In network computing, everything old is new again.
What do this summer’s clothing fashions and the current trend in network computing have in common? Both are examples of Peter Allen’s song “Everything Old is New Again.” The song, written for the 1979 musical “All That Jazz,” advises us to “not throw the past away, you may need it again some rainy day.”
During a recent shopping trip with my daughter, I saw racks upon racks of 1960s-era clothes. Bell-bottom jeans, peasant blouses, paisley shirts, wide leather belts, even a double-breasted Nehru jacket lined up to empty my wallet so that my eighth-grade daughter could wear the clothes I wore in eighth grade almost 40 years ago.
But even though they were old, they were still “new.” The fashion designers had cleverly made subtle but noticeable changes that would have rendered my original ’60s attire obsolete. So even if I still had my bell-bottoms, they would not be the right ones for my ’06 fashion-conscious daughter.
In network computing, everything old is new again. Grid computing touts many benefits that sound very familiar to those of us who worked with 1980s mainframe computing. The grid concepts of virtualization, job scheduling and resource allocation may be new to those who entered IT in the age of distributed computing, but not to those who cut their teeth on mainframe operating systems such as IBM MVS or VAX VMS. Granted, some of the specifics of the implementation are different, but the overall concept is nothing new.
Even the physical component of grid computing – multiple computers connected by software to form a computing grid that shares disparate resources – is familiar to those of us who created VAX clusters in the 1980s and 1990s. Again, the specific implementation may be different, but the idea is really not new. Yes, just as my 1960s wardrobe has enough differences to render it out of style with the new retro fashions, so too there are enough differences in grid computing to render the mainframe obsolete. But when all is said and done, the concept is not new. Bell-bottoms are bell-bottoms, and virtualization is virtualization.
A benefit to all of this may be in the IT workforce. During the late 1990s, older IT workers were often viewed with some disdain because of their process mentality. Younger workers were viewed as being more energetic, flexible and forward-looking. Then the economy shifted, and IT was no longer the treasure chest of high salaries, so younger workers moved on. Process-focused initiatives such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, IT Infrastructure Library and Control Objectives for Information and Related Technology have made IT undesirable to those who want more flexibility and freedom. Labor projections show there may be a shortage of new IT workers in the next five years.
Which means that the large number of graying, process-oriented, ex-mainframe workers who were once viewed with disdain may find they are now more valuable than they ever imagined. Yes, everything old is new again.
