Conference cookie::sls

2220.0. "Statement on the future of SLS" by COOKIE::CROSS () Thu Mar 13 1997 19:28

		What is the real future of SLS?

There is a growing concern in the customer base regarding the future 
of SLS. Do customers have to upgrade now? Should they be looking 
elsewhere for a backup solution for OpenVMS? 

No, and No. Here's the real story.

Today, SLS is the OpenVMS backup application of choice in Digital's 
installed base. SLS has achieved that distinction by virtue of its 
longevity and the simple fact that, once configured, it will run 
forever, or until an upgrade is required.

For all its popularity, SLS is nearing the end of its useful life.
With a ten-plus-year old code base it is now close to impossible to
extend the functionality to meet today's backup requirements on the 
newer platforms.

This fact was recognized several years ago. In order to provide the 
ability to expand the backup/restore/archive functionality beyond the 
limits of SLS, development began on the successor product:
Archive/Backup System. Today, ABS has fufilled the promise of 
expandability beyond OpenVMS with the support of NT and Unix client 
backup operations.

Although ABS now offers capabilities beyond SLS, SLS continues to be a
mission-critical application at many sites. We recognize that any 
change to an application as important as backup is not taken lightly. 
Therefore, we will continue to support SLS into the future, although 
we do not plan to make any enhancements to the product beyond 
qualification on OpenVMS V7.0/7.1 and the TL89* tape libraries.

A short note on upgrading from SLS to ABS. 

We do expect a gradual move from SLS to ABS over the next 2 - 3
years. In order to make that move as painless as possible, we offer
several features today and are planning more. 

o SLS and ABS ship together in the same media kit and are enabled by
the same licenses. This allows customers to introduce the use of ABS
for new backup functions, such as NT and Unix clients while continuing
to use SLS for existing OpenVMS backups. The ability to run sls and 
ABS concurrently on the same server is designed to allow SLS
users to become familiar with ABS at their own pace. There is no need
to make major changes all at once. 

o ABS V2.1 also allows file restores to be made from SLS history files. 
Files that were backed up by SLS can now be restored by ABS - again, 
allowing a gradual move from one product to the other.

o SLS and ABS use the same media and device management service. An
upgrade to ABS will require only minor changes to the existing media
and device configurations. 

o Future plans include the ability to translate as much of the SLS
SBK files to the ABS format as possible. 

In summary, while we want our customers to make the move to ABS, we
want them to be able to make the move when they choose and at a pace
they choose. To that end, we are working hard to ensure that ABS is
the product our customers want to use and to make the move to ABS as
easy as possible.