[Info-vax] OT: news from the trenches (re: Solaris)

[lists at openmailbox.org]

On Thu, 12 Mar 2015 16:00:28 -0400
JF Mezei via Info-vax <info-vax at rbnsn.com> wrote:

> On 15-03-12 09:50, lists at openmailbox.org wrote:
> 
> > As you know IBM didn't design x86 and it was never their baby.
> 
> In hindsight, imagine if they had designed a low end 370 chip for
> personal computers and got Gates to build DOS to the 370 instead of 8088.

Another poster has pointed out there were numerous examples of that. But it
should be mentioned even though those boxes did exist until fairly recently
(in IBM terms) the mainframe OS isn't at home on a small box and doesn't
make a good desktop. So even though technically there were mainframe PCs
(P/390, etc.) they were targeted at different users than the normal desktop
PC user. The P/390 was targeted at small development shops that couldn't
afford to buy their own mainframe and didn't want to lease a timesharing
setup. They were actually good enough to do real development on for a
fairly good sized staff but they were not production boxes because they
didn't support some of the specialty hardware required for MVS's version of
clustering, loosely speaking.

> > to run specifically on those architectures. Selling off z/Arch and POWER
> > fab is a major directional change
> 
> Are they selling only the fab business or the chip design for the 360/z
> and Power architectures ?  If they retain the chip design, then they are
> like Apple, designing their own chips and getting a vanialla FAB build
> them.

I really don't know what the terms of the deal were but I have to believe
IBM would not let go of the chip design. The OS and the whole product
line- compilers, third party tools, etc. depend way too much on things
being exactly so to allow an external company to be able to put them out of
business instantly. IBM has been pretty good about requiring new hardware
for OS upgrades. You're forced to buy a new box every two or three years or
you don't get the microcode upgrades necessary to run the latest OS.

> Note that IBM has traditionally been an R&D leader for FAB technooogies.
> So interesting to see them let go of that leadership.

Yes, as I said I think it was a mistake and I think it came from
corporate pinhead MBAs rather than engineering. But that's the way things
are done lately. Yet I don't think that decision extended to design, only
the fab and all that goes with that.

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