Sun Delivers Software Foundation For Datacenter.Com Clustering Initiative

EDP Weekly's IT Monitor, Feb 22, 1999

Latest Phase Of Full Moon Clustering Roadmap Brings Mainframe Reliability To Web Platforms

Sun Microsystems Inc. last week announced an enhanced clustering software solution it says gives Sun workstation users mainframe-class reliability on high-performance Web-enabled platforms. The new Sun Cluster 2.2 software is part of the Sun datacenter.com initiative, which includes a portfolio of software solutions developed to allow businesses to more quickly transition to a networked data center.

"Telcos, banks, retail chains and ERP environments that used to rely on mainframes for high availability and scalability of mission-critical data and services can now use the combination of the Solaris Operating Environment and Sun Cluster 2.2 software to meet their demanding requirements for application availability," says Rich Green, vice president of Sun's Solaris Software unit.

The next step long Sun's "Full Moon" cluster roadmap, the Sun Cluster 2.2 solution provides:

lSupport for Oracle, Sybase, Informix, SAP, Tivoli, Lotus Notes, Netscape, LDAP, NFS, Oracle Parallel Server (OPS), Informix XPS and other high availability applications; lA run anywhere Java-based cluster management utility; lSupport for both Solstice DiskSuite software and Sun StorEdge Volume Manager software; l The ability to cluster servers up to 10 kilometers apart allowing all data and services to remain available in the event of a disaster; lUp to 4-node clustering capabilities delivering increased performance and throughput; lSupport for Ethernet (Gigabit, 10-base-T, 100-Base T), ATM, Token Ring, and FDDI;

lSupport for the Sun Enterprise server family, Netra-t server and Sun StorEdge product lines; and lYear 2000-compliance.

In addition to clustering technology, key software components of the Sun datacenter.com initiative which allow data center resources to be managed more efficiently, include:

lSolaris Resource Manager software enables customers to run multiple applications simultaneously on a single server and dynamically allocate resources within a single domain to respond to peak demands.

lSolaris Bandwidth Manager software provides intelligent network bandwidth allocation to prevent IP congestion and regulate mission-critical IP traffic.

lSun Enterprise SyMON software is for managing Sun systems; Sun announced plans to integrate it with third-party enterprise management products, including CA Unicenter TNG, Tivoli TME and Enlighten's administration tools, as well as application management products from BMC and Halcyon.

lSun StorEdge Volume Manager and Solstice DiskSuite software, for management of large numbers of disks and the data on those disks.

Sun Cluster 2.2 software will be available next month and will support Sun Netra-t and Sun Enterprise servers running Solaris 2.6 or Solaris 7. The base suggested retail price starts at $2,000 per node with data service licenses sold separately. Existing PDB 1.x, HA 1.x, and Sun Cluster 2.0 and 2.1 customers under maintenance contract will automatically receive a free upgrade of the Sun Cluster 2.2 software.