Earlier today John gave fair warning:

> ....  the items I have so far for the SIGMPE ballot.
> ....  Items for which there is a third-party solution or an
> acceptable work-around or which HP has indicated in the
> past will not be worked on, will almost certainly not be
> included, ......

With just my end-user hat on, I urge all voters to "THINK
STRATEGIC" on individual SIG ballots that go up prior to the
pending combined SIB.....  And would like to <plug> and
campaign for votes on a few of the items on John's latest
SIGMPE list (which overall is IMO a very good list):


> 2. Add a disk partition mechanism to MPE/iX that would
> allow a single physical disk to be configured as one or
> more logical drives.

Stan distributed considerable additional detail on this one
earlier.  Especially important for the new A-Class with just
two internal 72 GB drives.  Might facilitate mirroring multiple
user volumes running on same spindles as SYS_VOL (with
some additional enhancements to MirrorDisc/iX, I suppose).
Plus usual comparison:  NT / W2K can do this partitioning
now....


> 11. Allow a way for a network session LDEV to be opened
> by another process.

VERY useful and in some cases required for a number of
debugging scenarios;  where you need to (for example) do
active I/O to a VPLUS screen while at same time doing I/O
to a debugger.  Even for those of us moving beyond VPLUS,
trying to do any kind of *interactive* block mode / graphics /
etc. to the same VT / TELNET session on which you are
trying to run a debugger is likely to work poorly or not at all.

Plus recent discussion of possible other uses was interesting:
Idea of being able to push session into "background" instead
of logging off;  then (maybe) be able to pull it into "foreground"
from a different network VT / TELNET logon....  All sorts of
interesting variations on the theme might be devised...  along
with potential security issues and cautions too, I suppose....
but still...


> 15. Extend Mirrored Disk/iX to work on the System Volume
> Set.

I was encouraged at SIG3000 to hear that HP has progressed
from prior years "no plans" (read that as "*NO PLANS*");  to
at least thinking about it again...  IIRC we first put this on the
SIGMPE ballot during IPROF-96 at the Red Baron...  I.e.:
Iiiiiit's baaaack !! (maybe)....


> 18. Allow "loosely" mounted volume sets. This would allow
> you to mount a volume set from one machine onto another
> without having to create all the account/group information
> on the system volume set.

Another good idea by Stan;  for which considerable additional
detail was presented.  While not claiming to have understood
or thought through all the details, I can see all sorts of useful
new options this would facilitate:  "Poor man's" semi-auto
CPU switch-over with multiple HP e3000s connected to a big
disc array / SAN should become much easier for one;  since
would not have to try to keep directory structures continually
in sync on multiple machines (*real* hard to do without major
continuing effort;  especially on "active" boxes).


> 20. Create a permanent/persistent ALLOW/DISALLOW
> facility.

While not a show-stopper, the current "all or nothing" is a
continuing irritant and management problem;  that under the
pressure of the "real world" leads many sites (including me)
to sometimes adopt expedients that are really not good
practice;  that may end up being forgotten "land mines" to
be stumbled over in the future...


Ken Sletten