I.T.-Rex? Reliability, uptime, data integrity—that's the principal reason many CIOs are keeping their big iron dinosaurs alive no matter how many Unix and Windows NT mammals are scurrying about underfoot. Mainframe users have yet to overcome two key obstacles—outrageous software licensing costs and staffing difficulties. But despite these challenges, other businesses might do well to reexamine the potential benefits of having a highly reliable, mature computing platform anchoring their e-commerce systems in the age of Internet availability demands. (Nov. 2000 CIO)

Juggling Diversity The truth is that most IT shops tolerate a variety of server operating systems. The mantra for all of today's server operating systems is "reliability, availability, and serviceability". Why is it that mainframes like IBM's System/390 rarely crash? Why should Windows users be plagued by with the infamous "blue screen of death"? (Nov. 2000 Server/Workstation Expert)

The Real ERP Fast Track: Forget ROI and Go Vanilla! Some ERP buyers are now forgoing up-front ROI analysis, implementing the "vanilla" package, and simply trusting in the software to cure their business ills. And, guess what? It seems to be working! So, how can you make this contrary purchasing and implementation strategy work for you? (Enterprise Systems Journal May 2000)

The IBM System/390 Workload Manager: Business Scalability for Real Workloads. (Workload Manager actively and automatically manages the workload across an entire cluster of systems based on the relative business importance of each type of work. (28 page pdf file Winter Corp 2000)

Study: R/3 users face high costs for upgrades Companies with at least 1,000 users will spend an average of $4.5 million to upgrade a full SAP R/3 system comprising financial, sales, inventory, logistics, and manufacturing applications. Users will have to contend with a "potentially long, complex, messy, and expensive" upgrade process according to a survey conducted by AMR Research. (InfoWorld Apr. 2000)

By the Numbers: Data Center Performance Mainframe and Unix data centers require slightly different priorities. The priority in mainframes is pure efficiency, reducing costs as much as possible. (CIO Mar. 2000)