IT) industry as a user, vendor and more recently as a thought leader, industry commentator, influencer, columnist and blogger. Well-known to the user communities of HP and IBM, Richard served on the board of the HP user group, ITUG (2000-2006), as its Chairman (2004-2005), and as the Director of Marketing on the board of the IBM user group, SHARE, (2007-2008).

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