To the Core: IBM
and LAMP
By Jim Balderston
IBM and Zend Technologies
have announced the availability of Zend Core for IBM,
a product designed to help developers deploy database applications and services
based on the PHP Web language. The companies also announced they were working
together to further the adoption and use of PHP. Zend also announced the
formation of Zend Networks, a resource for PHP developers that will provide
them with enterprise-class updates and support. The Zend Core for IBM
integrates IBM’s DB2 Universal Database and
Cloudscape, the open source database management system with Zend’s PHP
environment. Zend Core is based on PHP 5 technology and is available as a free
download.
The announcement that Zend Core for IBM
would be developed was made a number of months ago, and for many it may have
been something quite easy to overlook at the time. Zend and the entire
Linux-Apache-MySQL-Perl/PHP (LAMP) phenomena was only beginning to make itself felt in the market’s consciousness. Here, just a few
months later, we would argue that LAMP’s profile is growing, with considerable
credit due to IBM’s embrace of the
technology.
Make no mistake, LAMP and its adherents are a ways from
having market-wide recognition of a viable solution for enterprise-class
environments. But they are getting closer every day. As we have noted in the
past, IBM has a pretty stellar track record
when it comes to getting out in front of newly emerging technologies and
backing them with the full faith and credit of Big Blue. First was Java, which
everyone thought was for designing dancing baloney on Web pages. IBM
recognized its value on the other side of the fence as a valuable server-side
development environment. Then came Linux, and IBM
jumped out ahead of that parade when most companies were dismissing open source
as a non-starter. Again, given the clout of IBM,
Linux is now an increasingly integral part of enterprise computing environments
and shows no signs of receding. Which brings us to LAMP.
Based on what we have seen to date, and the overall success of open source
projects in the marketplace, we believe that LAMP technology is going to shine
brightly in the coming years, and due in no small way
to IBM’s early investment and backing.
HDS, Sun, HP Announce New Storage Array
By Joyce Tompsett Becknell
This week HDS announced the new Network Storage Controller
model NSC55, a lower-cost, scaled-down
version of its TagmaStore high-end storage controller. OEM versions of the
product were also announced by HP as the StorageWorks XP10000 Disk Array to
which HP will add clustering, disaster-tolerant, and fast-recovery software to
the HDS product. Sun will also offer the product as the StorEdge 9985 to
replace the current 9970. HDS claims the product is targeted at small and
mid-size enterprises that have traditionally purchased midrange systems. With
the new NSC55, they should be able to enjoy
enterprise functions like high-end customers have enjoyed. The NSC55
will manage up to 16PB of internal and externally attached storage, including
arrays from other vendors. The array can hold up to thirty-two controllers and
cache to ensure data availability and performance. The price is expected to
fall at about one-third the price of the original TagmaStore.
The new storage is the latest in the ongoing round of
storage array wars between HDS, EMC, and IBM.
And as IBM did with the launch of the
DS6000, HDS is attempting to follow in the footsteps of the server vendors and
drive high-end features downstream in midrange packages. And like IBM,
HDS is finding that it’s easier to do the engineering than it is to adjust the
market mentality. Sun and HP are positioning the new products clearly in the
high-end range. (HP in particular has its own successful mid-range products.) IBM
still sells the FAStT line renamed as part of the DS family with different
numbers, and positions the lower-end box as the 6000 line. The truth is that
storage arrays, like servers before them, are transitioning. It is more
cost-effective for vendors to develop systems based on the same architecture,
and it is more cost-effective for end users to have fewer types of systems to
manage. It is also a win for mid-range customers who frequently need the same
capabilities in a smaller package and not a watered-down version of enterprise
systems.
