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Linux On Big Iron
panker writes "eWeek is running an article about a company who converted their IBM mainframe into a Linux email server. "The technical support manager at Winnebago Industries Inc. recently oversaw the deployment of Version 7 of SuSE Linux AG's Linux operating system on an IBM zSeries mainframe to run his company's e-mail server supporting 700 users." "
As someone who oversees an email system with close to a million addresses (in various states of utilization from heavy to "what account?"), I'm kinda interested in how this works out. Has anybody done high-load stresstesting of these yet?
-- F.S.
You can support 700 users on a decent dual desktop system with Linux, what's this guy thinking?
Maybe he's just got an extra mainframe laying around...? You've got to think the support/maintenance on a mainframe would be horrendous compared to buying a new desktop server for this?
MadCow.
I used to have a sig, but I set it free and it never came back.
I love the idea of recycling old high-end machines. I think this could be a big thing in the future... Buying a cheap old mainframe could be cheaper and more reliable then using a PC workstation with server software. Besides it sounds like fun hehe.
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By the way, if you are thinking of taking the RHCE course 300 (fast track for UNIX proficient people), I really enjoyed it.
Click here or here.
It's frequently said that Linux is not stable enough for mainframe systems. It's also frequently said that mainframes have been obsoleted by smaller, more powerful computers.
I am quite relieved to see that Winnebago has challenged the "norms" and put Linux to use on a mainframe. Linux is commonly used for mission-critical software, like the Linux server sitting next to me that handles our company's mail, but to see it doing something mission-critical on a mainframe is quite impressive.
Good work, Winnebago.
IBM has a Virtual Machine OS, that allows you to run multiple OS's on a mainframe. You can run Linux (or even multiple instances of Linux) and still run your legacy apps under OS/390.
[Insert pithy quote here]
Perhaps it's just me, but that makes no sense whatsoever. How do you ship a measure of speed? "Shipping" millions of instructions per second seems to me to be the same as "shipping" miles per hour. It just doesn't make sense. My guess is that the author of the article got some terminology wrong.
Monday is a horrible way to spend 1/7 of your life.
My company is planning to purchase a quad Xeon CPU 4GB RAM server as part of our Exchange 2000 migration for over 1000 users at a fraction of the price. And even with the licensing it's still going to be cheaper than this Linux mainframe.
... This is Offtopic and Flamebait but hopefully it is interesting and informative as well. The 4 should balance to where it is just "okay"
I have been doing work on IBM AS400s of recent, mainly installing ethernet cards into 9402-400s, 9401-150s. Well, I had two machines completely die on me.
I followed the instructions from the repair / maintanance manual on installing and removing hardware to a T. Didnt swap hardware while the machine was hot, I was grounded, etc etc etc.
The two machines have warrentys on all the hardware but no where on the machine does it say working with it, removing the case, etc. voids your warrenty. There are no break me, void warrenty stickers. I was using IBM instructions on 100% IBM hardware doing a standard install -- nothing crazy.
There is no direct evidence linking the two sepereate ethernet cards and cages to the death of two seperate machines. Granted, its a coincidence that should be considered but there is no 100% proof. The fact that two seperate cards were used and the unlikelyness that a bad card would completely kill a system (namely the CPU card) is far fetched. More often do you see AS400s that die when powered down and moved. Its not insane to think that these very old machines were just waiting to have something fuck up on them.
However, the two incompotent IBM techs that came out to the second machine are crying fowl saying the machine itself is not under warrenty. This flys in the face of what Ive been told from the company I do this for and what I have read! Granted, these techs "rarely work on AS400s" and didnt know a single fucking thing other then to look in the manual. Had the office not had the repair manual, they woulda been fucked. They also had to have a tech on the phone the whole god damn time. They did not bring a 7mm socket to get into the system so they had to use my power driver and sockets. They removed and handled the CPU card w/o grounding themselves (one guy pulled it and just handed it to the other guy who was on the phone to read a SN). They left the machine on, w/ error code, overnight with everything just scattered this way and that.
So - now we are just waiting to see what kind of outrageous bill they send to my offices. Re-damn-diculous.
But, thats why I no likey the IBM. Im sure there are going to be replies that say of course I voided the warrenty, tell me that I am a moron and broke it, but I will be 100% honest -- I really don't thing it had anything to do with what I did.
The ultimate network admin tool needs HELP!
You either believe in rational thought or you don't
The need to ensure uptime was one reason Winnebago chose to run Linux on its mainframe. Last year, faced with an expensive upgrade to Exchange 2000, IT managers at the motor home and recreation vehicle manufacturer decided against the move and instead proposed running their e-mail system on Linux on the company's mainframe.
