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Transcript of 2166 Quayle
Replacing VAXen with VAX Emulation
Stanley F. Quayle, P.E.President
Quayle Consulting Inc.
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 204/12/23
Session goals
Whether VAX emulation makes sense
How to choose the best emulator and platform
How to get started
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 304/12/23
What about porting?
Do you have the design documentation?
Do you have all the source code?– What about DECmigrate (OMSVA)?– VAX SCAN, Dibol, LISP, OPS5, RPG
Operating system dependency?
Hardware dependency?
Target platform– Can code really be reused?– What about stability?
Can you validate the result?
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 404/12/23
Wine, FreeVMS, and ACCELR8
RealHardware
CHARN-VAX
Host OS
Application
Layered softwareSystem libraries
Operating System
Application
System libraryinterface routines
Host OS
Host CPU(s)
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 504/12/23
How hardware emulation works
RealHardware
CHARN-VAX
Host OS CPU(s)
Application
Layered softwareSystem libraries
Operating System
Application
Layered softwareSystem libraries
Operating System
Host OS
Emulator
Host CPU(s)
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 604/12/23
The emulator task
CPUEmulation
Disk controller
disk
virtual disk
virtual disk
tape image
Tape controller
Clock Serial ports
SystemConsole
SerialDevices
EthernetMemory
External SCSITape & Disk
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 704/12/23
CPU emulation
Retrieve state information from internal registers
Fetch the instruction from memory
Decode the operation to be performed
Retrieve inputs from memory as needed
Perform the operation
Write results to memory as needed
Update internal registers with the new state
“TSTL XYZ”
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 804/12/23
The emulator task
CPU
Emulation
Disk controller
disk
virtual disk
virtual disk
tape image
Tape controller
Clock Serial ports
SystemConsole
SerialDevices
EthernetMemory
External SCSITape & Disk
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 904/12/23
Cost versus benefit
The high cost of downtime– Customer impact– “Above the Fold” on Wall Street Journal– Data Loss
Saving money on maintenance– It’s cheap to replace a PC– Limited support vendor choices– Hardware support for some VAXen is unavailable
Improved performance
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1004/12/23
Available emulators
Open-Source– SIMH– TS-10– Others
Freeware– PicoVAX
Commercial Product– CHARON-VAX
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1104/12/23
Open source or commercial?
Open Source– Free: Can be downloaded from the Internet, including
source code– User-extensible
CHARON-VAX– Certified by HP as being a true emulation of a VAX– Supports Q-bus hardware– Dynamic Instruction Translation– Training, installation, configuration, migration, and support
are available
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1204/12/23
Evaluating the current system
CPU usage, memory size, number of users/processes
Network– Protocols: DECnet, IP, LAT, cluster, IEEE 802– DECwindows– Connections
Disk drives: size, type, shadowing
Tape drives
Major Items to Check
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1304/12/23
Evaluating the current system
VMS version
Layered product versions
Application
Major Items to Check
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1404/12/23
Evaluating the current system
Serial lines– Terminal servers– VAX serial lines
• Console• Modem
– H3104, DHV-11, etc
Licenses– Network MAC address as “key”– CPU characteristics as “key”– VMS license requirements vs. emulated system– “It works” vs. “Is it legal”
Risky areas
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1504/12/23
Evaluating the current system
Operating systems– NetBSD– Digital Unix– AT&T System V– VAXELN
Special hardware– Bus: CI, M-bus, SBI, Turbochannel, UNIBUS, VAXBI,
XMI – Disk interface: MASSBUS, SDI, ST-506 (MFM)– Some hope for: DSSI, Q-bus
There Be Dragons Here
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1604/12/23
Special hardware: Q-bus
PCI bus Q-bus rackCable
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1704/12/23
Choosing the host platform
Alpha OpenVMS– Unquestionable stability
Linux– Inexpensive
Windows– Inexpensive– Q-bus support– “Industry standard”
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1804/12/23
Sizing the host platform
Server-class– As fast as possible
Memory– More with DIT
Processor– Dual processors
Disk– SCSI
Network– Separate network adapter
“You can’t have too much”
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 1904/12/23
Performance
Sources: HP and Software Resources International S.A.
05
101520253035404550
CPU model - VUPs (VAX Unitof Performance)
MicroVAX II
VAX 11/780
VAX 3100 model 80
VAX 4000, model 500A
VAX 4000, model 700A
VAX 7000, model 710
CHARON-VAX/XM on dual AMD 1.6 GHz
CHARON-VAX/Industrial on 2GHz Intel
CHARON-VAX/AXP on 1 GHz Alpha EV68
CHARON-VAX/XM Plus on 1.4 GHz dual CPU Intel
CHARON-VAX/XM Plus on dual AMD MP2100+
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 2004/12/23
Disk migration
Direct disk access– SCSI? Just plug it in!
Cluster
Network– COPY or COPY/FTP– BACKUP– MKIMAGE– Poor Man disk driver
Tape
Serial
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 2104/12/23
Backup strategies
Tape
Network– TCP/IP to host– NFS
Host– Disk images offline– Disk images online– SCSI disks
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 2204/12/23
Write a plan
Disk migration
Backup scheme
Necessary updates
Test– Connectivity– Application– Limited user access
Going live
Backout plan
HP World 2003 Solutions and Technology Conference & Expo page 2304/12/23
Post-migration
Hardware support
Software support
System administration support
New versions
And they lived happily ever after…
Interex, Encompass and HP bring you a powerful new HP World.