IBM should have shot its bolt for the rest of the year with its System/390 announcements on September 5, but there is yet more to come today in the open systems networking area, Hesh Wiener reports from New York. Principal thrust of the announcement is expected to be the extension of the Open Systems Interconnection seven-layer model to all Systems Application Architecture machines with the launch of OSI/CS communications support programs for OS/400 and OS/2, and Open Network Distribution System X400 electronic mail for MVS and VM, usable from DisOSS, Profs and OfficeVision. As with most of IBM’s Open Systems Interconnection announcements, delivery of the key components is expected to be anything up to a year away. IBM dragged its heels as long as possible before enabling Open Systems Interconnection to co-exist with SNA, but European government demand forced its hand.
