ETI-NET and the HPE message of virtualization

The more we participate in NonStop community user group meeting the more the central messages coming from the NonStop team work their way into our consciousness and they begin to influence what we cover in our own internal planning meetings. Obviously, we have our own goals and as we listen to our customers there is always a need to do something more. However, it would be foolish for any vendor to ignore the messages coming from the NonStop team and we openly acknowledge that indeed, this is the case at ETI-NET.

The most obvious message coming from the NonStop team concerns virtualization. By now the shock has worn off for most of the NonStop community members and it has become obvious that HPE will be only too happy to sell you complete systems for on-premise deployment just as they will shortly become pleased to license virtualized NonStop (vNS) for installation on hardware they supply but perhaps, not exclusively. Furthermore, the need for anything to be delivered to a data center may become optional as cloud computing takes hold and the option to run vNS from within a cloud becomes a realistic option.

For ETI-NET it is still very much about data and files. It’s about ensuring that everything to do with data continues to be as available as NonStop. Future users of NonStop should not be worried about their availability profile because of uncertainties over access to data and this is driving our internal planning meetings as much as what HPE is telling us.

After all, we have been doing this for our customers for several decades and we see no lessening of interest in availability of data – it just has to be accessible no matter where it may be stored. But what does this mean from a practical standpoint and what are we now pursuing for our clients who will be going down the path to running NonStop on virtual machines?

The impact of virtualized NonStop on backup:  First the backup needs to be totally transparent and the same for a vNonStop as it is for the physical NonStop.  Since the physical tape cannot be used with vNonStop, the only solution is to virtualize the virtual tape solution.  In order to do this the technology  for connectivity needs to be adapted for the vNonStop environment.  The impact of the virtualized virtual tape solution, it will allow customers to use all their existing storage and backup storage available in their virtual environment and this will be totally transparent to the NonStop.  It will provide great configuration flexibility to meet the necessary performance and fault tolerance while allowing the NonStop to use the same backup tools.

There will continue to be ETI-NET presence at upcoming user group events as we plan on attending this year’s NonStop Technical Boot Camp. However, should this strike a chord with any of our clients where they want to share more information about future backup needs, then yes, as always, call us or drop us an email. We are only too keen to listen to whatever your future needs might be and to hear first-hand of your plans to run your applications on vNS.

Said Hini
said.hini@etinet.com (514) 663-0501
http://etinet.com/