The company had success using Linux for domain name servers, Web serving and file sharing on its IBM S/390 mainframe running the Virtual Machine/Enterprise System Architecture operating system. After Winnebago officials decided they wanted their e-mail system on a reliable system, they chose to upgrade the company's mainframe, adding a second processor using IBM's virtualization technology, zVM, to run several Linux servers on a single mainframe.
They had the frame already, and just moved a new app onto it.
Nope, no sig
well, depending on what kind of services you provide on your e-mail server, you could actually do with some additional horsepower. Things like virus checking, spam filtering, large IMAP homes with automated archiving mechanisms spring to mind. running everything over ssl will add to the load, too i guess.
:))
but generally, i agree with you that you can tend to quite a lot of regular mail users with a decent beige box, although i always prefer not to run services on desktop hardware, tempting as it may be (well, i might change my mind if there's a hot spare standing by...
There are several posts that are wondering if this is overkill, so I'll respond to all. It's not since they already had the hardware and only added a single CPU to their existing mainframe. They got the whole nine yards for $26K, but they don't have to add a new server, license Exchange, hire a Windows admin if they don't already have one and, as the exec said, they don't want to use Intel hardware.
This is the mail server. They still have to support mail CLIENTS at the desk. Just like they would if the mail server was running off a smaller/cheaper workstation. Soo... Either the mainframe does something else (doesn't sound like it) or it's overkill.
Oh shit, it has? I better get on that there Linux thing then! Is it just me, or did that whole article have the "this isn't going to teach me anything new" feel to it?
sic transit gloria mundi
The article says ". Altogether, the company has 128 mainframe mips. It's using between 7 percent and 10 percent of those to run Linux and the e-mail system." They use the other 90 someodd % for other applications...
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I disagree with your disagreement :)
:)
This is serious overkill in the money department (but kudos for the cool factor
My company uses a dual PIII 500 PC (built from scratch) with 1GB RAM running FreeBSD and it supports 6000 email addresses without a hitch.
Total cost: $2,000 Canadian.
DOS is dead, and no one cares...
If there's a Bourne Shell, I'll see you there
...according to this arcitle on IBM's Website.
How does Linux for mainframe connect to mainframe DASD? Do you have device files for 3390-3 and 9's? Do they mask it as SCSI volumes? What about FICON?
-Steve
They do plan on migrating more server type tasks onto that machine and off of standalone servers that have kind of "just grown". They probably don't have any other single tasks that will realize six figure savings from the migration, (and they aren't moving jobs to Linux due some secretive penguin fetish) but they willbe movinng other tasks where they find a good justification. The licensing costs for the mailserver made it their "killer app/service".
You either believe in rational thought or you don't
of course, if I finished reading your reply (or bothered to read the article in the first place :) I'd have noticed the "Doesn't want to use Intel" bit, which makes my argument a tad pointless. oh well
It seems more appropriate now.
DOS is dead, and no one cares...
If there's a Bourne Shell, I'll see you there
What a complete waste. REALLY. I've got an old Dell server running an oldish version of RedHat and Cyrus, serving email for about 1200 users. The machine is far from taxed right now. I would say that the whole setup cost about $4000 when first purchased.
We're replacing that setup with a newish Dell 1U server running a newer version of RedHat and a newer version of Cyrus and making tweaks along the way. With being a school that has promised email accounts for life to alumni, we're planning for growth, but the server still cost around $4000 plus the cost of the RAID for email data store.
--JLockard - "Some mornings, it's just not worth chewing through the leather straps." - Emo Phillips
On their minis (AS/400) they are known as Logical Partitions, which allow the machines to run Linux, Notes servers, and various versions of OS400, and rumored to eventually include other OSes...
Many times easier to support one machine that multiples... and its easier to execute a backup machine for it as well.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
As a hack this would have been nice, but email accounts for only 700 users doesn't need the capabilities of a mainframe. A high-end workstation or a low-end server would have fit this role nicely.
Options exist for about $25,000, that mirror each other so when one server crashes the other machine immediately takes over.
Now for the MS Exchange licenses I don't know the exact cost but $100,000 seems extreme. If you have the support staff to run the linux email server on a mainframe then its probably a viable option. Otherwise, your going to pay more in support in the next few years.
if you are thinking of taking the [fast track] RHCE course I really enjoyed it.
