This mainframe blog intends to write on IBM z Systems and high-end and midrange storage associated with it. My intention is to write all kinds of comments, hints and tips and thoughts about news in general, announcements, publications, interesting sites and user groups.
March seems to be a very busy month for the Belgian GSE Working groups. I got quite some invitations over the last couple of weeks, so I thought I might put them in the spotlight. I just hope I don't forget any. If so, please let me know.
Here we go :
Joint VM and Linux on System z Working Group Meeting Where and when : Tuesday March 6, 2012 at the IBM Forum Brussels at 1.00 PM Topics : Linux on System z: What, Why, How, and When? (by Eric Michiels, IBM Belgium), zVM Linux servers, our bridge pillars between business and legacy (P&V customer case by Carlo Werbrouck) and Mainframe, VM and Linux - A perfect match? (by Guy Przytula). Registration over here.
z/OS Working Group Meeting Where and when : Wednesday March 14, 2012 at RealDolmen Huizingen at 9.00 AM Topics : to be determined Registration over here.
DB2 Working Group Meeting Where and when : Thursday March 15, 2012 at Colruyt Halle at 1.00 PM Topics : The meeting is entirely dedicated to migrating to DB2 10 Registration over here.
Architecture Working Group Meeting Where and when : Friday March 16, 2012 at KBC Leuven at 1.00 PM Topics : dedicated to Mobile Application Architecture with sessions on Mobile Applications, Mobile Payments and Mobile Commerce; Mobile network architectures - Another look on mobile application challenges; Quelle architecture pour les solutions mobiles? Registration over here.
And to finish things off, the dates for the Regional GSE Conference are Thursday April, 26 and Friday April, 27 2012. As last year, Thursday will be 'only' registration and evening dinner. Friday will have all the sessions. Theme of this years meeting is : 'Information Management and Big Data'.
When z/OS 1.13 (ZP11-0313) and z/OSMF 1.13 (ZP11-0303) were announced, IBM announced a DASD Management Task for z/OSMF to become available in the first quarter of 2012. It was intended to simplify disk storage management as follows :
"The new task is intended to allow you to perform storage group management tasks from within the application. It is designed to streamline the process of adding volumes to SMS pool storage groups, reducing several manually intensive steps involving multiple applications to a reduced number of steps using a single interface. The DASD Management task is planned to be made available in first quarter 2012 with the PTF for APAR PM40869".
It was to contain an Add Storage wizard.
"The Add Storage wizard can enable you to add storage to an SMS pool storage group more easily than before. It uses the new storage group attributes as policy, if defined within the storage group definition. The Add Storage wizard guides you through the following steps:
Determining the amount of capacity to add based on the storage utilization goal and available capacity found in the assigned reserve storage pool
Selecting the volumes to add from the reserve storage pool
Updating the SCDS with the selected volumes
Initializing the selected volumes to match the naming convention of the storage group
Optionally, varying volumes online and activating the changes to the SCDS to make the new capacity available for SMS use"
Just saw this Storage Flash pass by : 'Potential DS8100/DS8300/DS8700 FICON Host Adapter Loss of Access during certain zHPF workloads'.
What's it about ?
"Customers running zHPF enabled on DS8100/DS8300 with Release 4.3 code bundle levels 64.30.78.0 and higher or DS8700 with Release 5.0 code bundle level 75.0.x.y may see global CRC checks or repeating host adapter error recovery leading to unavailable host adapter cards and potential loss of access. DS8700s on Release 5.1 bundle levels 75.1.x.y are not exposed. DS8800s are not exposed"
"DS8700s running zHPF on Release 5.0 should upgrade to Release 5.1 or higher (Release 6.2 bundle 76.20.82.0 is recommended). HIPER APAR OA38777 will also be available by the end of February to prevent Media Manager from using zHPF for Multi-Track Read I/O for records with data lengths less than 128 bytes; the chains will be done with FICON I/O instead.
DS8100/DS8300s running zHPF should not be moved to a Release 4.3 bundle without applying the HIPER APAR OA38777, unless zHPF is disabled until the HIPER APAR is applied. DS8100s/DS8300s already on Release 4.3 code (64.3x.xx.0) and planning to update software service levels prior to the HIPER APAR OA38777 availability should disable zHPF until the HIPER APAR is applied."
As already indicated above : DS8800 customers are not affected.
