IBM Serves Up 'Blue Ice' Packaging for Linux Across eServers

by Timothy Prickett Morgan

Two years ago, when IBM caught the Linux bug real bad, it promised to get the open source Linux operating system running on all of its platforms, to get its core middleware and databases running on it, and use Linux as a kind of common glue holding the disparate eServer family of incompatible products together. With the "Blue Ice" Integrated Platform for eBusiness, which will soon be available on the iSeries, IBM is making good on this promise.

With Blue Ice, IBM has put forth the blueprints, methodologies, and tools that show customers and resellers how to implement Linux on all of its eServers. Blue Ice also gives them installation scripts that can cut down the installation of infrastructure servers by as much as 75 percent.

Blue Ice was rolled out on IBM's xSeries Intel-based server platform in May 2002. This was a natural enough place to start, since X86 servers accounted for then (and still do) the largest number of IBM's Linux server shipments. But being a member of the eServer family means getting all the same goodies, so in January 2003, IBM rolled it out on the zSeries mainframes, which run Linux in logical partitions. Last week, at the LinuxWorld trade show in San Francisco, IBM showed off the Blue Ice offering on its pSeries RISC/Unix servers as well as on the iSeries OS/400 servers. The entry pSeries machines can support Linux as a sole operating system if customers want that, and all modern pSeries boxes based on Power4 or Power4+ processors can support Linux within logical partitions. IBM's iSeries line can support Linux in logical partitions on machines that use the S-Star or I-Star PowerPC processors or the Power4 processors. IBM's BladeCenter servers and its new eServer 325 Opteron-based servers do not fall into these categories, but Blue Ice is for them, too.

But just because an eServer machine supports Linux doesn't mean it is easy for IBM's channel partners to push it. Many of IBM's resellers have deep expertise on Windows, Unix, OS/400, or the MVS family of operating systems, and know very little about Linux. And they don't have time to learn. So IBM is going to make it easier for them.

Blue Ice is a set of presized, prearchitected Linux solutions that tell IBM's eServer resellers what they need to do to get Web, mail, database, firewall and WebSphere middleware servers running on Linux instances on any eServer, and gives them the tools, scripts, and sizing guides to automate such installations. On the iSeries, IBM is implementing Blue Ice starting this week on the two-way Model 810 and six-way Model 825 machines, which are the sweet spot for sales these days. On the pSeries, Blue Ice is being rolled out on the four-way pSeries 630 and eight-way pSeries 650 machines, which are slightly more powerful, but which represent the sweet spot in IBM's pSeries line. The rollout of Blue Ice was contingent on the delivery of versions of IBM's WebSphere application server and DB2 database running on Linux for the IBM's 64-bit Power processors. This software has been available on the xSeries for quite some time.

In addition to rolling out support for the pSeries and iSeries in the Blue Ice program, IBM has also revamped Blue Ice for the mainframe. On the zSeries, Blue Ice supports updated versions of Linux and the z/VM virtual machine operating system that IBM uses to create Linux partitions on its mainframes. IBM is also rolling out support for its WebSphere middleware and DB2 database running in Linux partitions on the zSeries machines. In addition, IBM's "Shark" disk arrays and "T-Rex" zSeries 990 servers can be part of a Blue Ice mainframe setup.

IBM and its partners will start using Blue Ice on the iSeries and pSeries machines beginning September 8. The updated Blue Ice for zSeries machines will be ready August 29.

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