Unisys sets Unix-to-SNA processor: com device allows direct plugging of servers into IBM-based networks

Electronic News, July 27, 1992 by Gerry Khermouch

Com Device Allows Direct Plugging Of Servers Into IBM-Based Networks

NEW YORK--Unisys Corp. is preparing to roll out a communications processor that essentially allows Unix servers to plug right into the huge installed base of SNA networks organized around IBM mainframes.

The Communications Access Processor (CAP) provides a means of bringing Unix workstations into an enterprise role without the need to install redundant networks or consume expensive mainframe processing resources, Unisys officials said in an interview here last week. The technology, which draws upon Unisys' years of experience in allowing its 2200-series mainframes to connect into SNA environments, is transparent in that it allows the Unix system to appear to the SNA network as just another mainframe, they said.

Several analysts and ISVs who are familiar with the new systems said they should provide a boost for the Blue Bell, Pa., mainframe company, which has enjoyed only mixed success so far in its effort to build a significant Unix business.

"Why fight against all those other folks to sell Unix when you can sell it into SNA where there aren't any other competitors?" said Charles Robins, director of communications research at Boston-based Aberdeen Group. He said several customers and integrators with whom he's discussed the CAP have been very positive about Unisys' approach.

The CAP systems, which should ship in September, will enable Unisys to exploit a market for Unix-SNA integration that it expects to burgeon as MIS managers seek to use the price/performance advantages of Unix systems to run applications that draw upon the data bases and other resources of their installed IBM mainframes.

The CAP represents an evolution from Unisys' DCP family of Distributed Communications Processors that was previously available for the 2200 mainframe series. It initially will be available in two models: the CAP 200, which supports 30 communications lines and is priced at $70,865, and the CAP 250, which supports 180 lines at $94,392. Using custom-built Unisys processors, the system can support all communication functions, SNA sessions and other functions on 4MB of memory.

For the time being at least, Unisys officials said the CAP would have to be used in conjunction with one of Unisys' U6000 Unix servers, which functions as a service processor to handle the data stream conversion from the block mode characteristic of 3270 terminals to the character-mode applications used in Unix. However, Unix machines from any other vendor can be attached to the network to handle the actual application load.

"There's the potential for bigger products down the road as the market requires them," said Russell J. Dobbins, director of technical support.

Unisys officials contend that market is a sizable one. While IBM has promised a solution as part of a broader program to open up its proprietary mainframe architecture, its Advanced Peer-to-Peer Networking scheme is still in its formative stages (EN, Jan. 27 and March 30). With APPN, IBM "seems to have de-stabilized customers' perception of SNA as rock-solid," and that has spelled opportunity for Unisys, said Jon M. Tempas, vice president for networking products marketing at Unisys' U.S. Information Systems unit.

Meanwhile, router vendor Cisco Systems Inc., Menlo Park, Calif., has abandoned an effort to address the problem at the Physical Unit 4, of front-end processor, level using software from Brixton Systems Inc. of Cambridge, Mass. "We're focusing away from Brixton, but that doesn't imply we're not supplying the advanced functionality we said we would," said SNA product manager Michael Zadikian, adding that Cisco will provide further details of its direction this fall.

One firm that could be challenged by the Unisys introduction is AT&T's NCR unit, which for two years has been bringing to market products that support both SNA and TCP/IP over a common network. Jim Harper, product manager for the TCP/IP product set at NCR Comten in St. Paul, Minn., was hesitant to draw any comparisons until he has seen the Unisys system, but agreed that the potential market is a large one.

According to Unisys' Mr. Tempas, the CAP enables any 3270 terminal in an SNA network to access Unix applications, while allowing Unix workstations to tap into the mainframe database. In contrast to bridges, routers and gateways, which often require the writing of custom code and the re-engineering of existing applications, CAP tackles the problem at the higher Physical Unit 4 and 5 levels, Mr. Tempas said. That allows both Unix and SNA communications protocols to run over a single SNA backbone, so that the Unix system appears to the SNA network as another SNA mainframe. Thus, the network itself can manage user sessions independently of the host, he said.

For clients seeking to downsize their applications, CAP "takes the mainframe out of the center of every transaction that comes through, while allowing them to keep their SNA network," said Leonard Lafrance, executive vice president at Century Analysis Inc., Pacheco, Calif. CAI has begun to employ CAP at British Telecom, which he said would be reluctant to scrap an installed base of 200,000 3270 terminals just to accommodate CAI's Unix-based telemarketing applications in various divisions.