At the same time, it would behoove HDS, Sun, and HP to
coordinate their marketing a little better. There is some confusion as to what
this product is — whether the product is meant to be high-end or midrange. It
doesn’t really matter whether a vendor positions it one way or another
ultimately, as customers will gravitate to the price and capacity they need
regardless of what it’s named or how it’s positioned. On the other hand,
storage is the part of hardware architecture where vendors still seem to sell
mainly products rather than solutions. The real value, of course, isn’t the
storage; it’s the data inside the
storage that matters, and understanding the value, flow, and movement of data —
ILM as it’s known — is where customers find real value, and not in purchasing
another array, disk, or tape library. The fact that HDS, Sun and HP can’t come
to some common agreement on marketing and positioning could give EMC
and IBM a lead if they can figure out how to
take advantage of it and start selling solutions rather than more disk and
tape.
IBM
Announces Enhancements to eServer iSeries
By Clay Ryder
IBM has announced
enhancements to its eServer iSeries that include new offerings for the model
520 and new pricing flexibility for the model 570. The i520 now offers a new
2400/60 CPW performance point for the Express and Value Editions and is
targeted at SMBs with fifty or fewer concurrent users that do not expect to
grow beyond a one-way system. In addition, IBM
has announced the Solution Edition for the i520 that features solutions from
select ISVs offering the combined experience and expertise of IBM
and its partner ISVs. The Solution Edition is based upon the i520 1000 CPW
Enterprise Edition and is targeted at SMBs with fifty or fewer concurrent users
that do not expect to grow beyond a two-way system. In addition, the Solution
Edition can be upgraded to the 1000 CPW Enterprise Edition at no charge and
then upgraded to 6000 CPW. IBM has also
modified its software maintenance licensing of i5/OS so that all iSeries
systems may purchase the OS license on a per CPU basis; the minimum number of
CPU licenses will now be one. The i520 Solution Edition is priced starting at
$39,500 when combined with a validated $25,000 minimum purchase of a supported ISV
solution. The 520 Express Edition Turbo #6, 2400/600 CPW with 4GB RAM
is priced starting at $42,000; the 520 Express Edition Turbo #7 with RAID,
2400/600 CPW with 4GB RAM and 40MB disk
write cache is priced starting at $48,000. The i5/OS software maintenance
agreement license starts at $1,200/year/CPU based upon system capacity.
As we noted last week, IBM
continues to be investing in the iSeries, and the latest announcements are yet
more proof of Big Blue’s iSeries spirit. What strikes us most about these
announcements is that IBM has continued to
simplify the pricing of the iSeries to make it more consistent with licensing
models available with pSeries and xSeries while at
the same time packaging offerings that make it easier for customers and IBM
business partners to deploy iSeries solutions. The Solution Edition for the
i520 along with the new CPW price point for the i520 is well positioned to
encourage more ISVs to support the platform while potentially broadening the
user base for existing iSeries ISVs. In addition, the investment protection
inherent in the i520 Solution Edition through the free upgrade to Enterprise
Edition status when seeking to upgrade the CPW should provide some peace of
mind to those organizations who may be attracted to the off the shelf approach
of Solution Edition but concerned that their needs may soon eclipse the
edition’s shipping workload capacity.
At the same time, we see the simplification and unification
of the i5/OS licensing model as a good move for customers and for IBM.
Customers rarely, if ever, complain when the base cost of licensing declines;
however, IBM has also made it easier for end
users to consolidate UNIX and other workloads on the iSeries by reducing the
minimum cost of deploying an iSeries with sufficient capacity to handle the
consolidated workloads without requiring more i5/OS capacity than needed. This
improved flexibility should help the iSeries become a more attractive
consolidation platform for those with AIX 5L, Linux, Windows, and i5/OS
applications. Overall, while to some these announcements may not seem
earth-shattering, they are reflective of incremental improvements in value
delivered while maintaining a customer-centric focus. To our way of thinking,
these are the kind of improvements that ultimately build customer loyalty and
promote long-term revenue growth.
More Bandwidth?
How About on Power Lines?