In short for XIV Gen 3.1 there are the following new features :
SSD Caching. Should increases read performance considerably
XIV Mobile (monitor) Dashboard for iPhone
Cross-generation mirroring between all XIV models
Management UI Enhancements
The most important feature of XIV Gen 3.1 is of course the introduction of SSD read cache. You know how each XIV module contains its own disks, cache, CPU and possibly interface components. To each module you can now add 400GB of SSD cache. That means that for e.g. 6 modules you can have 400GB x 6 = 2.4TB of read cache. This should give your read performance an extra boost. The Storage Buddhist compares it to NetApp Flash Cache and I guess that's a pretty good comparison since Flash Cache is also meant to boost read performance.
Next to the XIV announcement Tony Pearson also mentions some other ones on his Inside System Storage blog. I'm not sure why, but I can't find any 'real' announcement about it. IBM Tape storage policy normally offers reading N-2 generations and writing N-1 generations. The reading part is now extended to N-3. I'm not going to sum up all possibilities. Just look at the picture below. The red box should no longer be grayed out but for the moment I have no real details about how it should be filled in. Just click on the image for a larger version.
I already mentioned two fellow bloggers writing about these announcements. But I should add another one writing extensively about them. It's Anthony Vandewerdt on his Aussi Storage Blog with 'XIV Release 3.1 – SSD Read Cache is go!' and 'XIV Release 3.1 materials' including a video on the XIV iPhone App.
I'm a bit late, I know, with last weeks announcements. But you know what they say : better late than never. I'll start off with the System z announcements and make another post on the storage announcements.
New End of Support (EOS) dates are announced for a range of products : 'Software withdrawal and support discontinuance: IBM System z selected products (ZP12-0021)'. I'm not going to list them all but next to some Websphere, Tivoli, IMS, TPC and other products there's first of all the End of Support date of DB2 for z/OS 9.1 on June 27, 2014. A bit more than 7 years after GA. If you're still on V8, don't forget that the EOS date is in a couple of months on April 30, 2012. You might very well consider skipping DB2 9 altogether and do a skip level migration to DB2 10.
By the way, I just added a Belgian GSE DB2 Working Group meeting to the agenda. It's at the Colruyt site in Halle on Thursday March 15, 2012 and the meeting is entirely dedicated to DB2 V10 migration experiences. Speakers are John Campbell (IBM Distinguished Engineer) and Michael Dewert (IBM Germany).
Next to that, there's also the announcement of the EOS date for z/VM 6.1 on April 30, 2013. As you know, that's almost half a year earlier that the EOS date for z/VM 5.4 which is on September 30, 2013. z/VM 6.1 is to be replaced by z/VM 6.2.
You know I'm still quite happy with the name of my blog. It's not always that simple to pick a good name. I opted for the term 'mainframe' at a moment when the word seemed to have quite a negative connotation and wasn't even used by IBM at that moment. Time has proven me right I guess. But I also added Belgium for a reason. It was my intention to mention only events when our Belgian customers could attend them. Much has changed of course, since we saw, or see, more and more webcasts taking over real life events. But they still happen of course.
So here's one at the IBM Research and Development Center in Boeblingen. Yes, it's a good 5 hour drive from Brussels, but I think it's worth your while. It's a free two day workshop taking place on Tuesday March 13 and Wednesday March 14, 2012. You can find all information over here where you can also register for the event.
"In this two-day technical-oriented workshop on March 13th and 14th in the IBM Boeblingen Development Laboratory you have the chance to speak directly with IBM developers and experts about the technical capabilities of Linux on the IBM System z server systems. You will get first-hand information, and you can exchange your experiences with other customers".
Here's a sort summary of the agenda :
What's New for Linux on System z
Linux on System z Performance Update SLES11 SP2
Storage Options for Linux on System z and Comparison DS8K, XIV and Storwize V7000
Linux on System z Networking
Live Demo: Integrating x86 workload into Linux on System z environments
Live Demo: Debugging with Linux on System z with Valgrind
Linux Health Checker
You only have to make your own travel and accomodation arrangements. If you're planning to go and want more information or some help in planning, do contact me, I'll be glad to help you with it.
A couple of weeks ago I stumbled across a mainframe blog I hadn't seen before : Mainframe Analytics. Hey, a new mainframe blog, I mean, really new, because the first post was only written at the beginning of this year and it had this intriguing title 'What is a mainframe ?'. Now, finally, I was going to find out what a mainframe really was. Just kidding. Next in line 'Why do mainframes matter ?'. Hey, could we have a new advocate for the mainframe.