Same here, last June. And when I took my Linux on S/390 training in December, I was in class with people from a major online bill payment company, a major auto insurer, Canada's DOD, and many others. Most had already deployed it and wanted to see what they hadn't figured out for themselves yet.
In August, 2000, I sat next to an IBM'er by coincidence on a flight. He saw I was reading the "Linux for S/390" RedBook. He said I'd become a "demigod" if I get into that. I've already gone thru one consolidation project, starting a second one on Monday in NYC, and have a third one queued up, waiting for me to finish up in NY. It seems we recently gave a customer a server upgrade plan, and they replied, "what, no Linux?" So we're redoing it as a consolidation plan for Linux on S/390.
I'd say Linux on S/390 is picking up steam big time. When I spoke to a friend about this setup, he replied, "Wow, you finally sound like one of those mainframe IBM'ers we used to make fun of!" Of course, he still has no reply to the argument that I can reduce just about any single data center to a couple of 48U racks, and give all the servers five nines.
Intelligent Life on Earth
Ever see SpaceBalls?
But if you read the article you see that they don't want to support more servers, they want to support less, i.e. not buying anymore Intel servers, which are like so many cats. The only downside I see is a single point of failure, the zSeries goes 'poot!' and the staff takes the afternoon off.
But adding that function to an existing piece of hardware does keep support costs down, and as they've noted, pay once to get their mail running on there, as opposed to paying Microsoft for Exchange, year in, year out, well, it looks smarter, doesn't it?
Last, but not least, if they decide to move it off the mainframe later, hey, they should be able to migrate it with little pain, since the OS runs on just about anything.
'Bago 2005: "Tell eWeek we just moved the entire mail server to a hacked TiVo, will you, don't forget to mention it does voice and video email, too."
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Moreover, if you'd read some of the other posts, you'd notice that only a fraction of the system is being used for the email server, and that as a vm. The rest is running other odd apps. Of course, what I'm curious about is if you can fileshare between the mainframe and the vm on the mainframe...
What is your Slash Rating?
Maybe he really wants to waste power *and* has plenty of time trying to make it y2k compliant :}
What is your Slash Rating?
Exchange and Bynari are groupware packages which incorporate email functionalities within their capabilities. Same with PHPGroupWare.
If you just wanted email, you would probably stick with SendMail, Qmail, or the like. However, the shared calendars, todo lists, etc. are important in the groupware environment!
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Well.. ok, but I run a mail server for an ISP with about 1900 email accounts on a dual p3 machine that costs me about $1500.
Sigs are awesome huh?
Just where you can get sun microsystems's view on this (not neccesarily mine.. but perhaps.. but maybe not..)
To quote This Article in computerworld magazine:
Q: Sun has done quite a bit in the way of Linux support, but you really haven't gone the IBM route of marketing Linux-based systems. Why is that?
A: We're the No. 1 Linux appliance server supplier in the world with the Cobalt line [from the acquisition of Cobalt Networks Inc. last year] (see story). We have Linux extensions to Solaris. We just don't think a Linux partition on a mainframe makes a lot of sense. It's kind of like having a trailer park in the back of your estate.
There are a couple of things you're missing.
1) They're running IMAP, not just POP3 (though your system could probably handle 700 IMAP users easily)
2) They're using Insight from Bynari so that all their outlook clients can have their popups.
They may have antivirus software too, and that will really eat CPU and I/O.
http://ipswitch.com/Products/IMail_Server/multi
We've ran 400 users on this, on a K62 300MHZ
On a related note, wouldn't it be a smarter idea to have a cluster of cheap intel boxes? Cheaper at the least. Mainframes are just not my idea of a mail server.
about Linux on big iron. If I took over the entire mainframe with one instance of Linux and running a database app like DB2...what kind of benchmark numbers would it produce?
Considering a DB2 standard license is only 3-4K would it replace the need for an Enterprise license at 20K/cpu? Hummmmm
I never seem to find benchmarks on big iron installs.
TIA
Gizmos Gagets For Ninjas
I think there's a reasonable argument that the usage patterns of the users are an issue.
If you're running a small dialup ISP, then there are going to be few users doing work at once, probably more POP3 than IMAP work, the transfer sizes are likely to be smaller and you aren't going to have large numbers of people cc:ing lists of other users on your server. This would probably not hold true for at least some office mail servers.
Of course, I've never admined a mail server other than the one on my desktop, so I don't have much room to make strong claims.
May we never see th
as many people have said, it looks like they just added another process to an existing mainframe - it still does the other tasks.
But at first glance I still got this weird picture in my head that along with this machine running as a mail server, they got a gigantic cray sitting in the corner for a firewall...
