The biggest difference with mainframes is their ability to run multiple virtual systems (hence MVS). This allows a process to be run simultaneously. IBM's p-series (rs/6000) currently has this functionality. IBM's parallel sysplex technlogy allows a transaction to be run concurrently. This means that a transaction is fault tolerant no matter what stage the processing is in.
--- Tracy R Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Wade Curry wrote: > > paragraphs :-) . The breach between the mainframe > and *nix camps > > is more cultural than anything else, IMHO. We > tout our clusters and > > distributed setups, and then install a blade > server to get them all > > in the same rack. They tout the blessings of > consolidated > > hardware, higher throughput and ability to get > everything out of a > > CP (they are designed to run at 100% capacity), > and then install > > dozens of virtual machines... > > I would definitely like to learn more about > mainframes and apply the > good ideas from the mainframe world to the Unix > world. I understand that > mainframe hardware is of the highest quality and > fault tolerant with > lots of emphasis put on IO and I hope we can carry > more of that over > into the Unix/PC world. I am still trying to > understand what advantages > the mainframe software world has. My biggest > complaint (which I recently > voiced on slashdot) is that we have no way of > learning about mainframes. > The average person can't afford one. The average > (small) company can't > even afford one! And Wade is only the second person > I have ever met in > my life who had any real experience with mainframes. > I think mainframes > would be a lot more widespread if IBM had given the > software away for > free and some minimal hardware platform on which to > run it so that more > people could have access to understand the > technology. I know I will > never recommend a mainframe solution to my employer > until I really have > some practical experience with one. And given the > amount of OLTP and > OLAP that we do around here we could probably use > some of those > capabilities of a mainframe. > > > The *nix camp though, seems to be absorbing less > of the better > > technology from mainframes... and doing it more > slowly. Xen seems > > to be a good example. On the other hand, there's > not a whole lot > > else. We don't have nearly as robust facilities > for scheduling > > batch jobs, allocating resources to specific tasks > on the fly, > > detailed transaction logging, etc. > > What do you mean by "scheduling batch jobs"? I > understand that "batch > jobs" are a major part of the workload for > mainframes but I have no idea > what they really are. Would a batch job just be the > generation of a > report or something? If so we schedule batch jobs > out of cron and it > works just fine. Maybe the mainframes have a better > way of doing it but > the way we are doing it is "good enough". I would > like to be able to > allocate resources to specific tasks on the fly but > I think we are > getting there with clustering and Xen. Detailed > transaction logging is a > part of our application. Is it part of the OS in the > mainframe world? If > so, why should the OS need to be aware of Alice > buying a toothbrush? > > > The blog link mentioned below is a fairly good one > for mainframers. > > I will definitely be checking it out. > > > In case you need a reminder, IFLs are specialized > CPUs that > > are optimized for Linux. > > If you run Linux on a mainframe don't you lose the > batch processing and > other niceties that the mainframe OS provides you? > Then what you have is > a very reliable Linux box on very expensive > hardware. Still better than > running it on a PC, I'm sure. > > > Oh.. and let me know if you think these posts are > too off-topic. I > > don't intend to make a habit of it, just when I > see a more > > prominent announcement. FWIW, the press release > that Timothy > > I think these posts are very much on topic and I > hope you will send us > more stuff like this. > > -- > Tracy R Reed > http://copilotconsulting.com > 1-877-MY-COPILOT > > > -- > [email protected] > http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list > -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