Well, as it turns out, yes and no. The writer of this blog is Reg Harbeck, which you may perhaps know from another blog I mentioned before : the CA Technologies' Exec I/O Mainframe blog. Come to think of it, most of the posts lately were by Marcel den Hartog and no longer by Reg Harbeck. Turns out Reg has left CA Technologies to start his own company. But, and we have an expression for this in Dutch, which I can only literally translate into (no doubt, bad) English : 'Blood crawls where it cannot go'. Meaning, if you have it in you, you won't be able to deny your own nature. So Reg, changed companies but not his fondness for the mainframe.
Do have a look at his blog. He's really setting up a nice introductory series on the mainframe. Could be interesting for anyone who wants to know more about the mainframe or for people who want to explain the strong points of the mainframe to others.
Here I am again with another review of interesting TechDocs documents I came across while browsing through the latest publications. If you're completely unfamiliar to Techdocs, here's an introduction to it.
Presentation : z/OS Version 1 Release 13 Technical Update A couple of documents on z/OS starting with a presentation on z/OS 1.13 and z/OSMF. The audio of the presentation is also included.
Technical Document : z/OS Version 1 Release 13 Installation Plan Checklist "z/OS 1.13 Installation Plan checklist is for installing and migrating to z/OS 1.13 from z/OS release 11 or release 12. To be used as a supplement to existing product publications."
White paper : IBM System Storage DS8800 and DS8700 Performance with Easy Tier 3rd Generation Easy Tier 3rd generation "further expands Easy Tier to manage hybrid storage pools with up to three tiers including Solid State Drives (SSDs), Enterprise Disks, and Nearline Disks". But the paper is not only for people using hybrid pools : "Auto Rebalance has also been extended to include management of homogenous pools containing only a single tier of storage". Easy Tier 3 is available from DS8000 LIC Release 6.2.
Workshop material : WAS z/OS V8 Wildfire Workshop Material WebSphere Application Server for z/OS Version 8 was made available in 2011. It has many new features and functions associated with it, including updated open standard application interface specification support. This is the handout material of a 5-unit wildfire workshop on it. Units are 'Introduction and Overview', 'Administrative Model', 'The Split JVM Model', 'Accessing z/OS Data', 'WebSphere Optimized Local Adapters' and Hands-on lab instructions.
Technical Document : Using z/VM FBA Emulation in a Second-Level ID Starting point : "z/VM can access SCSI disks through the services of an I/O layer known as FBA Emulation, introduced with z/VM 5.1. FBA Emulation was added to z/VM to remove one of the \barriers to entry" for Linux on System z: ECKD DASD. With FBA Emulation, a site with no traditional mainframe installation can install and run z/VM and Linux guests without having to invest in mainframe DASD". "The z/VM FBA Emulation feature allows z/VM systems to access and use SCSI-over-FCPdisks via a SAN fabric. FBA Emulation is straightforward to use at a first-level system but complexity arises at second-level. This article presents a review of using FBA Emulation and the alternatives for using these disks in a second-level ID".
Well that's it for now. And, as I always say : just check them out !
As a matter of fact, it's nothing more or less than a try-before-you-buy license for CICS TS V4.2. Why would you want to do that ?
"It has a zero-cost license charge and does not initiate any Single Version Charging (SVC) period.
CICS TS Developer Trial is designed for customers who want to assess the value that could be gained from a CICS TS upgrade, before making an upgrade decision. This enables the evaluation of the latest CICS TS capabilities, in a non-production environment, without the prerequisite time and resources commitments required for a full production migration project".
This looks like a nice offer to me. And, to me, it seems to take away the pressure about getting into production before the end of your SVC period.
Of course "there are a number of imposed restrictions, in performance and capacity, licensing terms, and a fixed expiry date, that make CICS TS Developer Trial suitable only for use in non-production environments". About the fixed expiry date, it provides "at least 90 days operation from the date of fulfillment. New releases can be installed to extend this period. There is no limit to the number of times CICS TS Developer trial can be reordered, installed and used". So this should be pretty flexible, no ?
