(just in case the email from donna arrived in your email folder with formatting
problems as it did in mine...)

October 16, 2007

PRESS RELEASE

OpenMPE calls upon HP to transition MPE source code to OpenMPE

The following statement is OpenMPE's response to Hewlett-Packard's
recent support extension announcement.

On December 20, 2005, Mike Paivinen of HP posted a message to the MPE
community on behalf of Ross McDonald, MPE/iX R&D Director of
Engineering.  Of particular interest are item numbers 1 and 3 in the
message from Mr. McDonald.

Quoting from Mr. McDonald's December 20, 2005 message:
"1) HP intends to offer basic reactive support services for e3000
systems through at least December, 2008."

"3) When HP no longer offers services that address the basic support
needs of remaining e3000 customers, HP intends to offer to license HP
e3000 MPE/iX source code to one or more third parties -- if partner
interest exists at that time -- to help partners meet the basic support
needs of the remaining e3000 customers and partners."

On September 26, 2007, Craig Fairchild of HP posted another message from
Mr. McDonald publicly announcing that HP has decided to extend support
in a limited fashion, what HP is calling "MPS w/o SE" (Mature Product
Support without Sustaining Engineering), until December 31, 2010.
Support provided by HP in the period between January 1, 2009 and
December 31, 2010 will be on a limited basis without any software
engineering to resolve customer problems. HP will assist customers in
developing workaround solutions with existing patches. For some
equipment, HP will continue to provide hardware support contracts. HP
may discontinue support for some software and services prior to December
31, 2010.

With HP's September 26, 2007 announcement, HP effectively split hardware
support from software support and has left some customers in the
position of requiring engineered software support after January 1, 2009
that will not be available from HP.

In light of these statements, OpenMPE calls upon HP to begin the
transition of MPE source code responsibility to OpenMPE. Then OpenMPE
can, in a timely manner, prepare for and deliver engineered software
support to the members of the MPE community that require it beyond HP's
stated end of engineered software support, December 31, 2008.

A transition period of one year should be sufficient to properly
complete the documentation and transition process of MPE source from HP.
OpenMPE stands ready to provide engineered software support for our
members after HP no longer provides this service as of December 31,
2008.

OpenMPE's Board and the members of the MPE community look forward to
HP's announcement by the start of HP's new fiscal year on November 1,
2007 fulfilling their public commitments to the community, that is -
completing the software review process and the transition of MPE's
source code to interested third parties.

Quoting HP's December 2005 Addendum:
"In the future, when HP no longer provides MPE/iX support, HP intends to
license major portions of MPE/iX source code to qualified providers for
the purpose of helping them support their customers. Providers may be
able to use MPE/iX source code to investigate solutions, develop
work-arounds, and create binary patches to solve customer problems.
Licensing terms will be determined at that time."

The time is now to enable OpenMPE to provide engineered support services
to the community.

The Board of OpenMPE would like to thank those HP employees that have,
since November 2001, worked with OpenMPE as an advocate for the MPE
community.  Together, we have worked to provide various operating system
improvements and fixes.  We were able to reinstate the MPE certification
programs as well as transitioned MPE education responsibility. OpenMPE
looks forward to working with HP to transition MPE source code
engineered support to OpenMPE.


Birket Foster, Chairman
John R. Wolff, Vice-Chair
Donna Hofmeister, Secretary
Paul Edwards, Treasurer
Anne Howard
Chuck Ciesinski
Matthew Perdue
Tracy Johnson
Jennifer Fisher

* To join/leave the list, search archives, change list settings, *
* etc., please visit http://raven.utc.edu/archives/hp3000-l.html *