isham research

With the gap in IBM's current mainframe product line below 80 MIPS and the imminent obsolescence of many of its older system, the market for System/390 and zSeries emulation on Intel processors is growing very rapidly. The vendors maintain reference lists of their own, but it's very interesting that so many users are prepared to sing the praises of a solution in public, as happened in early 2003.

Fundamental's global business partners are Cornerstone Systems Inc and T3 Technologies

The venue was the Flex-ES mailing list at the University of Georgia. First the question that was posed to the list:

Date:Tue, 28 Jan 2003 15:53:41 -0500
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[Contact information deleted]
Subject:Who's using flex-es?

I've been asked to evaluate flex-es for my organization. One factoid I haven't been able to find is a profile of the market for flex-es. Any information along these line would be appreciated. Particulars: WHO is using flex-es? What applications are being supported? What operating systems are being supported by flex-es servers?

Anyone summary information of this type would be appreciated, as would any empirical feedback from flex-es users. As long as we're on the subject, discussion of tape and/or other backup media in the absence of ESCON is welcome also. Is there any way 3490/rmm can be made to work?

TIA

Now the responses. Contact information has been removed to thwart the addressing-harvesting spammers who infest the Internet these days (may they rot in Hell) but is freely available to anyone who signs onto the mailing list with a valid email address. The 'nomail' option will suppress the mailing list emails while permitting browsing of the list at any time.

Date:Tue, 28 Jan 2003 15:02:07 -0600
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[contact information deleted]
Subject:Re: Who's using flex-es?

We are a VM/VSE shop that has been running on an 18 MIP
Flex-ES solution from T3 Technologies since August, 2001.
Most of your questions can be answered by reading the success
stories at:

http://www.t3t.com/T3_S390_Success_Stories.htm

If you have specific questions, feel free to post them here or
contact me directly. The technology is incredible and works
as advertised. Count me as a happy camper.

Date:Tue, 28 Jan 2003 15:20:02 -0600
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[contact information deleted]
Subject:Re: Who's using flex-es?

I am running VM and VSE. There are several FLEX-ES machines in the OKC area
if you want to see one. There are probably some in Tulsa also, but I don't
know where they are.

Date:Tue, 28 Jan 2003 16:22:44 -0500
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[contact information deleted]
Subject:Re: Who's using flex-es?

Bill,

We're a small development shop with two flex-es systems. One is
running an OS/390 2.10 (I know it's old, just haven't had time to
upgrade to z/OS yet) with all the normal ADCD stuff (TSO, TCP/IP,
SDSF, etc. etc.), multiple CICS regions, DB2, IDMS, Compuware tools,
CA tools, etc., raid-5 dasd, no escon channels, channel attached IBM
3490's and DLT tapes. Flex-es supports all this for a 15-20 concurrent
TSO user population without working up a sweat. Excellent response
time I might add. The second system has VM 2.4 (moving to 4.3 asap)
which runs a VSE 2.6 image. Considerably less volume on that system,
but no issues there either. Neither system has "production" work, all
software development.

As for rmm, we use CA/TLMS but can't imagine why rmm would have a
problem. We use DFHSM daily incremental backups to 3490 and
full-volume dumps to DLT weekly. Had an initial problem of sorting out
esoteric names for 3490 carts and DLT for backups, but that had
nothing to do with Flex-es. Backup solution works fine now.

Support from FSI (Fundamental Software Inc.) is great. Upgrades to
their product are easy even for a unix dummy like me.

Bottom line is for us, the flex-es environment is a perfect fit.
Affordable price tag, down-sized Intel based hardware, excellent
performance, great vendor support. What more could you ask for?

Feel free to contact me offline if you wish.

Date:Tue, 28 Jan 2003 22:37:56 +0100
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[contact information deleted]
Subject:Re: Who's using flex-es?

Hi,

we are using flex (8MIPS) with OS/390 V2R10
for our customers (outsourcing),
there is small companies with small applications
applications was written under MVT, OS/VS1
and successfully migreted to OS/390

very important for us was
that we can buy OS/390 (one time charge)
not pay mounthly licence

Date:Tue, 28 Jan 2003 16:46:49 -0500
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[contact information deleted]
Subject:Re: Who's using flex-es?

We are a service bureau for the K-12 schools in Berrien and Cass Counties
of Michigan (about 20 districts). We provide business office applications
(payroll, accounts payable, general ledger, purchase orders, etc) and
student management (attendance, grade reporting, scheduling, etc).

We run VSE on an 8 mips Flex system and need more.

For backup we use DLT. It's fast and reliable.

Date:Tue, 28 Jan 2003 17:34:53 -0500
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[contact information deleted]
Subject:Re: Who's using flex-es?

We are running a development FLEX-ES system. This is a desktop/server system and not a notebook system.

System zvm:
z/VM 4.3 in 64-bit mode 'instset(esame)'
Virtual machines: VSE/ESA 2.3, 2.4, 2.5, 2.6 and zLinux
Plus the usual CMS and z/VM service machines (E.g., TCPIP)

System vse:
VSE/ESA 2.6 Native

I even have a 370 mode system where I can IPL VSE/SP 4.2. (Ok, to much play time and I wanted to know if it would work ...) We have VSE/ESA 1.4, 2.1 and 2.2 systems too but no longer use them.

Regards,

Date:Tue, 28 Jan 2003 16:36:38 -0600
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[contact information deleted]
Subject:Re: Who's using flex-es?

We are a small development shop for IMS Database software. The system comes preloaded from the ADCD disks. There is very little system programming to do if you can live with the predefined IO definitions. You then have very little to do with the FLEX-ES handling. Our system stays up for several months without any IPL (not that we need it that way).
The RAID disks are very fast. It makes you forget any native 3380/3390 disks. We do not need tapes. Our backup is done via FTP to CD-RWs (which we have on our PCs). We connect the 3270 emulation to the FLEX-ES solicitor (which is then treated by MVS as local terminal). We run this environment since 9/01 without trouble.

Date:Wed, 29 Jan 2003 11:18:14 -0500
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender: FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[contact information deleted]
Subject:Re: Who's using flex-es?

We're also a development shop running a T3 with FLEX-ES. Currently using zOS 1.3 on it. Also have zVM and VSE, but not using those two yet. Need to upgrade first. Our applications are pretty much all CICS-related, but include DB2 and IMS. SYStem is great, especially response! An IPL is about 4 times faster on the T3 than it was on a P390, and about 3 times faster than on an Integrated Server. Using a 10-cartridge, 3480 autoloader works pretty well; a DLT for backups is just about effortless. A little strange getting used to the configuration requirements, but the learning curve is impressively low. Support has been very good, both from T3 and from Fundamental Software.

Only complaint I have had is that one of the developers said it was too fast! They'd think a batch job had failed with a JCL error because it returned so quickly. You'd get the completion message from a notify before the '***' prompt from submit.

I give it a big thumbs up.
Date:Tue, 4 Feb 2003 18:09:08 -0500
Reply-To:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
Sender:FLEX-ES S/390 Emulator
From:[contact information deleted]
Subject:Re: Who's using flex-es?

Bill,

If you're still receiving inquires, we use Flex-ES for FAA Air Traffic Control test and training facilities. FAA En-Route ATC facilities run their NAS Host flight data processing on IBM-G3 processors. We use and sell OpenUnix based 8 MIP Flex-ES due to availability of 370 Channel interface. We are very interested in the future of ESCON on Flex-ES.

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