This looks like quite an interesting webcast series on Omegamon. I quote from the announcement page which you can find over here :
"Whether you’re an existing OMEGAMON® user, or you’re considering it, these webcasts will give you valuable information about greater visibility into the way services and applications are being executed across the enterprise. You’ll also learn how this helps you use fewer System z® resources and tackle enterprise-wide problems before they become outages. This webcast series is taught by subject matter experts from IBM Software Group who will share the most significant updates to the OMEGAMON product suite"
I'm just giving you the dates and titles of the sessions. Take a look over here for registration and more details on the content.
2 February 2012, 11:00 am EST, 5:00 pm Brussels Time Get More From Your Mainframe with Proactive End-to-End Monitoring Speaker: Susan Rice, Tivoli Product Manager
9 February 2012, 11:00 am EST, 5:00 pm Brussels Time Reduce Costs Based on Faster Problem Solving with Redesigned OMEGAMON Speaker: Richard Burford, Tivoli OMEGAMON Development
16 February 2012, 11:00 am EST, 5:00 pm Brussels Time Tuning Tips Lower System z Costs with OMEGAMON Monitoring Speaker: Don Zeunert, OMEGAMON XE Performance and Tuning
23 February 2012, 11:00 am EST, 5:00 pm Brussels Time Good News for Maintenance Windows: Install and Configure OMEGAMON Faster Speaker: Cecile Day, Tivoli Monitoring z/OS Installation and Configuration Developer
8 March 2012, 11:00 am EST, 5:00 pm Brussels Time See Into the Heart of CICS and Resolve Problems Faster Across LPAR Boundaries Speaker: Mike Goodman, Software Product Manager, Tivoli Systems Management
15 March 2012, 11:00 am EST, 5:00 pm Brussels Time The Critical Role of Service Management in Moving to Cloud on System z Speaker: Mike Baskey, Integration Architect and Chief Architect Management Standards
22 March 2012, 11:00 am EST, 5:00 pm Brussels Time Shave Time Off Application and Service Delivery with Enhanced Event Management Speaker: James Moore, Product Manager, Tivoli Application Dependency Discovery Manager
This is an initiative from the IBM Systems Magazine. As I always say, just check them out !
Hogeschool Gent (HoGent) is one of the Belgian schools participating in the Academic Initiative program for System z. Teachers and students of the IT Department attended the latest GSE z/OS Working Group Meeting in December 2011 at our RealDolmen Headquarters (Presentations are here). Of course I was very curious to find out what their impressions were about such an event. A couple of them wrote down their experiences and their teacher, Angeline van Achter, was so kind to share them with me, and . . . allowed me to share them with you too.
Overall, the impressions are very positive. In general, the students had no real problems to follow the sessions. I thought, that e.g. 'Batch Modernization' would be a tough one but it was pretty understandable to them. I can only conclude from this that the course is quite thorough and really prepares them well for their future life in mainframe. And if you see through a presentation as not much more than a sales talk (which it actually was), you must be on the right track of becoming a real system engineer ;-)
Students also found a confirmation that mainframe is not dead at all and that it's adapting to modern life computing and even evolving more than they thought. But still more important to them were the contacts with this small but, as they stated, very open community, willing to share information and knowledge. People all know each other and where this was a bit intimidating at first, this really changed after a few coffee breaks, since many people engaged in conversations with them. Of course, they also were curious to find out why young people are choosing a mainframe career.
For most of them, the second half of the course is a practical training in a company. So they had a chance to meet their supervisors up front. They also found it interesting to meet other young people who did the same trajectory before them and who could already share their first year(s) of experience with them.
So, content and perhaps even more important, contacts with the people in the field, gave these students a good feeling about this event which bears repetition. So, I would say to them, feel free to come back and I'd also like to invite the other schools to join us at a future session . . .
The articles I particulary liked (it's a personal choice, I know) were the ones by Simon Cooper (William Data Systems) on Network Management (ZEN), by Jeff Westerhaver (Serena) on application release management and by Tim Full (Software Diversified Services) on Secure FTP. I know (and Simon Cooper even points it out) that they are of course partial advertisements for their products. But still, I find they nevertheless contain quite some useful, informative content.
And if you don't bother about the annual survey, let me just give you two small fragments to tease you into reading it anyway. The first is a comment on the growth of cost of mainframe vs. the cost of distributed systems.
"Again this year, a substantial number of respondents felt that their Unix, Linux, and Windows user-support costs were increasing faster than the mainframe for an equivalent amount of capacity or support. Similarly, and particularly marked for Windows environments, their anticipated acquisition and maintenance costs were increasing faster than for the mainframe".
