[Info-vax] OpenVMS 7.3-2, Patch V26.0 -> sh mem/cache=(vol=*, topqio=2) -> EXE crashing

[IanD]

On Wednesday, July 1, 2015 at 1:57:50 AM UTC+10, Volker Halle wrote:
> Correction:
> 
> there is a more recent CLIUTL patch: VMS732_CLIUTL-V0300, so one could assume, that the Problem is solved in this patch, although the release notes do not mention it. Neither the release notes for VMS732_CLIUTL-V0200.
> 
> Volker.

Thanks :-)

My experience of Charon has been that's it pretty good actually, I have only encountered one small issue to do with tape drives clocking up the error count each time they are accessed (does not affect the backup), there was a windows patch put out for it but it requires windows downtime so it's pending, other than that it's been rock solid, one system up a year now :-)

The patch information looks interesting - really appreciate that feedback

Flying blind on the patches / fixes available is annoying to say the least :-(

On Wednesday, July 1, 2015 at 1:49:24 AM UTC+10, Stephen Hoffman wrote:
> On 2015-06-30 15:14:11 +0000, IanD said:
> 
> > *Before anyone suggests raising a ticket with HP, these systems have no 
> > support contract - please don't shoot the messenger here, this is not 
> > my doing...
> 
> The costs for those savings just came due.
> 

Totally agree with you but your preaching to the converted here :-)

> 
> Kick this up to IT management, and let them sort out what's involved on 
> getting these servers back on contract, and then getting HP and 
> Stromasys to resolve this.  Or they can decide "don't do that", of 
> course.
> 
> 
> -- 
> Pure Personal Opinion | HoffmanLabs LLC

And there-in is the rub

These old VMS systems / application has battled on for years with little love by the business

They don't want to spend money on upgrading as it's many millions of dollars for a new system (non VMS) and well a number of million for an upgrade of the VMS application (so I'm told, seems a lot to me but I believe it includes support etc) for a system that looks after a customer base that isn't core business going forward

When these systems go, my job also goes, hence it's a bit of self-preservation here keeping these systems viable for as long as I can without trying to get them added to the 'cost to much to run' list, which really = 'to be decommissioned' list

Is there a way to gain access to the patch listings and full descriptions at least without having to have a support contract?

Last time we had patch access was when we virtualised some of the systems but that was worse than extracting teeth getting that set up. The Alpha system serial numbers could not be found on the HP databases, no-one knew how to set up an Alpha contract and they had to track down the person who used to do this who had moved roles and on top of that, any service contracts on Alpha's had to be approved by someone just shy of god within HP (this was for hardware)

If one can glean from the patch descriptions at least, then you could decide if you needed to take out a service contract to get your systems updated or not and I would have something to go to the business with to say 'this improves the stability of your systems' versus 'There may be a patch out there that could improve things but pay up front and then we'll know'...

Do HP offer software service contracts on a short term basis or is it 12 months a pop?