Stephen,
Actually, that is not quite true even in the case of the filer, unless I have not understood some things about how Network Appliance builds their devices. The ethernet, fddi, gigabit, etc network interfaces are not made by NetApp. It does not seem farfetched to expect Network Appliance to use the same model that has led to open sourcing in other areas. If they have chosen to integrate the drivers directly into ONTap instead of calling the drivers as needed, and if they have not adhered to whatever standards exist for those interfaces, then NetApp has self-created a monopoly. It will go the way of all monopolies - competition will force them out of business or into supporting more flexible configurations.
-----Original Message----- From: Stephen C. Losen [mailto:scl@sasha.acc.virginia.edu] Sent: Monday, November 09, 1998 2:53 PM To: Sam Schorr Cc: toasters@magic.metawire.com Subject: Re: Potential user has questions
I think the reasoning here is not quite thorough enough. If I buy a
Compaq
server and then I install a 3-Com ethernet card, I still expect, and get, full support from Compaq. This has been the case in the clone, or Intel world for quite awhile. I know that it is less true the more proprietary you get, but still is essentially the case, even in the IBM mainframe
world
and in the UNIX world. I am now in the middle of an issue between Network Appliance and Microsoft and I would NEVER buy another filer if NetApp
tried
to deflect response to the fact that I use Microsoft products and
therefore
I should debug the Microsoft side first. Whether I like it or not, and whether NetApp likes it or not, multi-vendor environments MUST be
supported
- there is no option.
There is one BIG difference as far as interface cards go. Any driver code is part of ONTap. If ONTap does not have code to support a particular card, there's absolutely no way the card will work in a filer (unless it is a perfect clone of a card that netapp does support). And there is no way for a card vendor to supply you with a "driver" that will work on a netapp filer. They would have to provide you with a custom version of ONTap.
Steve Losen scl@virginia.edu phone: 804-924-0640
University of Virginia ITC Unix Support