Read it in its context of course, because there's more about this in the text. And here's the second fragment about the customer comments.
"No-one is ever happy about costs, but, usually, as long as they stay within the expected range, nobody gets too exercised about it. That doesn’t seem to have been the case this year, though".
You can read all the comments in the Yearbook itself, of course.
As it's the beginning of a new year, I thought this might be a good time to put some dates in your agendas. Which, by the way, reminds me of that hilarious video that circulated some time ago : "My Blackberry is not working". Don't tell me you missed that one ? Then I might just as well include it here. The date passes around 1'30''.
But now, let's get serious and pass on to the real dates. Oh well, you now what I mean.
Events in Belgium
April 26-27, 2012 - GSE Belgium Luxemburg Regional Conference 2012 Thermae Palace Oostende Information GSE Belgium z/OS Working Group Meeting dates RealDolmen Huizingen
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Information September 18-20, 2012 - Total Solutions Event for System z 2012 IBM Forum Brussels More information follows later.
IBM Webcasts
January 24 at 4 pm GMT, 5 pm Brussels DB2 10 for z/OS – Justify your upgrade using the IBM Business Value Assessment Estimator Tool "Join us for this (...) webcast and learn more about IBM DB2 10 for z/OS and a tool that can help you make a case for upgrading to it. DB2 10 is the latest release of the IBM flagship database. Its enhancements are designed to reduce operational costs, improve scalability and enhance productivity. This webcast will include an overview of the most significant potential financial savings offered by DB2 10. Then we’ll explore how these can be estimated using the IBM-internal DB2 10 Business Value Assessment Estimator Tool". Information and registration
January 26 at 4 pm GMT, 5 pm Brussels Getting started with highly scalable clouds across your enterprise "Topics include : Lowering cost of service delivery through automation and reduced skill requirements,Deploying IT services faste, Deploying IT services faster, Standardizing delivery for deployment and management of IT services, Enabling users to request, deploy, monitor and manage cloud computing services". Information and registration January 31 at 4 pm GMT, 5 pm Brussels Migrating to DB2 10? Get maximum CPU benefit with minimum impact "Topics include : Identifying SQL statements that need attention before they impact performance in your DB2 10 environment, Estimating the cost of your SQL between different versions of DB2, Running “what if?” scenarios to determine optimum performance settings, including updating catalog statistics and creating new indexes, Migrating and comparing access path statistics in DB2 V8 or DB2 9 to DB2 10 environment". Focus on the use of DB2 Tools. Information and registration February 14 at 4 pm GMT, 5 pm Brussels Coordinated Disaster Recovery for IMS and DB2 "In this teleconference we’ll descrbe storage-aware data management tools for IMS and DB2 that integrate storage-based fast-replication facilities with IMS and DB2 systems to provide fast and non-disruptive IMS and DB2 disaster recovery solutions". Information and registration February 15 at 4 pm GMT, 5 pm Brussels Boost performance, productivity and cost savings with IBM’s latest compilers for zEnterprise "(...) learn how IBM’s latest compilers, middleware and tools can help you stay on the technology curve. In this webcast, Ray (Jones) and Kevin (Stoodley) will discuss best practices and approaches to plan and execute a successful compiler migration, alongside CICS, IMSand DB2 upgrades. They will also go over IBM’s strategy for compilers and tools on System z to help you better plan your overall development and upgrade efforts". Information and registration
February 21 and February 22 at 4 pm GMT, 5 pm Brussels IBM DB2 10 Migration Planning and Very Early Experiences – PART 1 & PART 2 "To help facilitate your migration, John Campbell will provide planning information about migrating to DB2 10 for z/OS from either DB2 9 or DB2 Version 8. This webcast will be a two part series on February 21st and 22 nd.. Join us for this webcast series which will share surprises, pitfalls and lessons learned; provide hints and tips; discuss enabling fast start; introduce and discuss some further enhancements; and share the latest news about migrations". Information and registration
Other events
March 13-15, 2012 - Total Solutions Event for System z 2012 IBM Forum Amsterdam Information and registration
May 14-18, 2012 - IDUG North America DB2 Tech Conference Denver, Colorado, USA Information and registration
November 4-9, 2012 - IDUG EMEA DB2 Tech Conference Berlin Germany Information and registration
DB2Night Shows
The third DB2Night Season is already on its way. You can already find the replay of the first z/OS session from Klaas Brant on 'Ten reasons to move to DB2 10 in 2012' over here.
