Gary (or Mike?) wrote:...

> First, some correction in terms: '3rd party' as applied to HP3000 services 
...

Absolutely right ... if a bit overly kind to HP.  Even when HP was selling software support,
of all the "products" on a typical HP 3000, they were responsible 
only for a few (albeit an important one called MPE/iX), which made them "third parties"
when trying to help users of a typical HP 3000.

Hmm ... by that measure, Allegro's the only "first party" support company around!
Every HP 3000 is running some of our software.  Our software (and design) is in MPE, IMAGE, 
and nearly all major non-HP applications ... and that doesn't count our freeware!


> IMHO, the top 3 criteria for _Software Support_ service for HP3000 
> systems should be:
> 
> 1. HPSUSAN reliant applications. Many HP3000 non HP software products 

"HPSUSAN reliant applications" isn't a criterion for support ... 
the *ability to migrate them* to an alternate HP 3000 would be a good criterion.

We can do that in a variety of ways.  
We've worked with HP in the past to do such things.


> 2. New Critical Patches. Does your provider have a license for the 
> MPE/iX source code? Will they be investigating and repairing any 
>critical OS, security, or network problems? WITHOUT PATCHES TO ANY NEW 
>PROBLEMS YOU COULD FIND ONE DAY THAT YOU ARE DEAD IN THE WATER. This 

Quite right!

Allegro may be the only company that ever developed a (permanent) MPE/iX kernel
patch outside of HP.  

When we found the serious problems with Large Files, and alerted HP, 
we diagnosed them and produced a patch for HPSORT's use.

We also have a patch to reduce the "out of B-Tree entries" problem, allowing
one user to go from 1,500 users to over 2,000 logged on users.

In addition to patching the operating system, a support company needs to
be able to patch applications and/or libraries.  The most fun
patch we've done recently was for a nearly 30-year old BASIC program
running on a Micro3000!


> 3. Crash Dump and boot failure assistance. Do they have experts at 
> analyzing crash dumps, machine checks, and PIMINFO data. Do they have 
> custom DEBUG SAT and DAT macros? THE WORST CASE HP3000_ SOFTWARE_ 

Or a tougher criterion: have they *taught internals of MPE/iX* to HP engineers?
Only Allegro's done that!

Back to just analyzing dumps ... Mike's correct, the ability to 
analyze dumps is critical.  And, as HP 3000 users we're really lucky 
... MPE/iX's system dump facility is *VERY MUCH* better than on 
other platforms (particularly HP-UX).
(Kudos to HP's Pat Murphy and Chris Mayo!)


> SCENARIOS ARE THE INSTANCES WHERE MPE/iX FAILS TO BOOT EVEN AFTER THE 
> SYSTEM HAS BEEN 
[nearly] 
> 100% REPLACED. A simple example of this boot failure is 
...

I'd add a criterion based on a much more common scenario: 

   The ability to retrieve files from damaged disk drives, 
   damaged/incomplete volume sets, and damaged/incomplete STORE backups.

Allegro wrote the first defragmenter for MPE/iX, was instrumental in getting HP 
to support large disk drives, and we have tools that can extract files from 
damaged disks, volume sets, and STORE tapes (both classic and NM STORE).

I'd probably add a criterion on advocacy/sharing: a support vendor
should be known to be an active supporter of the HP 3000 and its users.

Allegro also believes in sharing knowledge ... we've been
active in Interex Special Interest Groups (four SIG chairs, one vice chair,
one outstanding SIG award), the Contributed Software Library (three 
outstanding contributor awards), and active question answerers on 
3000-L / comp.sys.hp.mpe since the beginning.


> The HP3000 is truly a remarkable server that continues to deliver 
> mission critical highly customized applications. 

Agreed!  I like to amaze HP-UX users when I tell them about the size of some
of our clients ... particularly the system with over 2,000 users logged on!
Couple that with longevity (e.g., the Micro3000 still running today for production work),
and we realize why we love this computer!

Despite being the premier software support provider for the HP 3000,
we *enjoy* working with the HP 3000 and hope our efforts help it to never die!
When you look for HP 3000 software vendors (whether it's DBMS tools or support vendors),
just rely on the letter "A"!

Stan Sieler
Executive Vice President
Allegro Consultants, Inc.
...on the web for two decades!

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