Stratus Computer Inc is porting its proprietary VOS operating system to run on a new generation of fault-tolerant systems it will build using Intel Corp IA-64 parts. VOS still accounts for nearly half of Stratus’ business which was $164.1m in its first financial quarter (CI No 3,397). Users of Stratus’ FTX Unix implementation will have a trickier migration however. Stratus says HP-UX – which it has just begun selling on its PA-RISC-based Continuum servers – will be its strategic Unix operating system on IA-64-based Continuums. The next-generation of FTX – which accounts for around 40% of its revenue – will be based upon HP-UX with FTX fault-tolerant features layered on top. Users will have to recompile PA-RISC-based FTX applications to run under the new HP-UX-derived system software on IA-64. Stratus also expects to create some custom implementations for specific telco customers. Stratus is providing some of its fault-tolerant expertise to HP, which has promised to deliver HP-UX systems with a guaranteed 99.999% uptime, or less than five minutes downtime a year.