It's not since they already had the hardware and only added a single CPU to their existing mainframe. They got the whole nine yards for $26K, but they don't have to add a new server, license Exchange...
And that's what I think the earlier posters were talking about, and what still hasn't been answered.
It makes sense to spend $26,000 on a zSeries/Linux solution over "spending $150,000 on new hardware and software for a Microsoft Corp. Exchange upgrade."
But why spend to the $26,000 at all if you can support 700 users on a $5,000 semi-high-end traditional Linux x86 email server?
Is it worth the $26k to not have to worry about an extra physical box? The administration is the same, it is just running Linux on a zSeries for $26k vs. running Linux on a x86 SMP for $5k.
What am I missing? Does the $26,000 include a bunch of consulting services that they needed? $26k to have the IBM name and support?
Take an AK-47
Take a magazine of 7.62 mm S ammo, and load.
Walk into computer room.
Aim at [Your Dell, The IBM]. Empty magazine at said server.
Which one still works?
More usefully, which one can you fix up back to full condition, without losing a single email?
That's reliability.
I note that there is quite a few peoples that do not know how things are done on a mainframe. I will TRY and clarify. If you have an average box, say 400 mips, there will be a couple of things happening on this box. Starting of with the OS, OS/390 (or z/OS, VSE, VM). Then a network server VTAM and TCP/IP, a Security server, the some DB's DB2, IMS/DB(or some vendor DB). Then transaction servers CICS or/and IMS serving 4000+ concurrent online users logged on to CICS or IMS. Then you may have oh lets say 500+ programmers, system programmers, DBA, Administrators etc, logged on to the OS "shell" TSO doing programming, compiling, admin, editing and in general doing what these kinda people do, maintaining the monster. The there may be a MQSeries or two running handling client connections and messaging applications and client (pc's, server's *nix's) connections to DB2.. (i'm touching the surface here!) So in general there is a little more happening on a mainframe than on you average wintel box. So in order to separate the production and development, and test environments you can go and partition this one little box up into three logical partitions, called LPAR's in dinosaur speak. Each LPAR can be IPL'd (BOOT in dino speak) without affecting any one of the other LPAR's. So now you have one IBM 2064 400MIP box, 3 LPAR'S and still have room to breathe. Add another LPAR, install VM, Load LINUX/390 and reboot the LINUX LPAR. But still only one Linux server on the box? But we have 250 NT boxes to replace? Not to Worry!! under VM on your brand new LPAR on your mainframe box you can begin to start Linux images at will. So in the end we have 1 Box, 3 OS/390 Mainframe partitions, 1 VM partition with 250 Linux servers running. But now the 400 mips is kinda running out of steam. Call up IBM and they will come and add another cpu. And if you were planning ahead the IBM 2064 should have an idle couple of CPU's under the hood not being used. So you call IBM, they give you the code and you go to the master console and issue a "very cpu online" command and off you go. No IPL required, no downtime. Do that on your duel XEON Intel with Windows... any kind of Windows. I'm not going to go into Parallel Sysplex'ing, syscon's and CICSPlexing etc.
Two points of contention here folks:
1. Linux on big iron
You're telling me that running a 700-user e-mail system on Linux is an example of Linux on big iron? Sure the server is big but I could do the same job on a medium-range Intel workstation. Are we supposed to be impressed by this feat of server load balancing? Whooo.... 700 POP accounts on a single server, it's magic...
Second point:
>the move allowed him to avoid spending $150,000 on new hardware and software for a Microsoft Corp. Exchange upgrade
$150,000 for a 700-user Exchange infrastructure?!?!? Where does he work cause I thought my company liked to throw money into the wood chipper! You could easily support 700 users with full redundancy for $60k. Ever seen FUD working in the opposite direction? You have now.
Actually, Unix is supposed to be architected specifically to allow the trailer trash and the bluebloods to next to each other in perfect harmony. Is this Sun's way of admitting that they don't design their Estates well enough to accomodate a wide variety of occupants?
Although, the key thing that is not being said here is: Next to zOS, Solaris is just a "double-wide".
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Likely scenario is they didn't have any other software running on the mainframe, so instead of turning it into a giant space heater, they thought they'd keep the sucker plugged in to run e-mail.
Damn, it kind of sounds like overkill to use a z-series mainframe to handle a measly 700 e-mail accounts. A 486 should be quite sufficient for that.
Not IBM's term but the users and media's term for Mainframes.
of a winnebago loaded with dat tapes hauling down the highway at 45 mph.