[PLUG] LINUX on IBM AS/400 iSeries boxes

["John Voris" <jvoris@axs2000.net>]

Here is an article I saw in December than kind of interested me.  It 
is just more proof that IBM is indeed supporting and pushing LINUX to 
its current customer base.....

* IBM Offers Trial iSeries Linux Partitions to Developers 
by Timothy Prickett Morgan 

Last May, IBM announced a special trial program for Linux 
developers to play around with its zSeries mainframes running Linux
partitions. At the time, I said that this was a great idea, and that
it would be an even better idea if IBM made similar trial Linux
capacity available to the OS/400 and Linux developer communities so
they could play with Linux on the iSeries and AS/400 server line and
see that it does indeed work. IBM seems to have taken that advice, and
earlier this week it announced the Linux for iSeries Test Drive
program. 

Under the iSeries Linux trial program, any member of IBM's
PartnerWorld for Developers organization can sign up for a guest
account on an IBM iSeries server running Linux partitions to test
code. (JV - It costs nothing to sign up.)  Trial users can choose
between SuSE Linux 7.1 or TurboLinux 6.5 Linux partitions, which are
equipped with 170 MB of disk capacity. The partition remains active
for 14 days. 

All access is remote, and the user ID and password are
supplied to trail users through email from IBM. The remote link to the
iSeries Linux partition includes an ssh connection and secure file
copy, but does not have root or superuser access. 

No additional middleware linking to OS/400 is available, which
limits the usefulness of the trial somewhat. For people who want to
play with Linux on the iSeries for a little bit longer, IBM is
offering a fee-based shared Linux partition with 500 MB of disk
space, which is available for 30 days for $200. For those who want a
dedicated Linux partition and 1 GB of disk, IBM is also making this
option available for 30 days at a cost of $400. 

In January, Red Hat Linux will be supported on the test drive as
well. IBM says that access to the partitions is available on a first
come, first served basis and says further that there are only a
limited number of slots open. It is unclear if IBM is using a mix of
Model 270 and Model 8XX iSeries servers to support the Linux
partitions, and IBM is not saying exactly how much processing power
is available in each Linux partition. 

The economics of the iSeries make it seem very, very likely that IBM
is using uniprocessor Model 270s with four virtual partitions. It
costs about $3,600 per partition to acquire a base uniprocessor Model
270-2432. A 32-way Model 840-2461, which can support 31 Linux
partitions running V5R1, costs nearly $1.5 million, which would make
each Linux partition cost just under $48,000 a piece. This is the
best argument for not using the Model 840 for the Linux for iSeries
Test Drive and for using Model 270s. (However, if IBM has some Model
8XX servers sitting around unsold, these might be the servers behind
the test drive.) 

Back in May, when IBM announced the similar zSeries (Mainframe) test
drive program, IBM chose a 10-way "Freeway" zSeries server as the
platform, rather than a smaller mainframe, because the zSeries server
supports thousands of virtual Linux servers on a single machine. (The
Freeway server scales to 16 processors.) So even at a cost of $3.4
million for the base 10-way zSeries server, the hardware driving each
virtual Linux partition only cost a few grand. The economics are
similar to the iSeries Model 270 line in that regard. However, IBM
offered 30-day, 60-day, and 90-day trials to customers, and did so
for free for even these longer trials. The zSeries Linux trial
program seems aimed at helping companies test their applications on
the zSeries platform, while the iSeries Linux trial program seems
intended to prove to potential iSeries customers that the Linux
operating system itself works on the iSeries platform.


John Voris           mailto:jvoris@axs2000.net
                     http://www.axs2000.net/jvoris

-- IBM Certified Specialist, iSeries --
----- Technical Solutions Designer ----

----- John Voris Consulting, Inc ------
-----  AS/400 & Java Consulting  ------
-----        610 873-0780        ------

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