[Info-vax] Desirable features for VMS

[Hans Bachner]

Marc Van Dyck schrieb am 29.01.2024 um 16:36:
> Dave Froble formulated the question :
>> On 1/28/2024 8:32 AM, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>>> On 1/28/2024 8:25 AM, Marc Van Dyck wrote:
>>>> Simon Clubley formulated the question :
>>>>> Does anyone have any others to add to the list ?
>>>>
>>>> Yes. Some kind of automatic disaster recovery. That is, if a process,
>>>> or a set of processes, run on a system that crashes, those processes 
>>>> are
>>>> automatically restarted on another cluster member, transparently, with
>>>> no manual intervention, and continue from the point they were at when
>>>> the system crashed. No transaction lost of any kind, and without having
>>>> to add anything in the code that those processes are running. The
>>>> operating system (or layered product) does all the work transparently.
>>>> Should work with code written 30 years ago, with ACMS applications,
>>>> anything.
>>>
>>> Something like Tandem NonStop lock-step?
>>>
>>> Arne
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Well, no, not really.  What I'd envision would be what I'd call an 
>> application monitor, for lack of a better name, that would be able to 
>> know what the applications should be doing, to monitor that activity, 
>> and to do whatever necessary to continue the activity, should anything 
>> happen to that activity. Yeah, non-stop, but not the Tandem design.
>>
>> Just a concept, and design and implementation might be "interesting".
>>
>> I'd just note that the OSs would be included as applications, so 
>> re-starting them from where they were interrupted would be included in 
>> the concept.  So, yeah, the monitor would be outside/over the OSs.  
>> Perhaps something like happens with VMs.  Except VMs want to move the 
>> activity to another system, not recover on the same system.
> 
> Whatever the design and implementation, this would be a really useful
> and marketable addition to the OpenVMS cluster concept. Clusters were
> invented 40 years ago to implement horizontal scalability, because
> vertical scalability was impossible, technically or financially. This
> issue has mostly disappeared today, current hardware being able to
> deliver any power we might want. Today's clusters are essentially
> put in place for redundancy or disaster recovery purposes ; the next
> logical step should be to provide this redundancy in a transparent way
> to the system user.
> 
> This should also be, as opposed to simple user niceties, something that
> allows VSi to make money with.


Would OpenVMS Service Control cover your needs?

<https://vmssoftware.com/products/service-control/>

Service Control was originally developed by Wolfgang Burger at HP in 
Vienna and later adopted by VSI. As far as I know it is (still) offered 
as a service, not a product - but only VSI can tell.

Hans.