Encore Computer Corp is targeting the thorny area of Year 2000 date change testing with the launch of the Infinity SP 2000, a storage system that automatically updates test data with all live transactions posted during the test run. One of the so far little discussed problems associated with the Year 2000 date problem, or the inability to recognize a date of 00 as 2000 that will affect most of the world’s computers (CI No 3,103), is the lack of computer capacity most companies have to enable them to fix the problem, and more importantly to test the fixes. Encore says the SP 2000 has been specifically developed to enable companies to store and maintain mission-critical data at the same time as implementing and testing changes to fix the date problem and make their system Year 2000-compliant. The Infinity SP 2000 has a software add-on that provides a resynchronization facility to enable the test data to be automatically updated with any live transactions taking place during the test run. It maintains two log files during any test, one identifies the live records that have changed, the other the test records.
Resynchronization
At the end of the test the resynchronization routine copies only those live records that have changed, to the test data. Infinity uses Encore’s TASC Transparent Access Storage Computer architecture, which, in conjunction with the company’s DataShare software (CI No 3,040), enables data to be shared across a variety of systems from mainframe, Unix, Windows NT and local network systems. The company says it is because the Infinity is a TASC storage computer that the resynchronization process takes place within the storage system and hence does not use channel bandwidth or cycles. The SP 2000 can be configured to run a simultaneous mix of three RAID Redundant Array of Independent Disks levels, 0, 1 and 5, has 1.35Tb capacity and supports ESCON, parallel, SCSI, local and wide area network communications. Once Year 2000 testing has been completed, the company says the Infinity SP 2000 can be reconfigured as required to fit current storage requirements. For example the test volumes can be reconfigured as open systems data for Unix or personal computer network support, or as shared mainframe/open data. The volumes could also be move to a remote site for remote dual copy. The product is available immediately. The Year 2000 resynchronization software will put about $5,000 on the cost of the standard Infinity system, the company says.
