On 30 Nov 2007 06:46:35 -0800, in bit.listserv.ibm-main you wrote: >I can only dimly remember planned outages. > >In my capacity as Customer Services Marketing Manager in Amdahl UK, one of the >metrics I had >to deal with was MTBUI - Mean Time Between Unscheduled Interruptions. It was >essentially >downtime with scheduled maintenance factored out - a planned two-hour slot >didn't count as >downtime unless it overran, and then an MTBUI incident was recognized and the >clock started >ticking. > >But as long ago as 1990 - some might say before - it became quite evident that >customers were >simply not able to take systems down for scheduled maintenance. A processor, >a storage bank, >a channel group - maybe. And it wasn't just Amdahl customers - we shared most >installations >with at least one other supplier and it was the same for them. > >Indeed, as long ago as 1979, I remember Eternit swapping MVS releases and >providing continuous >RJE service (and pretty continuous TSO) using shared spool. That's nearly >three decades. > >I can't think of another supplier who has outages like this. My personal >systems are set up >for automatic virus definition updates, automatic Microsoft patches, etc., and >they never >fail. > >I'd love to see someone try to sell a mobile phone with the caveat that it >can't be used >between 03:00 and 04:00 on Sundays because the network goes down for >maintenance.
This seems like a great requirement coming from active and large customers like banks that IBMLINK must be 24/7/365.24. Always available since you never know when an outage can occur. I am certain the financial justifications can be written. The requirement could be submitted and also concurring PASRs. If I were still employed and could get management permission, I would be glad to participate. You might also threaten to embarrass them at the annual meeting if you are a shareholder. Also ask on what platform IBMLINK runs and if not z, why not. I'm a shareholder but not big enough to afford to go based on my dividends. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