By Jim Balderston
Recent reports indicate that broadband penetration in the
U.S. home market stands at just over 57% as of March 2005, up three-quarters of
a percentage point from February. Broadband penetration at work stands at
slightly more than 81%, unchanged from the previous month. These numbers
continue to remain higher than European countries, which, while experiencing
larger growth spurts in market penetration, still lag behind the U.S. with
overall market penetration rates in the mid-to high 30% range. Meanwhile, both
Google and IBM have made commitments to
continue to experiment and test the feasibility of broadband delivered over
electric power lines (BPL). IBM
announced it will be working with a Houston energy firm to deliver BPL
in the Houston area.
Google is exploring BPL
as a means to get around having to have third parties deliver its ever growing
stable of content and services. IBM would
appear to be doing so as yet another effort to explore a technology that could
someday make the company a great deal of money. Given that broadband providers
— most notably the cable and phone companies — are sharply discounting their
broadband offerings in attempts to gain more of the uncommitted market share,
one would suspect that they would be very suspicious if not outright hostile to
a viable broadband delivery system that would not require huge capital outlays
for its infrastructure.
But even if the BPL
supporters are able to circumnavigate the opposition of the incumbent broadband
providers, there will be other thorny issues to untangle before BPL
goes mainstream. While some of the technical issues have been addressed, others
remain unresolved. One, for instance, is the question of how much radio
frequency emissions will increase with the deployment of BPL
and what parts of the already crowded radio spectrum will be impacted. Perhaps
even more daunting than the technical issues, however, will be those of
regulatory oversight. Will local Public Utility Commissions have the power (pun
intended) to regulate rates? Will the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission take
this role? Or will it be the FCC? These questions are far from answered, and in
fact may not be in the process of being answered. Before we see BPL
make an impact, a fair bit of legislative soul searching will have to occur,
and that, quite frankly, could take years if not decades.
Anti-Spyware, Take Two
By Susan Dietz
In April of this year, the Center for Democracy and
Technology spearheaded an effort to unite the IT industry in fighting spyware
by forming the Anti-Spyware Coalition (ASC). Some of the IT members of ASC are AOL,
Symantec, EarthLink, HP, McAfee Inc., and Panda Software. Public interest
members include Samuelson Law, Technology & Public Policy Clinic at Boalt
Hall, UC Berkeley School of Law and The Canadian Internet Policy and Public
Interest Clinic. The ASC is an effort to replace the Consortium of Anti-Spyware
Technology Vendors (Coast) which fell apart in February of this year for
several reasons, one of them being an ongoing debate over whether to include in
their membership companies that actually make spyware. The first mission of the
ASC is to define exactly what spyware is so that they can more effectively
fight it. To this end, ASC is inviting public comment on their Web site.
To defeat the monster, we must first identify the monster. This
is a bit more problematic than it at first seems. For example, look at the
problems courts have had when they tried to define pornography. “I know it when
I see it” doesn’t work as a definition of pornography and won’t do as a
definition of spyware, either. To that end, the ASC has tentatively defined
spyware as any software that is installed on a user’s computer that is not
asked for, not known about, and not easily uninstalled. But this definition can
be changed, partially because one of the objectives of the ASC is to have
consensus upon every point. Good luck with that.
The ASC has written a thirteen-page paper about the problem
of spyware and has invited public comments. Part of the problem with spyware is
that it is simply technology, and as with all technology, it can be used for
either good or not so good purposes. Just banning technology is not an answer;
for every “dark” purpose there is also a “light” purpose. It just depends on
what side of The Force the user is on. For example, the tracking software that
a shady company uses to illegitimately share personal information could share
components that are found in software that parents use to monitor their
children’s Internet behavior. So where is the line drawn and how is that line
defined? Wherever that line in the sand ends up being drawn, we anticipate that
it could affect every IT company in some way with the potential of new laws,
regulations, or controls on their products. Much as farmers petitioned the USDA
to officially define the tomato as a vegetable despite its scientific
characteristics indicating that it is indeed a fruit, we suspect that many
vendors of spyware would lobby to be defined as personal assistance, search, or
preference enhancement software or other less nefarious sounding moniker. Since
everyone is affected, everyone believes they have a say. However, as when
voting on an issue of great importance, one can’t count on a great turnout. It
will be interesting to note exactly how many consumers will say anything at
all.