For the moment there's just on other DB2 for z/OS session planned on January 23, 2012 by Cristian Molero on 'Data skew and big volumes in the real world data'. Details and registration over here. Normally all events are scheduled at 11 am EST, 5 pm Brussels.As I always say, just check them out !
If you want to check upcoming DB2Night shows, then have a look from time to time over here. There's an RSS feed available as well and they also have a blog now.
When I started this blog, disk storage was a very simple matter. I only considered the storage that was able to connect to the mainframe. I don’t think we even talked much about disk at the time. As you might remember one long time ago post on this blog (Mainframe Talk), real mainframers talk about DASD (dazz-dee) and not about disk. So the list of disk storage was very limited : DS8000 and that's about it.
But things have changed over the years. And our perspective of things has also changed. Mainframe has become more and more open. Look e.g. at the successes of Linux on System z. That’s one passage to, let’s call it, open storage. And in 2010 we had of course the introduction of the zBX, first allowing Power Blades and now Intel Blades with Linux and Windows too. These also need their proper storage. So that's an even clearer passage to open storage. But even our traditional operating systems have found their way to these new storage products.
So, the last couple of years, the scope of storage devices on my radar has broadened. There's e.g. ProtecTier, which was first an open systems solution only, until it introduced the TS7680 ProtecTier Gateway that connected ProtecTier to the mainframe. Next to that we had SVC. XIV followed in line. First it had to be connected via SVC but the "IBM XIV Storage System can now be attached through supported FC switches to z/VM for system use (e.g., paging, spooling, IPL, etc.)". (< IBM VM pages). Yes, you can IPL z/VM from an XIV. And "XIV Storage can also be accessed by z/VM guests through guest-attached FCP subchannels". But it hasn't stopped there. Look e.g. at the announcement of z/VSE 5.1 :
"IBM Storwize V7000 Midrange Disk System : Storwize V7000 is a midrange disk offering built on IBM System SAN Volume Controller (SVC) technology. It can now be attached through Fibre Channel (FC) switches to z/VSE using Fibre Channel Protocol (FCP) subchannels. z/VSE supports Storwize V7000 (SCSI) devices for system use (IPLable z/VSE system devices) and as data devices. z/VSE is designed to support Storwize V7000 devices in both an LPAR and a z/VM guest environment. z/VSE Storwize V7000 support is available with z/VSE V4.2 and later.
Or take a look at the Supported Hardware list for IBM StorWize V7000 :
"z/VM 5.3.0 and later supports Emulated Device (EDEVICE) attachment for all EDEVICE use including paging, spooling, minidisks, and system IPL. z/VM 5.3.0 and later also supports guest attachment via dedicated FCP subchannels"
What's my point ? Well, I can no longer pretend to write about high-end storage attached to mainframe. There's a whole range of midrange storage devices that can also connect to this very mainframe and zBX. And with that I'm strangely enough back at my starting point that I only consider storage connected to the mainframe. Only, due to the changing evolution, it's no longer a simple matter because there's much more now. And as I already pointed out before, you have to be aware of what's around, because you will be confronted with situations where people ask you why you choose a DS8800 for your Linux on z environment, rather than e.g. an XIV or a StorWize. And perhaps they're right.
So I intend to also write more about these products in the future. A CIO told me some time ago that because of limited resources people are focused on doing their jobs and don't have any time left to take a step back and have a look at what's new in order to see the greater picture. So, information pointing them in the right direction was always welcome. Well, let me try and help you a bit with this.
And here's my first bit of information. IBM announced today that 'IBM Storwize V7000 introduces new 900 GB SAS drives (ZG12-0038)'. If you're still a completely isolated mainframer or you have been living on another planet the last year and you wonder what StorWize is, I'll come back to that in a later post with a brief introduction to it.
And you want to know why ? Or you want to explain to others why ?
Then here's a nice short eWeek presentation that does it for you. Apparantly it comes from Greg Lotko, vice president and business line executive for System z.
I'm an employee at NV Realdolmen (Belgian IBM Premier Business Partner). I'm mainly involved in all pre-sales activities and systems architecture for IBM z Systems and IBM Storage.
Opinions expressed here are my own.
