[Info-vax] Building for Customers, Revenue

[Stephen Hoffman]

On 2014-09-13 18:03:04 +0000, JF Mezei said:

> On 14-09-13 13:52, Stephen Hoffman wrote:
> 
>> Um, call me back when VMS is close(r) to OS X or Windows in terms of
>> applications and features and system hardware support, when the costs
>> are known?   Then we'll chat.
> 
> Consider business applications, manufacturing plants and other 
> specialised situations where you want a "personal computer" but not a 
> desktop software.


Embedded environments.  Sure.  VMS was traditionally found in those, 
and I spent more than a little time working on the factory floor and 
with servers and networks in computer-hostile environments.  At one 
place, a train was pulled right into the building, and was parked and 
off-loaded right below the computer room.  The train looked small 
inside the building, though the locomotive did nicely vibrate 
everything the computer room.  (q.v. computer-hostile environments)   
But I digress.

This x86-64 port and support gets you access to parts of that embedded 
market, though you're still competing with Linux and BSD, and with 
Microsoft Windows Embedded 
<http://www.microsoft.com/windowsembedded/en-us/windows-embedded-8.aspx> 
   More than a few of the scans and the processes can and likely will 
increasingly involve mobile devices, whether ARM-based, or something 
similar to Intel Edison.

VSI has a whole slew of possibilities here with their VMS, and they're 
going to have to figure out where to best invest their resources and on 
which partners and customers they should focus, and how to price and 
support their products.  Initially, it'll likely be existing 
applications on Itanium and porting over applications from earlier 
architectures, and eventually porting Itanium and other existing 
applications and customers over to x86-64.  Then maybe VSI looks at 
whatever has replaced Intel Edison in ~five or ~ten years, or when VSI 
is looking for new markets.

When VMS has the hardware support and features and partners for the 
embedded market, and particularly when the costs and configurations are 
known, then we can chat.  Right now, VSI has no products.  They know 
they need to remedy that.  Quickly.  Then they likely want and need to 
get the x86-64 port out the door.

But if some customer is building a new factory or three, and wants an 
alternative to Linux, BSD or Microsoft Windows Embedded, sure, they can 
ring up VSI and have a chat.



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